Moving isn’t easy, especially if you’ve lived in your current city for any significant amount of time; however, sometimes it’s simple inertia that keeps us rooted wherever we are, when what we really quite desperately need is a permanent, or at least semi-permanent, change of scenery. Here, 10 signs you’re probably ready to make a move, no matter how hard you’re trying to ignore that little voice urging you towards change.
10 Signs You're Ready To Move To A New City
When a friend leaves town for good, you should just feel bummed. If you also feel jealous, and somewhat like they've escaped something you're not able to escape, it's definitely time to pull your own parachute.
Your city is so cool—the culture, the people, the restaurants, the events, etc; however, you can't afford to enjoy any of these things unless you work so much that you also don't have the time to enjoy any of these things. With rents rising in urban areas all over the country, this is a reality that millennials are facing well beyond their early twenties. If you're working hard just to live in a not-so-nice apartment, to which you return pretty much directly after work hours and from which you generally enjoy most meals made from Trader Joe's products—and you're not in your early to mid-twenties—it's time to take a long, hard look at the possibility that this less-than-ideal reality might not change in the future if you stay put.
When you first moved to [insert city here], you loved the weather. Snow days, you thought, are so novel and fun! By your second year, you loved those snowstorms just a little bit less, and by now, you've quit your job and become a shut-in just so as to avoid the elements. This is not okay, and it's probably time to flee to warmer temps.
No one likes spending half of their day in traffic, and no one likes the feeling of being stuck in bumper to bumper traffic en route to an important meeting. That said, if you find yourself screaming in a fit of frustration and rage at no one in particular while trying to navigate your city's streets on a regular basis, you might be due for a little rerouting.
If you still feel like your current living situation is a short-term thing, in terms of the city in which you live, and yet you've resided there for quite some time and are in your late twenties or older, it might be time to ask yourself what catalyst, exactly, you're waiting for in order to start your "real" life elsewhere.
Yes, it's true that "wherever you go, there you are." That said, it's also true that sometimes you just can't pull yourself out of unhealthy patterns or circumstances without majorly disrupting your life to do so. If you're feeling stuck, consider starting over somewhere new, but only after you've fully meditated on what's not working in your current life so as not to bake it into the one you start anew.
Now's the time, folks. Once the baby's been born, it'll be a lot more difficult to uproot your life and start from scratch.
You're over every restaurant in your town or city. The idea of going out to local bars or clubs with your friends makes you want to marry Netflix. You roll your eyes when people express enthusiasm over activities you have so been there and done before, too many times. If any of this rings true for you, it might be time to move on to somewhere new and different.
If the thought of being home over the weekend fills you with dread or boredom, and you therefore run out of town at every opportunity, you might need a bigger, more permanent change of scenery.
A lot of us end up in the cities in which we live because we went to college there, or we moved there on a whim when we graduated, or for some other arbitrary reason. This doesn't mean we should stay where we are for life. If you're working a job you hate or even just don't love, many of your friends have moved away or moved on to families and you never see them, and you're not dating someone who must stay local, you are free to go wherever you can find work. This can feel like a radical concept as it's easy to stay within our comfort zones, but if there's no compelling reason for you to be in your current city, and you're unhappy, it's time to move on.
