Transcripts
1. Introduction and Overview: Hi, and welcome to my class, where I will share three steps towards
driving in a new place. My name is Alina, and in this class you will
learn something that I wish somebody would have taught me when I first moved abroad. This class will be
especially valuable for you if you're planning to move
abroad in the near future. Or perhaps you have
already moved abroad but still don't quite
feel like home. However, this class is
also for anyone who is thirsting to achieve a
new level in their lives. Maybe you've been
living in your hometown for your entire life and
you're not planning on moving. However, you still feel
like there's that, that spark inside you that could come out and you can
have a more fulfilled life. In this class, you will have
the chance to create a list or a map for your inner
values and needs. So that once you move to
a new place, new country, you don't feel lost and you
can always come back to it and remember what really
is important to you. You will also learn to
ask better questions. And when you ask
better questions, you get better answers. And this really is the
key to our well-being. By taking this class, you ensure that not
only your body, but also your mind
catches up With switching environments
and oftentimes cultures and languages too. It's not an easy
job for your minds, so you have to prepare it. And we'll do it
together in this class. Welcome, and let's get started. There are a few
practicalities that I want to walk you through before we
start the actual class. First of all, you will
need to go through the class description
and download the digital worksheet
made for this class. And then you can
either write on it digitally or in the
best-case printed out. And don't worry if you don't
have access to a printer, you can also just look
at it on your screen and write the answers on
a blank piece of paper. This worksheet will be your best friend
during this course. And throughout the class, there will be several
times when you can share your thoughts or ideas or creations to the other
people attending this class. And please feel free to do this. I really think that by sharing
our answers are insights. We can help so much more people together and really
learn from each other. And I will be curious to
see your answers as well. And perhaps be able to give a more personal feedback
in case you need it.
2. Understanding Your Values and Needs: When moving abroad,
we are usually very good at settling
in physically. Before we even set
foot on the land. We have checked where the
nearest grocery store is, how far is the airport? How is the public transport? Where's the nearest hospital? Work? And you do your morning yoga, et cetera, et cetera. We have a very good
understanding of the map. Maybe we have even created a Google Maps with all
the different locations. But what about our mind? What about our emotions? Our inner world needs even more adjustments when it is suddenly thrown into a
completely new environment. We have never seen before. Perhaps it's just a small shift. But most of the
time when we move, move abroad, we actually
have a cultural shock. We have a new language, we have new people around us. So what we will do in
this first step is create our own inner map so that we can always
come back to it in moments of insecurity and so that we can build
our life around it. However, before we get
started with the map, there are few questions
that I want you to answer, and this is when you can start
looking at your worksheet. The first question you will see is how they feel about moving. See just as when starting a new business and new
project, losing weight, wanting to run a mile, wanting to create an
online course like this, you have to figure out
your starting point. Because without that, you don't know how far
you have to go, you don't know which
things to focus on. So it is essential to
answer this question for yourself and to be as
honest as possible about all the feelings and all the expectations
that you have. Now, if you're like me for you
moving by the bittersweet, there might be the excitement
of the new things to come, but there's also the past
that you're leaving behind, perhaps your family,
perhaps your friends, certainly the environment
that you're used to, you're kind of in a dilemma of how to feel about
moving and what helps us in these moments
is actually this way. The next question is about you and your knowledge that
already is within you. What makes you feel good? You can start with
the smaller things that you really do everyday
and you've really know, well, let's say drinking coffee and move it in the
morning makes you feel good. Or perhaps it is a
walkout sides for 30 min and that can really
change the course of your day. But once you've got these
small things written down, dare to dream bigger. Think about things that, you know, would make you
feel good if you had them. Something that you
have to strive for, write it all down, and don't miss a thing. When you have done this
comes my favorite part. It is in this moment that I
want you to pause the video, stand up and put on your
favorite song and dance to it. Dance, likely the
world depends on it. Just enjoy it. And once you're done with the song and you feel
pumped and energized, sit down or even
better, stay standing. Bring your paper and
your pen and answer, what do you love? Don't care about the sentence
is Magnus, have speedtest. Write down as many
