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You have to have money to move, though. I don't care what anyone says - maybe not a lot, but at least a few months salary. People that just "up and moved" usually had money (if they didn't already have a job lined up).
I want to thank you for posting this thread because it's given me the motivation to "just go" again. When I was younger (in better economic times), I'd choose a city in this region and just move there - no job, no familiarity, no family/friends/acquaintances at my chosen destination, only a nest egg for a couple months of living expenses. The moves always seemed to work out. My life now is a catastrophe. I'm older. I'm stuck in an area and in circumstances that are debilitating and draining me. I've been so fed up and would probably have left many times over the past year, but I have pets - I couldn't subject them to the instability and the unknown. In the past, my circumstances always improved when I leapt into blind opportunity. I'd somehow forgotten that. But reading this thread has prompted a glimmer. I have to trust someone with my pets while a find a better place for us. Monday I set forth to find it. You've bolstered my hope. Thank you.
I'm leaving, gave my boss my notice three weeks ago, and I've never felt so relieved. Ugh, let me tell you, this place I've found to be just miserable; I've tried to make the best of it, truly, I tried thinking positive for three years (yes, that's a long time) so you see, in the end it's just too hard to make farm country in Calif. to meet my end goals.
So I'm done here, packed my stuff, moving in with a friend in L.A., I have no job lined up, not looking back, and could not feel more elated.
I had forgotten about this post but someone had given me a rep so I just want to update you guys and hopefully give you some hope; this coming from someone who tends to think negatively.
After L.A., I packed my things and moved across the country to the Northeast. No job lined up. I did however had money saved, enough so I could survive at least six months. I've been living very frugally and keeping expenses to a minimum while trying to look for a job. After about three months without a job, I finally landed one, one that's close to my degree (it actually paid off, look at that! I would have never imagined that it would). By the way, the job I just got I had applied over a month ago for and they finally got back to me and up until then I was feeling rather anxious about everything.
I've got to say, I am elated. I walk more upright and at times with a smile (something I never did when working at my previous job), I feel good, things are good. Whoever is planning to make a jump I would advise to be realistic and optimistic about it, make sure you take copious notes with your expenses and differentiate between 'wants' and 'needs', have some savings to fall back on, and with a little luck things may fall into place for you.
As the proverb goes, "Nothing ventured, nothing gained.".
I had forgotten about this post but someone had given me a rep so I just want to update you guys and hopefully give you some hope; this coming from someone who tends to think negatively.
After L.A., I packed my things and moved across the country to the Northeast. No job lined up. I did however had money saved, enough so I could survive at least six months. I've been living very frugally and keeping expenses to a minimum while trying to look for a job. After about three months without a job, I finally landed one, one that's close to my degree (it actually paid off, look at that! I would have never imagined that it would). By the way, the job I just got I had applied over a month ago for and they finally got back to me and up until then I was feeling rather anxious about everything.
I've got to say, I am elated. I walk more upright and at times with a smile (something I never did when working at my previous job), I feel good, things are good. Whoever is planning to make a jump I would advise to be realistic and optimistic about it, make sure you take copious notes with your expenses and differentiate between 'wants' and 'needs', have some savings to fall back on, and with a little luck things may fall into place for you.
As the proverb goes, "Nothing ventured, nothing gained.".
Good luck.
Good for you!!!! As soon as I am done with school ( 1 to 2 years) I'm moving back to CO. I miss it terribly...I'm hoping the economy gets better but I will have new job skills and hopefully a much better paying career.
Aside from finding a job, which is challenging right now, we all know that - was it difficult to do?
I'm talking you you need a change of scenery/hate the weather where you are/whatever your reason.
How did you go about doing it? Just pack up and head out? Take off driving and just hope you can find a place to stay when you get there?
I packed up and move to Charlotte back in 2009. I had visited Charlotte two weeks earlier and fell in love with it. I still love the city but the economy was horrible there and after three years couldn't find anything more than a glorified telemarketing position. I ended up leaving Charlotte for Oklahoma City this summer and found a great job within a month.
After I got a History Degree in College and had no skills, I moved to Orlando Florida with everything I owned in a UHAUL Truck, found someone who was looking for a roommate and got a job at a grocery conv store. Worked for minimum wage for three years living paycheck to paycheck. Later I found out that many people in Florida work for under $9 an hour and it was full of lazy folks who do the minimum.
Moved back home and got a MBA and while in school got some great internship experiences and landed a great job after getting my degree. Whenever I go back to Florida I drive by my old employer and apartment and wonder why I wasted three years there!
This is such an inspiring thread! Thanks everyone. I was going to quote various things, but when I got done reading there were simply too many great things to quote
It's wonderful to hear "go for it" stories and encouragement, since we all face plenty of people in our lives who tell us we are reckless or stupid for considering doing something outside the "safe zone". I am plugging my ears to all those voices and doing what I WANT for a change!!!! After all, isn't it my life?
I have done the crazy drop-everything-and-move-for-no-reason thing once before. I don't regret it, it was exciting and made me feel very alive. But I came home with my tail between my legs, in the end. I struggled too much trying to find work...it was in 2008-2009, bad timing. I came home and found that all the stuff I hated here all my life, is still here and still as annoying as ever. Why did I come back? So I am moving away again, 3,000 miles away this time. And as expected, family and friends think I am out of my mind. After all, I FAILED before. So what? It's not a success to stay here and do nothing, to stop trying. Like someone posted, you don't choose where you're from, and sometimes it's a horrible fit for who YOU are. Why be stuck with it?
Also...40 is not old! Whoever posted that they are afraid to attempt this kind of change because they are (gasp) 40...So am I! But I am child-free, heathly and single so why shouldn't I act like a twenty year old?
i did. one day i just got sick of living in the southeast and found a job in carmel california, and three weeks later i was moving from GA to california. i had one friend in los angeles, and a couple in long beach i had never met. and i had never been to california.
i am now typing this in los angeles. that was 6 years ago. it can be done. it was terrifying, and i lived in my van for a while, but i did it, and i am still pulling it off. if i can do it, poor as i am, anyone can. ANYBODY.
If I had a van or so I would have moved a lot more often...life is an adventure and you really have to take a chance and do new things and stick your neck out sometimes. I'm in the same place for 4 years now and that's a long time for me...I have no one holding me in one place so that's why I can think that way. I don't regret any of my moves, even if things didn't work out, I learned so much about myself and had so many new experiences, it doesn't all have to be positive all the time.
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Thank you
