Making Normal

Eight long days ago, bags where gathered, the truck was packed, the Garmin was set up, and I began the nine hour drive to Maryland. One week ago today I started life as a resident of the East Coast. And now, after living this past week, I can look back and already see how this whole experience is changing little things about me. 

Moving to college 3 years ago was a very stretching experience, full of growth and change. But slowly somewhere along the way, the newness and discomfort of leaving home and living on my own, wore off. In its place grew a sense of normalcy. College became my home. My new friends became my family. And the new ways I did things became habits that gradually altered the definition of what it was to be me. After a while I was able to settle into a sense of belonging. Things, life, daily patterns that once were strange, eventually became normal. 

But now, here I am in a new place once again. I arrived here last Sunday with lots of uncertainties. I only really knew one person. I had a new roommate and found myself living with 12+ new people in very close quarters for seemly endless amounts of time. I had to adjust. Change the way I did some things. Change the way I reacted to some things. I've had to weed out little parts of who I was that simply were not practical, useful, or right. 

It is painful when you have to do that. When you have to leave what is normal and stop operating in a way you consider normal. When you have to adapt to a new environment and develop parts of yourself that may have been unused up until this point. 

This is a great place to be I think. When you're put in a new place with new people and new experiences, you have two choices: either try to deal with the situation in a way you would have in the past, or chose to grow and develop a new part of yourself. That whole moving out of your comfort zone thing can be really uncomfortable, but you grow so much more there. There's very little chance to grow in a place that's just, "normal." In a, "normal," place you will only feel compelled to do, "normal," things. Sometimes you have to go somewhere new, somewhere that is perhaps uncomfortable, in order to learn something new about yourself. 

Two nights ago I was laying in bed getting ready to fall asleep, when I felt it for the first time: normal. It actually felt strange. For nearly a week I had been surrounded by, "new," "strange," "uncomfortable," and "awkward." But in that moment in bed, all the emotions I was feeling and thoughts I was having, were suddenly a repeat. Something I had done before. And in that moment I felt normal, and it felt really good. To know that amidst all the chaos and craziness of my new living situation, I had for now, found one little place where something was normal.

I think sometimes normal can be good. I think it can be good to have something to fall back on. Something that feels right. And the thing that I loved about that moment, was that the normal wasn't an old normal, a normal from life back at home or college. It was a new normal. A normal that I had made in this new place. It proved to me that despite the difficulties inherent in moving to a new place with new people, I could still eventually find somewhere where I was comfortable because something was normal.

And now over these past few days, life with these 12 people has slowly become at least a little more normal. There are still countless ways every day that I have to adapt and grow. But day by day I'm learning that fear of new places isn't really a good reason to stay where you are. If you're not growing and learning and adapting where ever you are, then try going somewhere new. Try doing something different or meeting someone new. Because where ever you go, you can make that normal, and you can learn a lot along the way.