words as you can, as many things as you can, and keep it short and concise. And just write,
write, write, write, write until you feel like you
have nothing more to say. And this question is so
important because it lets you see the world from the perspective of love rather than expectations
or achievements. This question really
is at the core of your values in life, because our values are
not the external things. They are not the, the achievements that we are
so much striving towards. They're actually
what's within us, what do we love? That's what life is about. That's what we feel
grateful about. That's what, that's where
we get our joy from. So really enjoy
writing this question. And as you discover this
loving part of yourself, I want you to move on and
answer the next question, which is, What do you hate? Now, in this question, don't focus on situations
because situations change. Not constant, focused on traits, on emotions, on things. Lead those things, stay there on the paper and also
keep it short. It is important for you to understand what it
is that you hate. This is because if there are recurring traits or emotions or any patterns that you notice in yourself or in
others or in life, you need to identify them. That's where you get started
with building your new life, a new community and environment around you when you
come to the next place. Next question is a follow-up
to the previous question. What would the world
look like in the future? If you only focused on
the things that you hate. Think about that and write
it down and this time, picture it in as
much detail as you can and picture the
worst scenario. What would happen
if you continue to wake up feeling
tired every day? What would happen if you
were stressed every day? What could that lead to? Diseases? Depression, unhealthiness,
what is it? How would the world
look like if you're only focused on the
things that you hate, what would your
world look like in five years if you had continued down
this downward spiral. If you move abroad
and your life look exactly the same
as before moving, That's not what you want, right? Moving abroad is
a new beginning, whether it's a career decision, whether it's for your family, whether it's further adventures. You want something new so
you can keep on doing and seeing the same things that
you've always seen and done. And use this as a momentum
for the next question. Put on another song that
you love and dance to it. Once you've done that,
sit down and write, what do you really want? What do you want in life? What are you passionate about? What is it that makes
your heart scream of joy? What values do you want
to have if you imagine yourself as getting to do all the things that
you love every day, what are your values? What do you dream about? Write down everything and make
this a speed test as well, and just let your
hands lead the way. If you're overthinking
about this, you're probably overthinking
about other things as well. Answering all these
questions always feel so powerful to me. It's like gaining a
new friend inside yourself who finally
understands you. And it is through
questions like these, and through asking them regularly that we really
understand what we are about. Once we know what
we really want, what we really love, and also what we hate. Only then we can pick a
new direction in life, and only then we can
build something new. And this is essential
for moving abroad. Because think about it. Since the beginning
of your life. As you grow up, our inner world, our emotions, they're always, we're always trying
to catch up on them. It's like your first
friendship argument, your first relationship
that fails, your first feelings
of doubt or anxiety. All of these things, they come at a certain
point of your life. And once they come, you
tried to figure them out. But that's not the way to go. That's not how you prepare
for a soccer game. You practice, you practice
and your practice again, and you fail, and you practice. And in the end, you come to the game and you feel
like you're prepared, you still don't know
how it will turn out. It's all a matter
of luck and it's all a matter of the
cars that you're given that they however you have the practice so you
feel more secure. And this is why we're doing this class to prepare
you for moving abroad, but to also prepare you for any other stress
that your body and mind might go through
as you proceed through life. Think about it. If your car breaks down, you go to the mechanic. The mechanic identifies
the problem. And then he has a list
of things that he does in order to fix your car. So he takes his step-by-step and in the end you
have your car, it's fixed and maybe
it's even stronger than before because he
hadn't some new parts. He may be changed you their oil or something and you
have in your car. Imagine if we did
this with our minds. Imagine if when a stress
comes when we move abroad, we make a list of things that we know can
make us feel better. We make reminders like the gas lamp in
your car that says, oh, you need to fill more gas is the same
thing within us. If we give us these
warnings saying that, hey, today you feel tired. I think you should
do this, this, this, and you will feel better. And let's say you're stressed and you just look at your
list and you remember the things that you said to yourself when you
were at your best, then you said to yourself
that if you do these things, you will be less stressed.
