Important Considerations When Choosing Your New Home Country

Are you stuck choosing a country to live in abroad? Let's talk before you pack. Listen to this honest chat about why your dream destination might not be the best fit. We'll cover what matters—like healthcare and living essentials—to ensure your move is a success. Tap play to listen.

YouTube Generated Transcript

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hey hey hey y'all hi there welcome back to my channel Marcia Unbound I'm really
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glad you're here and today's big question is will moveing abroad make you
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happier now might seem obvious to some of you because some of you immediately say
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yes right but let's talk about it I'm not going to pretend I have all the answers on this by the way because it's
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more it's a more complex question question than we want to think I see a
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lot of people online who just like I'm moving abroad and then they're over there and then there're people who end up coming back to the US because they
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really didn't consider some things so let's just say we don't have all the
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answers right now but let's explore how we can figure out what's right for each of us right so let's talk about
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happiness we talk about what it is what does it look like or at least I want you to think about that and what does it
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take to get it can moveing abroad be like a magic pill well we'll see so let
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me first introduce myself uh my name is Marcia Hilton and Marcia Unbound is my
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channel and on this channel I help black women find ease in the move abroad
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process from when it's first a dream to any mindset shifts that need to happen
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to make it happen because a lot of people get stuck in the dream phase just talk about it for years and years it
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never happens but to making that mindset shift mindset shift to make it happen
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and then through the decision phase like what country not just the country you like but what's the country that will
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like you back what's the country that will suit your needs right and then the planning the logistics the part that
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gets tough again because you actually have to do a lot of work and make a lot of decisions beyond what
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country it's a lot it's a lot but if you believe moving abroad will make
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you happier um then it's worth it I think
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it's worth it for me so if this topic if this subject matter is something that
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you find interesting or that you want to know about more about make sure you subscribe to my Channel please and also
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hit the notification Bell because you know when I go live and have live discussions you can get a chance to ask
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questions get your answers and also when I have guest interviews guest experts you will have people there that can
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answer additional questions for you so you don't want to miss that hit the notification Bell subscribe to my
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channel so I'll see you again right please do that thank you so much all
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right so what is it that got me thinking about this question if you don't know my
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whole thing is I write on about four maybe five online
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platforms and the one I write on the most because I treat it like my blog is is medium.com but I write I've written
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on others as well and on medium.com I used to write a lot of markeet marketing articles but I also wrote lifestyle
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articles travel primarily and now I emphasize travel um since I'm I'm a resident of a
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country outside the United States So and I've traveled quite a bit the last several years quite a few years actually
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probably the last 10 years so I started writing more about
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lifestyle and happiness Finding Joy finding happiness and traveling and whenever I see topics come
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across posts online about any of those topics or I hear podcasts or interviews
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on TV or wherever about those topics my ears perk up so this morning I did
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something we should never do which is I picked up my phone as soon as I woke up don't ask me if I do that every day I
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won't tell you the truth um I picked up my phone
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cuz it was right in the bed with me and um I opened
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Instagram no shame in my game shut up I open Instagram and the first post I saw
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was from Oprah daily I don't subscribe to the website but I follow them on
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Instagram and the post was about happiness and so I did a screenshot so I
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would have to go hunting for it again but it got got my interest they got my
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attention so the post mentions it's like you know the post mentions um that there
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was a study done oh I'm going to sneeze oh all right there's a study done across
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47 countries and they asked students which I assumed these were univers adult
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students like University students and and they found that they said that
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happiness was the most important goal not 47 students but 47 Nations and they asked students
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um most important goal in their life happiness is the most important goal in their life and I think a lot of people I
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think we all know a lot of people would say that I would say that I always say that actually I say my peace of mind is
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the most important thing and anyone who would ruin that I don't want to be around them not for too long not unless I have to um but that's all about my
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happiness my peace of mind helps me sustain my happiness so I get that I'm
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sure you get it too right so but even though happiness is their
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biggest goal another study other Studies have found that in the
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US um we are the least happy we've been in
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50 years the least happy and I think this was done around 2020 so this is
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2019 so this is pre covid um it may have
