Relocation & Expat Coach

Tip three - don't despair!

Australia ... New Zealand ... South Africa ... Thailand ... Vietnam ... Philippines ... Malaysia ... Mexico ...  Where?  We didn't despair ... we knew that with enough research we would find the ideal place!  It's at times like this that you really need to absolutely clear on what your goal is. 

What is the real reason that you want to make this move? 

What are you trying to achieve by uprooting yourself, your family, your enviroment to go somewhere else?

After nearly five years of looking we still knew that we wanted to change our lifestyle.  We knew that it was the right time for us to do so - or accept that we would continue to live in the 'rut' that we were in.  We knew that this was not the lifestyle for us - we knew that we had to move.

Research shows that people tend to emigrate because they've visited somewhere that looks a lot 'nicer' than where they are today.  Often not enough research is done, to understand where they are now and what they really want.

Emigration does mean 'starting again!'  Unless you are lucky enough to move to a place where you know a lot of people, often you arrive, settle in, start work and it all feels the same as it did before your move but without the social life.

Thinking now about what you truly want:

- What do you like about your current environment?

- What do you like about your current job?

- What do you like about your immediate family? 

- How close are they to you now?

- How often do you get to visit them?

- What do you want to change about your current environment?

- What do you want to keep about your current environment?

- What do you want to change about your job?

- What do you like about your current job that you want to still do?

- How far do you want to be away from your immediate family?

- How often do you want to see them?

- Once you've moved, how will you make friends?

- How will you build your social life?

I understand that as another drizzly summer passes us by in the UK and the sunshine in other countries seems to draw us, it makes our plans for emigration all the more urgent!  How will you feel if you join the statistics of people who move and within a couple/three years have returned back to the place of starting/origin?

- How much research have you truly done to absolutely know that where you are looking to emigrate is the right place for you?

Don't despair ... just know that you will find your dream! 

Take this time to turn your dream into your goal!  Take some time and write in your journal - allow your imagination to run wild!  Everytime you think of a reason to move ... something you are drawn to ... an idea of your 'new' life ... just jot it down.  It's important when you are writing in your journal that you do not try and interpret your thoughts - just write them down as they come.

After a while (it may be days ... weeks ... months) review what you have written down and now, take a clean sheet of paper in your journal and be:
- specific about the type of lifestyle you want.
  specific about the type of environment you want to live in.
  specific about the type of job that you want to be doing.
  specific about the hours that you want to be working.
  specific about how you will find the 'job of your dreams'
  specific about how you will find friends.
  specific about how you will build up your social life.
- how will you measure that the life you are designing meets all the criteria you set initially?
- agreed / action-oriented - you've heard the phrase 'if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail'.  When writing in your journal be absolutely clear about what you have to do to get there.  Now if the time for you to really document your tasks, your actions.
- realistic - looking at what you have now written down, what about your 'new' life is different to the one you've got now?  What makes this new life realistic?  What draws you to want to live it?
- time framed - a lot of the process of emigration is outside our own control; so sometimes putting down a timescale for actually moving is a little difficult.  Now is the time to think about the decisions that you have to take (these are generally based on the tasks and actions you've set yourself above) - what is your timescale for each task/action, and what is your timescale for each decision you need to take?
- exciting - looking at your journal, how do you feel?  It's true that it we cannot live, dream, breathe, be engulfed by our goal, it probably won't be achieved.  If you are not feeling absolutely overwhelmed by excitement, now is the time to ask yourself 'what is the reason or reasons that I'm not sure about emigrating?'  Once you've written these down, if you have to go back to the beginning and reflect in your journal about these answers - this is the time to do it.  Once you know that this is your goal and no longer your dream, then move on!
- recorded - it's important to capture your goal ... write a sentence (preferably not a paragraph) about your emigration goal.  This will allow you to focus - clearly focus.  Now write it on something or put it somewhere where you will see it regularly.

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

OK ... so where next?

One of our desires was to live in a country where the weather was reasonable - we wanted to be able to plan outdoor activites - BBQ, sight seeing, visiting friends, swimming, sailing, to name just a few!