3. Creating Your Inner Map: So now it is time for
your first-class project, creating your own
inner map for this, I would like you to go back to the questions that
you just answered to. Circle all the things that you think you
couldn't live without. It can be things that you love. It can be things that you value. It can be things that
make you feel good, that you think are essential
to your daily life. Circle. These things. Try to see how they're
connected and maybe create some bigger
categories of your values. Let's say you put down
that taking a coffee, the nice cafe is something
that you cannot live without. And it's true, It's one
way that you are getting. The thing is that you need
and it's one way that you're expressing your
values in the world. Try to trace it back. What is it about the coffee in that beautiful cafe
that you like? For me, it's, I go to the cafe, I sit down and the first
thing I see is the coffee. And I can see the smoke coming up from it and
I can feel the smell. And instantly I feel calmer. I breathe in more. And I feel very present because I'm just looking
at that coffee and it feels like the rest of the world is just
not there anymore. It's just me and my coffee. So I have this presence
and I'm right there. And then I feel the
smell and I feel pleasure and I drink it
and it tastes so good. And perhaps while they were
carrying the coffee to me, I saw the beautiful drawing on it and I thought, wow,
that's beautiful. And there's my value for beauty. And maybe I'm meeting
a friend in this cafe. So there goes your values of connection and
love and growth. If we're discussing
interesting things, all of these things
I can pull out from a simple coffee date with
myself or with somebody else. So now I know my values
and once I know them, I can see, I can think
of other things. How I could exercise them and incorporate them in
my daily life more. So if your value is love, then maybe you try to meet
your family more often. Or maybe you practice how to feel that love inside of you. No matter where you are, no matter who your width, no matter the outer
environment that you still feel it inside
because that's your value and that's how
you want to spend your life. So if we're creating the map, you can either create
it on the worksheet. There's some space there, or you can bring a huge paper and you can really write
that down in detail. Your values, your needs, small things that make you feel better day by day and write it down in as much detail as you can and put it somewhere
where you can see it, put it somewhere where
you can come back to it in case things
get stressful. And once you've done that, you can make it in a
smaller format as well. Let's say you want to have
it as your phone background, you'd pick three words that
encompass what you're about. Three words that will remind you of the beautiful
state that you want to be in of how
good life can feel. And put these three words
on your phone screen. So each time when you
look at your phone, you will be reminded of what
it is that you live for, what it is that you're
trying to create.
4. Building New Routines: For the next step, we will be building
new routines. See in the previous step, you identified your values and values are like a fireplace. They keep you warm, they keep you safe, and they are really at
the core of everything. In the summer, it's very
easy to keep it up. It's hot outside. And if you're not careful, it might even burn down
the whole neighborhood. However, if the
winter comes and you still don't have a house
built around your fireplace. It will die in seconds. The wind will come, the rain will come to snow, will come on your
firewall distinguish. And this is what happens
in moments of stress, in moments of being put in a situation that were
not fully prepared for. The fireplace is our values and the house that
we build around it. That's her routines. Routines are what hold
your life together. Values are what ignited. Many people actually survive
only on their routines. They wake up, they
either breakfast, they take their kids to school, they go to work, they come back, they spend some time with their
family and they go to sleep. What is it? Not routines. How many people can
you walk past on the street and see that's
parked in their eyes, that excitement for their life. 5%, 3%, 1% of the
people that you walk past see routines are
extremely effective, but you need to start
with your values. Your values will determine the type of routines
that you want to have. There will determine the type of life that you want to build, the type of daily schedule
that you want to have. So we have those values, but now it's time to
prepare for some storms, for some heavy wind to come, because it will come
and that's unavoidable. But what we can do is we can prepare routines
are actually what make us feel instantly at home when we arrived,
when you place it, we may if we maintain
our routines of drinking coffee in the
morning, working out, writing a journal, our
body will feel much calmer and much less disturbed
by a new environment. As like if I drink coffee at
08:00 A.M. in the morning, my body doesn't really care if it's a new cafe
or if it's at home. As long as I do it and I
get a signal that okay. It's similar to the day before. So I want you to look at your needs from the previous
questions from step one. Identify the things that you probably already wrote
down in your value map. Identify them once
again and be even more specific about the
things that you need. What do you need
on a daily basis? Of course, you need food. What kind of food you need healthy foods and eat junk food. Do you need sweets
from time-to-time? Maybe you need to work out. What kind of workouts
do you need to do? To feel good? To feel really good long term. Is it just one type
of workout you need to go running twice a week? What is it be as
specific as you can? And start with answering
the first question. Create daily wellness list, things that you have to do
every day to feel good. For me. It might be drinking Lemon
Water as soon as I wake up, stretching and maybe listening
to my favorite tongue so that I started the day on a
good energy level for you. It can be anything. It could be washing your
face every morning, even if you just think of that every day and you
do it consciously, your mind will
start to handle it the same way as
if you were going for that run that you maybe don't feel
