Toastmasters Speech 2: How to leave your hometown

                                                                    Speech

How leave your hometown for another city (AKA step out of your comfort zone)

1. Make a list of everything you want in a place to live. Basically all the things that are annoying about where you live, write the opposite. Is daycare as much as your mortgage? Write I want daycare that is affordable. Do people hunk as soon as light turns green? Say I want to be around nice patient people and low traffic. Are you tired of city life? Say I want nature, sky and trees. Are you surprised at when was the last time you looked at the stars? Say I want grass at my feet, time freedom and time to smell the flowers and look at the stars. Whatever is important to you, the things that you must have, that you will not compromise, write those things down. The quickest way to get to where you want to is to figure out what the destination is first. Begin with the end in mind. 

2. Turn it into an affirmation. Affirmation is a group of sentences you speak over yourself, to affirm those things into reality.  Do not say 'I want' or 'I am going to' say as if it happening right now. Say them as 'I am grateful and thankful now that I' and speak the list of what you want. 

Get used to saying it, what you are doing is you are tricking your mind and therefore yourself, into receiving those things which you desire. Every night read the list to yourself and let your imagination wander and create mental pictures around your affirmations. Start getting emotionally connected to what you are speaking into your life, imagine yourself already receiving it and how happy you will be in your new place. 

3. Consistency is key. Say it everyday! If not, say it every day and every night. Say it so often you remember it as clearly as you know your name. 

4. Get ready. Start taking actions. Look at homes at Zillow. Do a weekend trip on Airbnb 2 or 3 hours away, just to start getting used to sleeping and being in a different environment. If the area that has what you want available is near, spend you free weekend days hanging around that neighborhood. You want to start living and touching and feeling what it is like to be in your new environment. 

5. Take a tally of what is keeping you where you live. If it's friends and family, start noticing when do you actually see them? When do they come to see you?  Do you actually spend time with the people that is keeping you here? If all you do is work and spend time with your child and your partner and no one else, Trust me, you can live anywhere else.

 If it's job opportunities, think of the possibility of being mobile (making money from everywhere) or look for places in which your line of work has many opportunities. 

6.  It is time. Some time has passed. You have done the work or God has done the work for you. Let me see, you have been speaking your affirmations, looked at Zillow at houses and locations. You have done weekend trips. You have your list. Now, life is getting ready to get your ready. Maybe you job is ending, you realize your friends suck or your family life is not where you want it to be. It's okay! If things are shifting around you, understand it is because you have been speaking the changes you want to see and life is getting you ready for them.

7. Make your move. This step requires a dose of courage. Get in the car and drive. Hop in the plane and go. Do what you said you wanted to do. Sometimes life will make it so all that is left to do is get in the car, put in  the key, turn it on and drive. Fear and procrastination will want to stop you.  Doubts will come in your head, like are you really going to do this? Fear of the unknown will want to creep in. Like, what are you going again? What about if you ever want to see grandma down the street? Whatever it is, know that this is normal. All you need right now is courage. If you have said it and prayed on it and everything is ready to go, and its just time for you to go, know that you are able and even though you don't know what the new place looks like, remind yourself everything about your life that you currently hate. Focus on it until you say 'Enough is enough!' Have the courage to know that whatever it may look like on the other side, it won't be this. What you want is out there, and it's possible. Now get on the car or plane and truck and just ride. 

Congratulations! You have left your hometown and now live in a different city/state. You successfully stepped out of your out of your comfort zone and did something noone you know has ever done before: leave. Remember when you visit, others in your hometown that thought about leaving will ask you for details. They will be curious, be honest with them. It is going to feel weird in the new place, just because you were so comfortable in your previous arrangement. The first couple of  months or entire first year could be spent in a state of constant comparison. Give yourself time to adjust. In the meantine, go lay on the grass, look up at the stars and be thankful for all the things in your life that are now your new reality. 

Congratulations! You have left your hometown (AKA you comfort zone). More in life is to come!

Reject Pile

 How to move to another city (AKA step out of your comfort zone)

1. Truck, plane or drive?

If you will dirve your own car, minimize to fit the car. If you go on a plane, obviously that means you decided to take nothing with you but a few items, most extreme by okay, as long as you are able to buy it when you get to the new city, or its okay if you are going to be living with other. Trucks rentals are most expensive to move your stuff all the miles you will go but you also need a person to drive with you (depending on the distance). 

Become a minimalist

Take an inventory of everything that you own. Anything that you haven't touched or used for the last year has to go. Understand that we hold on to stuff due to the memories. You get to keep the memory, but let go of the item .and guess what? you are still you! If you have  books, you can write on a notebook the favorite quote from the books so that you always have that available (but not the book) to look back at your favorite parts. 

All major furniture, sell or give away. Trust me, I'm sure you have a friend that need a bed or a dresser, or someone from craigslist might. 

Stop, Auris... too informative.

Write it like this famous writer did. like a manual, it shall be kind of funny.

OR

1. Tell your friends, don't tell your family

Your  family will try to stop you. Your friends they may not like it, but eventually they will understand. Call only the ones that will be supportive. You have your own doubts in your head, you don't need anyone else's.

2. When you arrive to the new place, then tell your family or need to know people. Say hey! I'm in (blank). They will be shocked that you moved and might be speechless. But it's okay. You have already moved! They can't stop you!

3. It's okay. You may not love the place you moved to, you might be culturally shocked or it might feel like home after a week. Give yourself time to process all these emotions.