In my business travels I had, had the opportunity to visit San Diego in California a number of times - both in winter and in summer.  My knowledge (very limited), my contacts (reducing over the years), and my research led me to think that this area of the world may just be what we were looking for.

Yes, out came the laptops - on went the research and we came upon Mexico!  At the time of our research, we were watching a number of programs on TV about buying property across the world.  We turned on the TV on evening and the program that evening was about a couple who were looking to buy a property in Mexico - our interest was raised and we watched with note pads at the ready to capture our own thoughts!  What we saw heightened our interest, so we carried on with our research.

After a couple of months we were talking about our move and one of the concerns we now had was how far away we were from everyone!  Family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances - it didn't matter who they were we really were looking to move away.  This didn't feel comfortable, so we stopped our research and decided that we would not visit Mexico at the moment (although we will one day, just to see what we could have moved to).

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

After Thailand ...

So Thailand wasn't to be.  One of the reasons pulling us to looking at Asia was the distance between Australia and Europe - both were reasonably easily accessible.  So we stayed looking in this area of the world.

Vietnam - wow, this seemed to be an interesting area to research.  A friend of mine who had emigrated to Taiwan many years ago (straight from University) had recently moved his family and his business to Vietnam.  Back to our research - so back onto the internet!  Now that we knew some of our pitfalls for moving to Thailand, we were able to restrict our research to reviewing those pitfalls first.  Again we found that purchasing property wasn't a simple process.  The difference here was that the length of the lease was more reasonable - in fact, we believe that the lease would outlive both of us!  So although this wasn't our preferred option to invest our finances, we continued to look. 

Philippines - a friend from my schooldays in Malawi moved to the Philippines which drew our attention to the Philippines.  Although we had not finished our research for Vietnam, we started to look at the Philippines as well.  I contacted them and asked what had drawn then to move there.  Interestingly one of their reasons was very similiar to our own - equal access to our families (Europe and Australia).

Our research continued and for varying reasons (one of the main reasons was the lack of information) we decided against Vietnam.  We felt that if we really had wanted to emigrate there we would have, at some time during our past travels, visited the country.  We hadn't ...

Malaysia - still researching the Philippines, we started to research Malaysia.  We could drive to Australia from Malaysia, and although the drive through Australia would be a long one down to Sydney - we knew that we would both enjoy that travelling.  Although on our trip(s) to Malaysia we had loved the country, we couldn't find an area that we would love to live in.  A lot of the information on the internet indicated that the 'expat' community lived in a number of areas, and we didn't want to live in an 'expat' community.  One of our reasons for emigrating was to participate in the local culture and learn the local language.

Continuing our research into this area of the world, brought up a number of concerns.  We took our research notes with us and went out to a fabulous and interesting area of Kent - Samphire Hoe (it's the newest part of Kent, UK, and is made from 4.9 million cubic metres of chalk marl dug to create the Channel Tunnel)! 

Following our pathway from our decision to the leave the UK, on the 1st January, 2007 (after 4 years of research) we walked and talked!  We sat outside on a beautiful sunny, but very cold, New Years Day at Samphire Hoe and talked through our research notes.

We made the decision that this part of the world wasn't what we were looking for!  It wasn't an easy decision - it did mean that we now had to think about how easy it would be to travel to our immediate families - Australia and the UK.  Family members outside the immediate family also live in Canada, UK, Europe, South Africa, and Zimbabwe - so travelling is still one of the concerns we have where-ever we decide to go!

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

Where next?

Our desire to leave the UK was still high ... so we now had the sit down and think about where we really wanted to go!  Out came the world map and we pinned it on the wall.  So where next?

We looked at what we wanted from life ... we wrote lists ... we jotted ideas down.  We started to think about which countries met our requirements.

We knew someone who had emigrated to Thailand.  A client of mine was in the process of buying a property in Thailand - so we looked.  One of the draws to Thailand for us, was that it was half-way (reasonably) between Europe and Australia.  We still want to be able to visit both families. 

We spent many hours on the internet (a great resource for information, but very time consuming) researching Thailand.  We got out our photographs and our journals from the times we had visited Thailand.

After about a month of independant research, we sat down over a glass of wine and started to discuss what we had found - what our research had uncovered.  We looked at Thailand from all aspects.