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extended further but we're the unhappiest we've been in 50 years
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is that alarming or what Maybe not maybe if you're really paying attention to what's happening here in this country or
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what has been happening the last few years um you feel it too right you're
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sensing this change and the vibration this country so you might be already aware of the changes in terms of
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people's level of Happiness like I've seen a lot of black women I think just going abroad I am
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among them I am but but I've always I've traveled a lot over the years but I've
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seen a growth in a number of black women who are exploring other places so and I
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don't think it's only black women or black people are doing this but one in
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three Americans reports being lonely so you have a room of 100 people that's 33
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people or so that are lonely and it's not always obvious it's not always the person who's sitting in a corner quietly
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that person could be could be very happy with their lives and not at all lonely and then someone else is chatting you up
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you know in a crowd they are the life of the party but they're the person who's the most lonely and you just just isn't
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that evident um and then 20% of Americans are dealing with me a mental
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illness and that's remarkable because that's one in
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five people you're in a group chat it's one in five I mean you're in a meeting with people and there's one of those
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five people is having a mental illness issue and it's
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not like we see in the movies you know having a mental illness issue does not mean you're the person going to shoot up a bank or whatever like most people with
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mental illness it could be someone without a mental illness that does that just out of anger and rage and then most
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people mental illness are really just dealing with stuff internally they're suffering on their own and if you don't
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believe me just keep an eye on all the reports you see in in with celebrities
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you know like that one miss was she Miss USA or Miss Miss Universe something or
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that one um beauty pageant contestant and then The Comedians and then that one
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gentleman who had that Traveling Show um like there are a lot of people we can
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think of who people see them and assume their lives are so ideal or their lives
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are so great and they may be but they still are struggling with mental illness whether depression or anxiety or
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something even more serious maybe some sort of schizophrenia or something else
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that's even harder to treat right as depression it's like yeah there people can have that throughout their lives but
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also someone could be dealing with depression in their 20s and be fine in their 40s or someone could be dealing with anxiety in their 30s and be fine
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when they change their circumstances whether at home or at work or whatever so they may be diagnosed with these
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conditions but it passes through their life and then there's someone else we think is living this great life who
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actually develops depression um or people it's just it
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just varies and you can't always tell it's to talk about invisible illnesses like you can't always tell can't always
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look at someone and tell I've battled PTSD for years and there are periods
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where I go for years without needing therapy and there periods where I'm back in therapy I'm back in therapy right now
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because I'm doing all these huge life changes and so that creates stress even when it's good stress and so I know from
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my experience that yep let me make sure I get this in order you know I had a friend who
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lost two of her closest friends over a period of a month two of her dearest
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friends people she known for decades and so we were speaking I called her because I knew one of her friends um one of her
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friends a physician who had committed suicide and she had been a friend of
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mine even though they were much closer but someone I knew as well so I called her to console her and to let her know
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you know she had my condolences and that's when she shared that with me but she had already made the decision to
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sign up for therapist because she knew even though she it hadn't hit yet she was realistic enough mature enough in
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her life to know this is something that's going to affect me drastically um and I need to get myself
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into therapy and deal with this because this is about my mental health so it's sometimes it's just that So 20% of
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Americans are dealing with with the mental health issue right now so that's we're not going to go on about that much
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longer the point is that happiness is supposed to be like the number one thing
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for so many people and yet so many people have a hard time finding it so my question was in response to this was can moveing
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abroad make you happier I don't know let's see all right so it got me
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thinking if a change of scenery a change of culture could be like a breath of fresh
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air like could explore in the world help you find you're happy for me you asked
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me that did you ask me that question did you just asked me would Moon abroad make me happier listen it's a resounding yes
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it's yes hell yes I am happier moving abroad I am happier
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traveling nothing makes me happier in life than travel I have actually put
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online in different places that travel is life you don't have to agree with me but travel is Life okay so nothing makes
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me happier than than being exposed I love learning and what better way to learn but than through
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experience and I like having a broad range of
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experiences and the familiar the monotonous you know there's some parts
