New beginnings. And changes. A lot of changes. Which is something that I look for.

2023 has already surprised me. I moved from Italy to Providence (RI, USA) – and yes, this one was a long-term change that I knew would have happened. But I didn’t know that after a couple of days in this country, I would have overcome some of my biggest fears.

1. I opened a blog. I had the courage to finally say “Hi, there’s me behind this website” (if you don’t know this story you can find it here, point 5).
   
2. I started driving. That was my worst fear ever.
   If you know me you knew that I was scared to death to drive. Here we have the biggest car that I have ever seen (a rental car). When they gave this car to us I had a thought: if this car arrived to us there’s a reason.
   And the reason is this one: the right time to start driving is now.
   In my last newsletter, I dive into that story, not relevant here, but if you want to know more you can read about it here.
   
3. I had the courage to go out there and fight one of my worst fears, others’ judgments. But here I am, showing my vulnerabilities on YouTube and my face, my Italian accent, and my not-that-perfect English.
   I also share some of my interests such as Expat Life, Goals tips, Self-awareness thoughts, and Positivity. And some Italian random gesture (🤌).

Learnings

Two thighs that I learned:
–in my mind, I was creating more problems than the ones that are issued in the objective reality
–sometimes I just need to do it without thinking too much

More in general, seeing myself from a different perspective has helped me reevaluate my life and put in perspective all the problems. Sometimes I laugh when I think about how much I used to complain about things that now seem like nothing, and it was just a couple of weeks ago. Yes, of course, when you love something you give a specific meaning to that thing. But when you think about that specific thing, that specific meaning from a different perspective you learn how much everything is relative. At least, that’s what I am learning.

Things that made my life better

Since I started talking about my weaknesses and fears, how am I changing here, and what differences I see in the cultures: 

1. My conversations with family, friends, and colleagues have improved a lot: most interactions are more meaningful and people opened up with me and we had the chance to know us better 

2. I reconnect with people that I had lost during the normal process of life 

3. I felt more balanced and grateful for the great people that I have in my life. And that’s why I am more positive (and most of the time productive!) I would have never thought that opening up would have improved my social relations and that’s a blessing! 

Why I love changes

I see changes as opportunities. I change my life a lot to see things from a different perspective.

When I left one of my first jobs, I didn’t have a backup plan. I just left it because I couldn’t continue, it was over my limit. And I had the opportunity to take my team to think about myself and what I wanted from life and what I didn’t want from my job.
When I moved to Colombia for a semester I had to experience my life alone abroad, learn how to do bureaucratic stuff in another language, how to make friends with different cultures, how to study with a different method…and all of this stuff helped my approaching my life in a different way, with less stress on the single task, more hope and trusting others.
Now, that I left everything that I had in Italy (a life that for most people, was really really great) I am starting again and that’s the biggest blessing for me. That’s something that aligns with my values. That’s something that I really care about.

I don’t know about you, but change is my comfort zone. If I had to spend my life in the same place, with the same job, the same friends, and the same restaurants…that would be out of my comfort zone. And I don’t exclude that. I mean, I’ll have to stop one day. Not that’s something mandatory because of the culture or whatever, but moving and changing constantly is really expensive in terms of energy. So I know that one day I’ll stop. And that one is gonna be the biggest change of my life. Let’s see what’s going to bring me!

Ciao belli!