"Perhaps the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything. Maybe it’s about unbecoming everything that isn’t really you.” — Paulo Coelho
Starting a new life abroad can be both exhilarating and unsettling. While new beginnings bring hope and possibility, they also carry moments of uncertainty, homesickness, and a longing for what’s been left behind. It’s natural to feel both proud of where you are and deeply aware of what you had to give up.
Emigration doesn’t only change your address; it transforms how you see yourself, your family, and your idea of home. If this resonates with you, you’re not alone.
During times of transition, what we often need most is a space to say aloud what we’ve been keeping to ourselves. Through conversation and reflection, it becomes possible to make sense of your experience and to find words for the complex mix of emotions that follow change: excitement and grief, belonging and longing.
A Confidential Space: Share your experience openly without fear of judgment.
Sense-Making & Reflection: Piece together the moments of joy and challenge to form a coherent story of your journey.
Identity Exploration: Gently explore the person you are becoming in this new chapter of your life.
Perhaps the answer lies not in reaching a destination but in discovering a deeper understanding of yourself and finding a sense of home within, wherever you are.
Expert articles and tips to support your journey and understanding.
4 minutes
As a family therapist specialising in emigration, I’ve learned that leaving one’s homeland is never simple. In my article “The Relativity of Emigration,” I draw on M.C. Escher’s artwork Relativity to illustrate how families, like the figures in his impossible staircases, live in different worlds yet remain connected. Parents learn to live with absence, and emigrants learn to care through distance. Though our perspectives differ, love and shared history continue to bind us. Migration may separate families physically, but it also reveals the enduring strength of human connection — proof that, like art, love knows no boundaries.
4 minutes
Emigrasie is meer as net ’n fisiese verskuiwing, dit is ’n emosionele reis van verlies, aanpassing en veerkragtigheid. Hierdie artikel ondersoek hoe die Franse beeldhouer Bruno Catalano se kuns die onafgehandelde emosies van emigrasie sigbaar maak. Deur sy halfvoltooide figure en simboliese tasse gee Catalano vorm aan die innerlike leemtes en herinneringe wat emigrante én dié wat agterbly saam met hulle dra. Sy kuns bied ’n visuele taal vir die stille pyn, hoop en aanhou beweeg wat eie is aan elke emigrasie-verhaal, n bewys dat selfs in verlies, daar steeds beweging en betekenis is.
4 min
I read somewhere that airports are story-making factories: people waiting to watch their loved ones walk further and further away from them until they can no longer be seen. Today is my turn... you with a backpack filled with dreams on your way to another continent and me with my memories bidding you farewell, not knowing when I will see you again. I wanted to paste a red and white "Fragile: Handle with care" sticker like a Band Aid plaster over my heart to ease the pain...
