We’re so excited to be recording this episode of Taking Route Podcast, mainly because it’s been SO LONG since we’ve released a new one. Thanks to all the transition in each of our expat lives, finding the perfect time to record a podcast was simply not going to happen. One could even say we didn’t set realistic expectations – hey, what a great segue into today’s topic! For this segment of “It’s Tea Time Somewhere”, we’re talking “All About Expectations.” Life overseas brings a whole load of expectations – what we put on ourselves, what others put on us, unspoken expectations, and spoken expectations. How do you deal with it all without going crazy? That’s what we’re going to chat about. (We’re also talking about Honda. If you’re listening Honda, we’ll send you an invoice for the ad space we gave you.)

Show Notes

Connect with Alicia

Connect with Denise

Connect with Melissa

Questions discussed during this episode:

What big transitions have we been going through?

Which is harder for Melissa: homeschooling or getting up early in a Baltic winter to take her kids to school?

How have we dealt with expectations since moving overseas?

What does comparison have to do with the expectations we have on our own life?

What do you do when you expected life to be harder (or more sacrificial) than it actually is?

How do we find out what expectations we need to hold onto?

Mentioned in this episode:

Article referenced: Choosing Joy in the Transient Life by Mallory Brooks

Related previous episodes:

Episode 24: Committing to What Matters Most with Gloria Furman

Related articles:

Meet Me in the Middle  (thingswedidntknow.com) 

“We live in the “Middle”; in between two worlds which contrast themselves in a million different ways. To Americans, we are the ones who are always in need and the ones who gave  up so much. To many people in our host country, we are the wealthy; the glowing answers to meeting their needs and who just need to give more.

All of us who live in this “middle” are in a battle which is constantly fluctuating between abundance and need. You learn to cry with those in need and rejoice with those in abundance and find yourself living in both at times. Those of us in the middle carry a pervasive struggle in our hearts. You can’t really articulate it because it’s a kind of schizophrenic leap between guilt and jealousy, gratitude and shame, pitying other and pitying yourself, anger and sorrow, generosity and greed, a bleeding heart and a shocking coldness due to compassion fatigue.”

Expat Friends, We Are on the Same Team by Heather Fallis

“Does my life look like my other expat friends around the globe?  Of course not.  Our challenges here are unique to this place and culture and people and location, even specific to our own family DNA.  When we start trying to measure who has it easier or harder we miss the incredible gift that this community can be to us if we let it. There’s no room for comparison in this life abroad.  In our host country, we have this saying- “same-same but different.”  No matter how different our experiences are, we can find similarities in this crazy life that tie us together and give us a place of commonality and camaraderie that enriches our lives beyond measure.”

A Little Advice to my Pre-Expat Self by Rosalie Duryee

“Cross-cultural living is a lot of mundane, repetitive tasks that are difficult to accomplish. You’ll go to the city three times, and you still won’t have your residency card. Your couch will take two months to arrive. Culture fatigue is real: it’s physically tiring to move. So, rest when you need to so you have the energy to work when you can. You or a member of your family will be sick every other month for a year. Your daily schedule will be dominated by delivering and picking up children from two different schools. There are taxes to pay, paperwork to fill out, communication to keep up with, floors to clean and beds to make.”

An Expat’s Blended Expectations by Denise James

“Seven years living overseas has taught me not to set my heart on temporal things. That a lot of times, expectations lead to disappointments. There are always going to be power outages, usually right before you have a large group of people over. People come and go. Sometimes you are those people. Western food never tastes western until you are halfway through your term. Change is inevitable. Difficulties are unavoidable.   

But I had exuberantly high expectations for this appliance.  This American appliance.  America in my mind is pretty perfect when it comes to figuring out how to run a home with as little elbow grease as possible. America rarely lets me down. I really thought this blender was going to make life easier for me. A fool proof plan for green smoothies. Gone are the days of grinding my meat at the market by a person who never cleans their equipment. Expectations. Dashed.”

The “Suffering” Expat by Alicia Boyce

I know it’s a perk to have a supermarket or a Starbucks in town. I know one care package is better than no care packages at all. I know my broken kitchen appliance is a “first world problem.” And yes, for the love, I know it could always be worse.

But can we please stop belittling our fellow expats’ struggles and momentary hardships? Can we please just give a listening ear and let them vent? Or lean a shoulder over for them to cry-it-out on? And if they are having a moment that’s worth celebrating, don’t be the rain cloud.

Please and thank you.

We’re all on the same side, people. This isn’t a contest. No one should be trying to win the award for “Expat Who Gave Up the Most When Moving Abroad”.

Show credits: 

Hosted by Denise James and Alicia Boyce // produced and edited by Melissa Faraday // content managed by Alicia Boyce.

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