As some of you may already know, I'm a sort of digital nomad.
Let me explain.
My partner's career is impactful
My partner is a civil engineer who, currently, works mostly with infrastructure. Because of that, he is often transferred to work on construction in some remote cities in our country and it's up to me to join him or not.
Some of you may also know that I'm a remote worker. I work as a project manager for a Dutch company with people from all over the world, although my team is now 90% composed of people from Latin America, each one in their own country and city. That is to say that I do have the freedom to choose whether or not I want to go with my partner to those remote locations without giving up my career.
Long-distance, our dynamic my first "home" thoughts
Since the end of 2021, we've been switching from a long-distance relationship to living together and back. Being in the long-distance phase at the moment, we meet once a month somewhere, whether it's at the place I'm living now with our dog, his current place, or some other city in between. We are even planning to meet each other in Santiago, Chile in a couple of months.
Living like this made me realize a bunch of things, but one of them is that home is a state of mind, not a place.
The place I was born in is very nostalgic and comfortable to me, but it doesn't actually feel like home anymore. The place I lived in when I first moved out and got my first "big girl" job feels a lot more like it.
Over the last 4 years, I've lived in mega cities and small towns, traveled a whole bunch in and out of my home country, and met and worked with a bunch of people both in person and through a computer screen. Life, for me, expanded way beyond my immediate surroundings, and that includes the place I call home.
What makes somewhere a home?
Home to me is now a bunch of factors that, combined, create a feeling of coziness, belonging, comfort, and safety. Those factors include:
The people I'm with and how comfortable I am being myself around them.
How much I can give my personal touch to the space I'm in and make it fun and convenient for my daily life.
If I can have my big German Shepherd dog with me (otherwise it's a no-go)
If it gets chilly during winter and not too hot during the rest of the year
If I'm ok with being alone in that place
My willingness to enjoy that place and share it with my partner
How the moving and decision process happened and how much we could take my feelings and priorities into consideration too
I also realized how tied this home feeling is to the presence of my partner, ever since we first decided to move in together at the start of 2021 and that's why one of my current home-feeling factors is my ability to be alone in that new place and how comfortable I am with it.
I think the concept of home will always evolve as we go through life. Much of what I had growing up, like my whole family in the same place and friends I've had since childhood, was taken for granted until I decided to explore the world a bit more. I see more value in these things now than ever before.
At the end of the day, some common knowledge and sayings have a reason to be, so yeah, home is truly where the heart is.
What does home feel like to you?
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