Expat Curiosity and Adventure in Abroadland

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This month in the Thriving Abroad podcast I talk to Helena  Jalanka, author of Greetings from Abroadland: Experiences of Family Life Abroad.

You can download the show notes from HERE

As I prepared the blog post to accompany the podcast, an announcement of a new book bounced into my ‘inbox’. It is one I have been eagerly awaiting: “Cracking the Code of Curiosity: The key to unlocking human potential” by Diane Hamilton and it seemed serendipitous that it arrived just as I sat down to write about a podcast that talks about the value of exactly that – curiosity. I still have to sit down and read the book, but I was struck by the introduction where Diane Hamilton says:

“We’re born with a built-in spotlight that’s extremely powerful and extraordinarily agile…. We can shine it in any direction……… amazing things our spotlights, our means of gaining wisdom and exploring the unknown, escaping ignorance, learning and growing, the means of our very survival.”

Cracking the Curiosity Code by Diane Hamilton, PhD. 

How well is your spotlight turned on?

Curiosity has a fundamental role to play in how we live and succeed in life. Think of the great inventors and business leaders - at the centre of all they have done has been an unquenchable thirst for discovery, learning, understanding and growing.

It perhaps comes as no surprise that in expat life curiosity has a key role to play as well. It is a key competence in the TASCA Global measure of Cultural Agility, you can learn more about that below. Developing cultural agility requires us to be curious and reflect on our personal values, assumptions and behaviours.

Recent research has suggested that one of the benefits of living abroad is the enhanced sense of ‘self-concept clarity’ that comes from reflection about our identity and whether it truly reflects who we are or purely reflects our cultural upbringing (Adam et al 2018). It seems that being curious about who we are and how our sense of who we are is impacted by living abroad has many associated benefits - such as a better psychological well-being, adaptation to stress and job performance. (the reference to the research is posted below)

Curiosity and the willingness to reflect on experiences has great potential personal value and the podcast conversation this week is a great example of the benefit of living abroad with curiosity situated at the heart of the experience.

In our conversation, Helena Jalanka shares how curiosity was an important motivating factor firstly in their decision to move abroad and secondly in how they chose to live their international life and benefit from the different experiences that unfolded.

Helena also offered the following tips for living a successful international lifestyle 

• Focus on living in the moment, build your home where it is now.
• Recognise that challenges are often opportunities – we talk about the challenge and opportunity that comes from creating time for your family, learning languages and the freedom to reinvent yourself and start anew.
• How living abroad means that we are encouraged to develop our concept of self – you may be interested to read some recent research I mention on this subject - the reference is posted below.
• Take time to really explore your new locality – the fact that your time there is limited means you have more motivation to get to know your environment.
• Stop categorising ourselves, we are not ‘a role’ alone, we are so much more.
• Career development, particularly for the partners of international assignees, can be challenging. Helena shares how her location independent career evolved and the role that creativity had in that development – and how her international experience fed into her creativity. 

Helena’s top tip:

“Try to make the most of your time abroad – as my son used to say: ‘I live wherever I live’. Try to build your life where you are at the moment, and also focus on the positives….create your own land in your current land.’

If you would like to learn more about Helena’s book ‘Greetings from Abroadland: Experiences of Family Life Abroad’  you can visit her website:

www.Abroadland.com

You can buy her book from Amazon

Cultural Agility and Curiosity:

Cultural curiosity: the degree to which people have an interest to learn and develop their understanding about other cultures is one of the six cross cultural competencies featured in the assessment of cultural agility developed by TASCA Global, which I am certified to administer. Cultural agility is defined as

“an ability to quickly, comfortably and effectively work in different cultures and with people from different cultures. Cultural agility helps professionals succeed in multicultural environments by enabling them to vary their behaviours and responses to the needs and demands of the cultural environment”.

If you are interested in learning more about your level of cultural agility you can discover how to access the assessment and a 90 minute debrief with me HERE.

 

 

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