like doing just yet. But you start with small steps and create things to
do in the morning, create things to do
before you go to sleep, but then also things in
the middle of the day. Perhaps you can write down doing something that you
love for 20 min or reading a book
for 20 min if that makes you happy once
you've got that down, head over to the
list for a week. And this list, you
can write down the things that you think
you need to do regularly, but you cannot do them every day because nobody has all
the time in the world. But we can still find time. Things that are important
to us at least once a week, whether it is going for a
run or meeting your family, or putting that 1 h on an online course that
you've been dying to take, write it down in this list and make sure that it's things
that you can really do on a weekly basis if it's two weeks or even
if it's one month, if you can't come up with
things for just one week, then think of it as for a month and write all the things that you want to do every month. And at last, make a list
for a special things, special occasion, special
treatments for yourself. And now I'm talking
about bigger things. Maybe there's a vacation
that you crave. Maybe you want to go somewhere for one month, once a year. Perhaps it is a
weekend where you go away and you practice
something that you've never done before
or a hiking trip, whatever it is, that
kinda refresh you are a restart you if you
feel like you've been running on the same
program for a long time, then you know that this
thing that you will do, that you'll put on that list, it will restart you and
you'll feel better. Write these things
down and really think. And it doesn't have to be
things that you've done before. It can be dreams, it can be things that you wish
to do in the future that, you know will make
your life better. Once you have finished
all of your list, feel free to share some of
them on the class discussion. These small things that you
might take for granted. There's, you know, work for you. Somebody else might have not
thought about them at all. Please feel free to share and let's help each other
towards a new life.
5. Defining Your Focus: The next part is all about
defining your focus. Start by answering the question, why did you move? Why are you moving? Or if you're in the same place, why are you in the same place? As if your work is your family? Are you moving to be adventurous and to
explore new places? Are you moving to run
away from something? What is it? Is it a fear? Is it the person? Why are you running away? What's your aim with
being in this new place? Maybe you feel lost and
you're moving to get some new insights
and new experiences. And that's okay too, as long as you write
it down honestly. And you really think about
why you're doing this. For this next part, I really want you to realize
the time is limited. We only have one life, we only have one opportunity
at the present moment. So why not make the most of it? So think about it. What would you regret not
doing while you're here? Maybe you know that you will
only stay for three months. And then you write down, what is it that you
want to achieve or do or seeing
these three months? Maybe you're saying
for two weeks then do the same for that. And let's say you're staying for an indefinite
amount of time, you're moving permanently, you're planning to
build a family. You're planning to
start your own business or to explore this area. Or maybe you bought a house and you're finally
settling down. Whatever it is. Imagine if you had
only one year, if you had only one
year in this place, this place is unique. Every place that you are at, it has something special. So what is that unique
thing that this place has or that you have in
this stage of your life. Maybe you were 22 and
you don't have kids yet, you don't have a partner, and you're out there and
you want to explore, explore, do it for real. Or maybe you are 33 and you have a kid
that is one year old. And you have these moments with your kid that you will never get back and you moved for a job. But but this job
can wait, right? Like you can do the
bare minimum while your child is one year old. And instead, put your energy and put your time into spending as much time with
them as possible, into showing them the
world and being with them. And as a Help you can
imagine talking about this year of your life with your grandchildren
when you're old. Let's say you spent
a year in Argentina. Imagine what questions
they will ask. They'll want to know
what you did there. Who did you meet? What did you see? What
was special about it? What were you like? What
were your thoughts and your goals and your
dreams? Right? All of that down. Then you can move on to the next question
and actually make a list of things that you want to do and the
nearest six months. So it can be personal
life related. It can be something to do with your work, with your family. Thing is that you
want to achieve or feelings that you want
to feel in six months. What emotions do you want
to have on a daily basis? Maybe you want to
have new friends by that time and have a community in the new
place that you're at. But it can also be things
related to the specific place. So if you're in Paris, you can read down all
the tourists spots. Anything French bread
and drinking coffee in the coffee shop, whatever it is, wherever you are, try to see the uniqueness of the place of yourself of this moment
and write it down. And then we arrive at the
final summary of this class. In this summary, I want you to write down the things that
you've learned about yourself, some key parts from all the three steps that
you want to remember for yourself and use as
a guidance and share these things on the
class discussion and I'll be happy to read
them and comment on them. And if you want to
go one step further, now you can create an
even bigger inner map. You can add some things
from step two and from step three to your
original in their math, or adds another piece of
paper or below or above it. And just write down
everything that you feel you should remember about
yourself on a daily basis. Something to guide you through
the hard moments of life, and something to guide you
through the joyous moments. This can help you with
the smallest things that you do on a daily basis, but can also heavily affect
your entire life direction. The people you meet, the amount of money that
you are able to make.