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of my life where routine and ritual are important to me but I like change I know most people are
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afraid of change and there's some changes I'm afraid of too but I embrace certain I pursue certain changes and I
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embrace it I love I feel like this world is so big and there's so much we don't
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know the US is 4% of the world's population when I tell most Americans
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that they're like what no way but it is 4% of the world's population that's 96%
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of the world out there why I'm such a curious person like I think why would you not want to explore that world why
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would you not want to try everything so for me going somewhere else all my
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senses like turn on like to the max all the tastes and the sounds and whether
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it's the music or the the language the accents and when you're in a for like
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when I was in Thailand um one of the times I was in Thailand I had I was at a resort where um off this island I can't
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remember the name right now but it it wasn't just people from Thailand it was people from all of Southeast Asia that
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worked there so you had different accents you had people from Europe from different European countries who were
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there I love that kind of environment you had people from just everywhere the US Canada different parts of the African
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continent like you meet all kinds of people when you travel and me I solo
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travel like nothing's better than that I think I have made people feel offended
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when they've asked even though I try not to and I don't know the best way to to say it when they ask to travel with me
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and I reply trying to communicate that I really like to travel alone you know and
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some people will take offense because someone asking that is someone who's saying I enjoy your company I want to be
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around you and so these people ask me are people whose company I enjoy too and want to be around too and want to become
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better friends with or maintain our friendship but solo travel is just it's
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magic for me travel is magic for me that's life so it's hard for me but I am
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that person so you may not be that person moving to another country may not feel like that for you like I am not a
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tree I do not have Roots I will move and move again people are like I've moved a lot in the US too and people like is
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that your last place I'm like how would I know there's so much more and if I'm
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around for another 30 40 years I don't know I don't know why would I to that
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what I don't need to the other thing you should know about me is I am not married
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and I do not have children um so my life
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is not in those ways because those are not the only ways your life can be complicated or complex right so in those
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ways my life isn't complicated but there are other ways in which my life is complicated for instance besides the
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ptsc I also deal with autoimmune conditions so my move abroad meant I had to consider a lot of factors like
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pharmacies because I need a lot of medications daily like um access to the
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you know Specialists Physicians and Specialists like I need to think about those things affordability of Health
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Care and medic medications you know Insurance like I have to consider all that
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so you know everybody has their complications everybody has their
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considerations when they're thinking about making a huge life change so in my answer to that question is
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yes sorry I didn't mean to yell but I get do get
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excited and just nothing is more exhilarating or fulfilling to me than traveling and so moving abroad means an
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opportunity to just keep keep moving or to stay somewhere I really love for a while and then consider exploring
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somewhere else but that's for me so don't get me wrong I'm not saying there aren't challenges with moving abroad I
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kind of explained to you a little bit about how I've sold all my things and that was tough that was a lot because I
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do have some connection some of my things um sometimes because I paid so much for it sometimes because it took me
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that long to choose that thing sometimes because someone gave me that thing um or
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it represented something to me that was important to me so selling all my belongings was not an easy process um
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there are other decisions I made during that process that were not e far from they were far from easy for me uh I also
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sold my car that was the first thing to go that was an easy sell so the challenge is most people face
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though with the move of bra process is going through the legistics which is what I was dealing with but also the
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emotional changes you go through when you first start this process so is can
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you be happy through that process as well I was because I have a tendency to hold on to the goal like I I have like
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this laser focus on the goal and the goal is to shift my life into a certain place
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where I know I will have more joy and I
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I see my therapist once a week um so I was see my therapist and uh we were
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having talking about different things and I said how I just have this tendency to hold on to the light if I find just a
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speck of light in the room full of Darkness I am going to hold on to that light because it ends up being a matter
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of my survival whether it's emotionally or whatever I am going to hold on to that light so for me even when I'm going
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through a process process where patience is required I mean I always feel patient
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but patient but if it's taking longer than I expect or I just can't be sure it's going to