We started by reviewing what we wanted from our emigration plans and Thailand seemed to meet most of our requirements - as high as 90%!  We knew that we would need to 'start again' with building our social life and we looked at ways in which we could do this.  We looked at running a business in Thailand and although there are restrictions, we felt that we could meet these.  We looked at purchasing property and this was the one thing that stopped us in our tracks!  Although we fully understood the reasons for the local property ownership legislation, we felt that we could be investing in leasehold property with no asset at the end of a reasonably short leasehold.  We reviewed our own financial situation - selling the house, our investments, pensions, etc. - and knew that we did not want to put ourselves in this type of financial position.

So back to the map ...

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

What type of expat are you?

Over the years I've come across a number of reasons why people 'move abroad'.  What-ever the reason that you've selected to move away from your own country of residence the emigration process is not always a simple one.

What is the reason that you are looking for move away from where you are living now?

1. company move - the company you are working for has requested that you move to another office where the office that they would like you to move to is not in the same country in which you are living and working now.
2. job move - you've seen and applied for a job that is not in the same country in which you are living and working now.
3. career move - to enhance your CV, to take you up another step on your career ladder, you apply for a job that is not in the same country in which you are living or working now.
4. career challenges - to provide you with the opportunity to experience a completely different type of career.  One where you live at home during the week-end, but live in different countries during the week.  For example, airline staff, IT consultants, engineers.
5. moving your own company - opportunities are opening up for you away from where you are now living, so you select to move your own company to a place where you can take advantage of these opportunities.
6. family history - your ancentory is from another part of the world.  For example you will know of South Africans, Australians, New Zealanders who are living in Europe.  They've moved away from their country of birth or citizenship to experience and understand their own personal family history.
7. closer to family - this provides you with the opportunity to follow members of your immediate or distant family who have moved away.
8. retirement - where you 'looking for a better way of life'.  This can be driven by health, wealth, hobbies, interests, a whole variety of reasons.
9. a more holistic way of life - you move to 'get out of the rat race'.  In this you often feel 'stuck in a rut' and are looking for a completely different way of life.
10. back to your roots - your parents emigrated and you've now selected to return to the country of your birth.
11. let me know if there is another reason ...

Emigration is always thought to be where you 'withdraw from the residence in one's native country'; but the challenges, trials, problems encountered by those emigrating can also apply to those moving from one area of their own country to another i.e. Aberdeen to London; New York to San Francisco.

Whatever your reason for moving away from where you are now, ask yourself 'does the grass look greener on the other side'? Looking at the questions in hint and tips two ... what are you moving away from?  What are you looking for?  What's driving you to make this move? 

Looking at all the questions in the hints and tips section of the blog, whatever the reason you have selected to move away from where you are living now - only you will know whether you are making the right of decision.

Want to make a success of your move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

So what were our reasons to want to move to Australia?

After talking to our agents and working through what type of visa we could emigrate with, we sat down with a real feeling that we could do this.  We now knew exactly what we had to do.

Then we looked at the reasons we were selecting to move specifically to Australia.  We looked at what we wanted from our lives, and we looked at the business I have set-up in the UK.  How were we going to make this move?

When we followed the questions in tip two, we understood the real reason we were looking to move to Australia.  This was to allow us to live closer to my parents, and my brother and his family. 

We then asked ourselves if this was the right reason to uproot ourselves from the life we had in the UK to move to Australia.  What impact did this have on what we already had in the UK?  What were we ready to give up?  How easy is it to fly to Australia?

We looked at the work we had to do to fulfil the visa requirements.  We looked closely at the impact it would have on my business and our income stream.  We looked at, within the visa requirements, what changes we had to make to our business plans.  We researched the changes we needed to make to our business plan.  We looked closely at the simplicity of flying to Australia. We looked at our reasons.

We asked ourselves if Australia and our reasons for moving there specifically, met the reasons we wanted to move away from the UK.  We had a long discussion and we made our decision.

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

Decision time!

Knowing the requirements to move to Australia, we looked at New Zealand, we looked at the islands around Australia and New Zealand.  Although this research took months, once we had completed it - we knew we were ready to make our decision.

