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kleinbl00  ·  2924 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Daydreams of leaving

So...

Like most decisions, this is one that isn't "a decision" so much as a series of things you can try on easily and simply. I was going to ping briandmyers because he's one of like six people I know that have emigrated to Kiwiland. I myself took a good hard look at Canada in 2004. Friends of mine were going to take jobs in Brisbane but opted out; since he had that very discussion with me, I'll share the way it went:

Jill didn't like her options in her field in Seattle but her office had an opening in Brisbane. Jack asked me what I thought about it; he was madly in love with Jill but wasn't sure he wanted to follow her clear around the world.

I told Jack that the smart thing would be to take Jill on vacation to Brisbane to see how they liked it. I mean, when you're talking about upending your life for years/forever, what's a couple plane tickets? It was the first trip Jack and Jill went on, and she was thrilled.

Until she got to Brisbane. Her office, which ostensibly was willing to pay her a massive hiring bonus for moving, couldn't even really organize the time to have her meet everybody. She discovered that her pay package was much more diminished by taxes than she'd been led to believe, and the cost of living in Brisbane would have meant a massive real-wages paycut. And, Jack would have had to find something to do and Jill's company figured that was Jill's problem. More than that, they spent some time in Australia in general and decided that Brisbane was one of their least favorite places.

However, Jack and Jill had a marvelous time and started thinking more about places they could go, things they could do, and what their future together looked like. That was 2007 or so, they've been married since 2009, have two adorable kids and live in Pennsylvania now.

You'll note they didn't get as far as looking at visas - they just checked it out and noped the fuck out after having an awesome time. They ended up doing something different because of what they learned. And they did noting irrevocable or life-changing, other than committing to sharing a hotel room for a week.

You're happily married. Your wife is your biggest fan. Spend some time over beer or wine with an atlas or something and come up with a list of ten places you might conceivably want to live. Look into the visa requirements for each one and see which ones are viable. Then arrange to visit your top choice for a week and see what you think.

You're out a vacation, which you need one of anyway.

Maybe you go somewhere awesome and decide to get gung-ho about it. Now you're going into it with eyes open. Maybe the first place doesn't work so you try the 2nd choice and spend the rest of your life thanking your lucky stars you didn't move to Brisbane. Maybe you visit your top 5 and decide you really like travel, but you also really like the great US of A. And by the way, since most of your flights are out of Dallas and since you actually really enjoyed your layover there, you decide to relocate to Texas. Hey, stranger things have happened.

My big note of advice is that when you look at a momentous decision and try and figure out which way to go, you'll vaporlock and miss all the easy stuff. If, on the other hand, you investigate what you can get solved for free and little time, the whole mountain gets shorter. It's also fun. I mean, even looking up the visa requirements made the 2nd term of GWB sting less.

Good luck and have fun.