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work out or whatever I'm GNA hold on to that little bit of hope that little bit of Hope as long as I can sometimes I
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lose it but as long as I can I'm going to hold on to that little bit of hope so that makes me happy because I'm
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anticipating the end the goal reaching the goal if there's a meme that goes
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around that discusses says something like like um um happiness is having
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something to look forward to have you seen that one happiness is having something to look forward to I love that
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and I believe that because if I have a trip planned a flight bought some
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reservations at a resort whatever it is I'm happy the whole time waiting for
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it I am not one of those people who's sad waiting for it I'm like 10 days to
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go two days to go my my my happiness is getting level
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is getting higher and higher every day as we get closer I'm just looking forward to it and then the next thing and the next thing I'm very goal
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oriented anyway so that's how it works for me so there are things that you have to consider in the process that you can
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choose to have a great attitude about it and be happy in the process because you know you're working towards this thing
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that is your ultimate goal your dream goal of moving abroad of Liv in another country if you think that can make you
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happy so there things you you think about like your health care even if you're in great health you might need
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accidents happen you're going to need insurance or it's a good idea to get it um you may have to think about Visa
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requirements they may have Financial requirements other requirements if you're truly moving abroad you don't
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want to just move on a tourist visa because there's no security in that um
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get 30 days 60 days 90 days six months I mean it can vary so you may want to get
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an actual residency Visa which which is what I've done um you may have to think
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about things like your assets if you have I had enough stuff of four people that's I should be ashamed but there's
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never shame in my game Sorry so you you want to get rid of your things or you want to store your things like all those
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things are questions you'll need to answer for yourself um but there's there
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all these logistical details uh that you encounter when trying to move
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abroad that for me happiness is maintained
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throughout that process because I'm just looking forward to the light now I don't know how it works for
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you like for me I'm just like yeah I'm getting closer to it right even though I'm not I'm not pretending it's not hard
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like it was hard but I was still happy that's what I'm trying to say right all right
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so these things can challenge your happiness but you're working towards something something you really dream of
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so when I'm asked if moving abroad will make me happier I can say yes without hesitation
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I know what brings me joy I've sorted out the pieces of my planning that could
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create a personal obstacle for me or obstacles but how about you how about
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you like when you imagine a happier life what is missing in your current
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life that you will find in this new place when you you move abroad like these are questions you need to ask
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yourself and actually write down your thoughts like get it out when you imagine a happier life what is actually
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missing in your current life that you'll find abroad because there are people who move abroad and then move back because they're not that happy with where they
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end up they didn't really do the inside work of asking themselves what they
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expect and what their what they need their needs are Paris might sound wonderful and
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romantic but is it right for you and what are you expecting when you get there what is it that you need and will
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it deliver that will move abro will mov in abroad make you happier possibly if you address
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these kinds of questions before you go um are you excited about the when you
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think about things like exploring a new country or your new country that you're looking at I get excited um do you feel
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that too I want to think that you do if you're choosing a country you want to go to um is it maybe if you're someone who
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has kids is it maybe that you want your kids to grow up in a with a global education a Global Perspective that
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makes me excited too because I think if I had children I would definitely want that um is it that you're curious about
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the world and you want to see it uh as of as much of it as you
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can maybe like what is driving you to move abroad what is it inside of you
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that makes you want to do this and what makes you know that this is your dream what your dream life is made of is it
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that is it that there's a country out there that better aligns with your
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personal values and where you will feel more welcomed and accepted and you know
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as black women listen do you feel welcomed and
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accepted here like could be a yes for you or a no
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or not enough um is other countries listen there are a
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lot of countries out there to choose from so are there countries out there where if that's what you're looking for
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you can find that hell yes so what does happy look like to
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you what do you imagine what's the picture in your mind have you visualized this like where is it that you want what
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does happiness look like for you figure that out before you move abroad before you pick a country and then we can say
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moving abroad can make you Happ happier right and that's just the beginning
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there's a lot more to think about so it's important to sort that all out before you move to a whole other