Now that we knew the reason we were looking at Australia and the countries close by, we had to ask ourselves that very difficult question ... was our reason to move to Australia the right reason?

Was the grass 'just greener on the other side of the world?'  We looked at what we were giving up.  We looked at what we had to start or was it re-start? 

After five years of research, studying, flying, visiting, exhibitions, conferences, we had to admit that the reasons we were looking to move to Australia were not the right reasons.  We could fly to Australia at any time we wanted, but we had to admit that it wasn't our choice to move away from Europe or Africa; and that in selecting Australia we were selecting to follow, we were just following the decisions others had made.

It wasn't a comfortable time or happy time in our lives, but just knowing that we had made this decision helped us move our emigration plans forward.  We still knew that we wanted to move away from where we are living now.  What we didn't know, was where to.

We seemed to have spent our married life travelling - both of us had travelled extensively for work.  When I started by own business it was to find a career that would allow me to 'live from home'.  When I re-trained (as a coach) and changed the focus of my own business to coaching, I suddenly realised that I could work from anywhere.  Our opportunity to work from home and live where we wanted to live, suddenly became a reality.  Living in the UK was fabulous for the time when our careers had us travelling around the world, but we knew that this was not the life we wanted to continue to live ... so now started the fun - where to?

As part of our decision not to move to Australia, we not only had to tell my family, but also knew that we had to get the map out and start looking.  Our reasons for wanting to move were still valid and now very clear.  To start looking for our own destination, we went out and bought a world map that we could hang on the wall of the office.

Want to make a success of your move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91

Tip two - what are you trying to move away from?

Now that you've spent some time working through why you do want to move away from your home country and why you don't, let's explore what you are trying to move away from.

What is it about your current life that you don't like? 

What dreams did you have as a child that you feel you have not fulfilled?

What is it that you do not like about the country you are living in?

What is it about the way you earn your living that you don't like?

What is it about the way you earn you living that you would like to change?

What is it about your immediate environment that you want to change?

What is it about your social life that you would like to change?

What is it about your health and fitness that you would like to change?

Who are you trying to move away from?

Where have you visited that so attracted you, that you feel you now want to move to there?

What is it about that country that has attracted you? 

Before you select to go through the upheaval, what do you need to do to be absolutely sure that the country you've visited, that has attracted you, is able to provide you with all those things you are trying to move away from?

Where in the country that is attacting you, would you be able to find the things that you don't like about the country you are currently living in?

Where could you live that would allow you fulfil the dreams you had as a child?

Where could you live that would allow you to find a way to earn your living, that incorporates the changes you would like to make?

Where could you live that would allow you to make the changes you want to make to your immediate environment?

How will you develop the social life that you would like to enjoy?

Looking at what you don't like about your health and fitness, where could you live that would allow you to make those changes?

What research have you done about your current country that shows that your current country provides you with the things that you are trying to move away from?

Where in your current country could you find the answers to your questions?

What country or countries would you like to research now that you know what you are trying to move away from?  Write these into your journal, with a list of things that you need to research.  Be:
- specific about the country or countries that you want to research.
  specific about the things you need to research in each country.
- how will you measure that your research is a success?
- agreed / action-oriented - you've heard the phrase 'if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail'.  When writing in your journal be clear about your research.
- realistic - looking at the things you are moving away from, what makes your answers a realistic reason to move?  What makes you think that where you are moving to will allow you to move away from these things?
- time framed - what timeframe have put on your move?  Looking at the research that you've still got to do, what makes you believe that you can meet your timeframe?
- exciting - looking back at what you've written down, does it make you feel excited about moving?  Write down what is exciting about the things you have moved away from. 
- recorded - it's important to capture this information in bullet form.  This will allow you to focus - clearly focus.

Want to make a success of your plans to move?  Want to work with someone who will not judge the reasons you want to make your move, who will not guide you down a specific path?  You have this opportunity to work with a qualified and accredited coach who has done it!

Just email Barbara on barbara.dalpra@nyasa.co.uk!

Find Barbara's biog on http://www.internationalcoachinginstitute.org/coach_referral_service/display_detail.php?trf=91