Do you think moving is a part of life?

I have moved since I was a child every two or three years. Once I became an adult I stayed in one place longer (18 years one time), and I appreciate the chance to develop community ties, which takes, literally, years.

I don’t know that moving is necessary (of course, it is in some cases), but I think that living in a different city from your hometown, at least for a while, can be good for character.

I recently turned 30, and moved to Toronto after having lived in my hometown my whole life. The reason for my moving was to go to grad school for a program not offered by the university where I did my undergrad (in fact, my degree program is only offered at 2 universities in Canada, and Toronto was closer to home than Montreal). I’ve been here for about 4 months now, and though I do miss my family and friends, as well as the familiarity of my hometown, I feel that living elsewhere has given me a new perspective. I’d visited Toronto many times, but had never spent more than a week at a time here. Living in a big city (downtown, at that) makes me better appreciate the small-town mentality (such as it is; my hometown is a small city of about 165,000).

I think one’s opinion on this will depend on whether the answerer has been a habitual mover, by choice or not by choice. I know I wouldn’t want to live in a different city every few years, but I appreciate the newness I’m experiencing now.

@Seelix What do you mean by small town mentality?

I have moved 7 times not counting college and never got more than 30 miles farther from where I was born. Me….I do envy those who have packed it up and made a go of it anywhere but Chicago! I want mountains or beaches out my window and that will have to wait another 15 years.

@Aesthetic_Mess – I suppose I just mean the friendliness. I’ve noticed that here, people are generally in a hurry and less likely to engage in everyday niceties, like letting a car in front of them when traffic is merging, holding a door or saying “excuse me” if they bump into you. There’s little eye contact on the street in a big city; people generally look down or straight ahead while striding along – I’m more used to the occasional glance and smile.

Forgive me if I generalize, I’m just describing what I’ve noticed.

I like where I live but could easily move somewhere else.
I am convinced that I could be happy most anywhere :)

I have moved many times. Most of the moves were near where I grew up, but a few of them have been big moves. I don’t think moving is a necessity, but it is nice to see what things are like in other places.

66 years old and have moved only twice, since being married. i hate moving. it hurts my back.

Do you think moving is a part of life?

It must be.
Last check up, my doctor said, I needed to get out, exercise and move around more.

i think it just depends on the person. some people are perfectly content living in the same town, or even the same house, their entire life. that works for them. i personally think that with this huge planet we live on and all its diversity, i would like to live a million different places before i die. because why not? variety is the spice of life.

Of course it is, nothing remains static.

I couldn’t imagine still living in the same places I have lived, every move is part of the great moving on. ;-)

Life is an adventure, let it happen!

Yes.

And I envy. I soooo envy.

@ChazMaz

What do you envy?

I have worked all over this country. USA
Byproduct of working in the “biz”.

It has been at times a blast. But, all in all, a big pain in the ass.

I have watched as friends paid off their homes (were able to buy a home) and their children have enjoyed the pleasure of growing up in the same neighborhood.
Established solid friendships that stayed local and close.

Would have been nice to have married my high school sweetheart. And watched our children go to the sames school and explore the same haunts of my/our youth. ;-)

But, this is one of those thing you do not see till it is too late. That youth wasted on the young thing. I was that “youth”.
Don’t get me wrong. I do not regret anything. I have some great memories. But, I still envy. :-)

Note: Not easy to commit to a home when you usually will end up working somewhere else in 2–5years.

Moving, I believe, is a class thing. People with more education have to be more mobile and are more mobile because they move more, on average. That’s because they get jobs that take them all over the place.

Working class people tend to be more likely to stay in the same community they grew up in for most of their lives. Of course, they might move a few times within that community.

I think it is increasingly rare for a person to live in the same house all their lives. So, for the most part, I do think moving is a part of life; some people do it more than others.

For the first 26 years of my life, I moved an average of twice a year. As you might imagine, I was sick of it. I have now lived on the same block for 24 years, and in the same house for 20 years. My wife imagines us moving somewhere when we retire. I plan on being encoffinated in the house I live in now.

It totally depends on the reason. I feel sorry for military families, being uprooted all the time, but when I was growing up, we moved every single year, because my dad was what we now call a house flipper. He would buy a house, add a bathroom, upgrade the kitchen, and sell at a profit.

I have now been living in the same house for the past 20 years, because my husband’s company makes it worth our while to stay here. The house is great, don’t get me wrong, but I would rather live by the ocean, like I did, in several different apartments, the previous 20 years.

I move a lot, ever since I was a kid. I’ve moved from one country continent to another. I change homes practically every year even if it is the same town. I like my nomadic lifestyle, I don’t let go of ties made elsewhere but I love the feeling of exploring something brand new. Plus because of this, I can acclimatize almost anywhere and make friends easily.

Once I have my own family and kids, I would like us to switch countries every now and then too. I think it is an excellent learning opportunity. The traveler, IMO, learns so much more about life and world experiences. So to me, yes moving is an important part of life.

I was born to moving parents and haven’t stopped since. At one time we counted 17 moves in the first 11years and I’ve stopped counting since. As an adult I thought I’d be able to find a place to settle but this life just doesn’t want that for me, at least not right now and I might not be able to handle it if it happened.

It was necessary for my parents to. They needed new jobs and we needed a new house, so our family moved to Las Vegas in 2003. My sister thought moving to Vegas was like Alice going out the rabbit hole discovering Wonderland. Since we first came there, everything was weird, confusing and mean to us. We didn’t trust much people. It’s been seven years now, I realized people traveled from many different places all over the nation and the world to here for jobs and houses. And usually most of them are nice. There’s still the threat of rapists, drunk drivers, drug dealers, gangs, and other kinds of people I don’t know lurking about. But Vegas is the least crime infested city than New York City is (please don’t be offended by that, I know it’s an amazing place with the strongest sense of patriotism).