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country because if you ask me to answer that question for everybody I would say
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yeah I can't imagine that this choice to move abroad to move to the country of
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your choice you the country we live in is the country we happen to be born in well not in my case my parents moved us
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here when I was younger but but still it was wasn't I I didn't
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choose it right so the country you live in you didn't choose not initially you may have chosen to stay but you didn't
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choose to be there um what if you consider all the other options out there
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for you and consider that they might be a better choice for you what if you were
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open to that thought right anyway um what's right for you
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look into the country what are your values what's important to you what do you want out of the rest of your life
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and then you can answer that question because I can answer the question for you but in general my opinion in general
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and that would be a yes but I can't answer that question for you only you can answer that question only you know
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if you're still working through the process if you're still working through the process of figuring out if you're if
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you want to move abroad and you're working through the process figuring out if that will make you happier or or how
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to go about getting started or the things you need to think about to make sure you get it right the first time
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um you can feel free to send me a message you can leave me a comment here
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in the video right leave a comment with the video I promise I'll respond um if you decided that a move abroad is
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actually your dream life and you know you feel strongly it'll make you happy and you just need to work out some of
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the mindset stuff because you've been thinking about it for a while and you haven't really acted on it um you find yourself being too busy
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for it or just not you know it's not the right time or there's always a reason to
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put it off we need to talk all right we need to talk about that leave me a
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comment say I've been thinking about this for four years I haven't moved on
25:49
this that's me right raise your hand on that one um I do have a move abroad
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planner it's called The Escape ese plan the Escape Plan get out of here no
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it was created just for us black women U who want to move abroad so it's
26:08
considering our needs um our concerns and I'll put a link in the
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video description here for that too you can go check it out all right it's it's a big book all right I worked on it for
26:21
months it's a over 130 pages and it keeps growing so I may need to upload a
26:26
newer version right now that I have I haven't thought about when was the last time I uploaded it because I work on it every week
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sometimes a full week I work on that but I'm doing several things at once so it's
26:39
it's it's grown since the last time so if you go get it today there's probably gonna be a newer
26:44
version later but you can always get the newer version you don't have to you know you always get the newer version um it's
26:50
a guide and a planner so it's taking you
26:55
through um it's giving you a lot of information about getting getting this right but also there are Pages there are
27:01
worksheets and fill in the blanks um where you put in your plan where you
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answer the questions you need to answer deal with the logistics you need to so you don't miss things you don't miss important things you're filling in the
27:14
blanks you're putting in your considerations you're comparing countries I give you all the tools I
27:19
give you all the fill-in the blank fields for you to do make it uniquely your own customize it for your plan to
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follow to get your move abroad going um and to keep you from delaying anymore
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like I have a a 9mon process you can adjust these however you want and I have a 18month process so you can get a
27:36
timeline in and you can choose which one you want to do which timeline you want to follow or which will work for you and
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then you can um use that as your as your your checklist there are also multiple
27:49
other checklists in there too to break down different processes so get your hands on this okay get your hands on
27:55
this as a matter of fact I I think right now it's like only now don't hold me to
28:01
this you have to go to the website and check it out because there's been a couple of changes here and there so I think though right now it's about $1.99
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if you use a coupon which is with the coupon code Escape because it's called The Escape planner so the coupon code
28:15
Escape I think it's still I think it's still active and I believe it's active through jul July I
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think I did that I think I said let's keep it active till the end of day on July 4th Independence Day right right so
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the link in my bio goes to the escape plan the move abroad planner you might see me refer to it as that and it's a
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huge book it's a digital download but it's huge colorful lots of good stuff um
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only 12 bucks $11.99 with the coupon code Escape so it's the Escape Plan get
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your butt out of here Escape while you can right because I'm out of here all right so go check that out it's in the
28:58
description and listen I want you to find your happiness wherever that is and
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whatever that looks like I want that for you as black women we deal with enough
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we've dealt we've taken a lot we've carried a lot we've helped everybody else with a lot we deserve this we
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deserve to have our dream lives we deserve happiness and peace of
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mind um I want that for you and I want that for myself so let's go get it all
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right oh also if you find this video helpful remember if you found this helpful remember to
29:37
subscribe still a new channel go ahead and subscribe help us s St out um and
29:44
hit notifications turn that on so will your move abroad make you happier it's very possible if you answer the right
29:50
questions and get things in order to make sure you're going to end up where you should end up someplace that really works for you I think if you dream of it
29:58
you should go for it because you deserve to find your happy thank you for watching have a good rest of your day
30:06
bye-bye

Now, I'd love to hear from you! What are your thoughts about choosing a new home country? Comment below and share your top picks!