6. Bonus Video: As a bonus for this class, I wanted to give
you some tips and tricks for moving abroad. So one of my biggest tips that I wanted to give
you is going to cafes. I know I talked
about cafes before, but it really is a place where so many different
kinds of people meet. If you're looking to
meet new friends, to make new contexts,
whatever it is, I would suggest you go to cafes, Find the original ones, and you go there in
different times of the day. So you go in the morning and you assess what kind of people
are sitting here now. Are there late for
work or are they tourists and they're
just starting their day? Who do you see? Who do you want to connect with? Then? You come there during lunch and during the middle
of the day and you see maybe you meet some people that are remote workers and you
can connect with them. Or you mean more
families with kids. And by coming at different
times of the day, you will really get to
see the diversity of people that hang out
in different cafes. And you have a chance to build networks and even more so if you build networks with the people that work there,
It's even better. And you can do this
not just with cafes, you can do this with stores, with churches, with
whatever you feel like. Because then once you
go to the supermarket, you go to the cafe, you'll have somebody
to say hi to you, have somebody to exchange
a few words with. And it will make you
feel more at home. And you will also
feel like you have some people that you always
know where they are, you know where to find them. In case you need help
or in case you need some advice about the new
place that you're living in. A thing in cafes as well. Something that I accidentally
stumbled upon was language cafes and
different kinds of groups meeting in cafes. So you can actually ask about this to the cafe owners if they know that
perhaps on Tuesdays, there's a German
language group that is meeting and maybe
you want to learn German or you just want
to meet new people. You can go and say hi to them. And you get to meet people
that are more open-minded, that are there to interact and communicate with each other, rather than maybe somebody
sitting alone with their computer not really
wanting to be disturbed. Another tip Is being kind and giving
compliments to people. If you see somebody
interesting on the street or somebody wearing
a jacket that you like, or talking a language
that you know, you can walk up to them and just started
the conversation, compliment them
on the thing that you liked or thought was
interesting about them, and see where the
conversation takes you. This is the best way to
meet people, I promise you. And the more you practice this, the better you get at this. This also relates
to your ability to handle stressful situations
and new environments. If you know that you can
talk to anybody in the room. If you just decide to, then moving to a new place
won't feel as scary even though it's a new culture,
a new environment. If you know that you can get to the people that are there, then what's there
to be afraid of? Another thing that
has helped me is going out with a certain
goal in my mind. So even if I just
go for a walk or if I go to if I go to the gym, if I go to a museum, I tried to always
search for beauty. So I'm from Stockholm, and Stockholm is the city
that can be very beautiful, but it can also be ugly. There are many buildings, are many streets that I walked through and I don t feel good. And yet there are so
many beautiful places. This can take my breath
away completely. And especially in such
cities where you have both an industrial side and you have the beauty and the history. If you decide to focus
and search for beauty, you will find it
and you will have such an enjoyable walk. And they, and life, if you've focused on
the beautiful things rather than on the
things that you hate. This also relates to
you being more present. The more you look for beauty, the more you have this
feeling inside you and this, and this awareness that
lets you really look at the detail because beauty
oftentimes is in the detail. It's in the way the sun rays shine on a building or in the smiles of the
people on the street. And when you notice
these things, you become more present. And presence is the
ultimate key to happiness. And last but not least, I would like to advise you
to join some communities, whether it's something
sports-related or a language group. As I said earlier, all of these things
will make you feel a lot more like home. For me. It was really the people that made me feel like
this was my new home. That made me feel like I could
live here and grow here. And it's really a big value to have people around
you that support you and that can also help you
if you feel slightly homesick from before and when it comes to
everything else, actually you know the best. And that's why you have the inner map that
you can now hold onto and you can adjust your
own reality accordingly. Thanks once more and I hope
to see you again soon. Bye.
Evelina Rimkuse, Traveler | Cellist | Sommelier
