Transitions, Cross-Cultural Adjustment & Re-entry
You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart will always be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people from more than one place. - Miriam Adeney
TRANSITIONS
Last year when my sister and I began to explore writing together about transitions, a friend advised, “Don’t write anything on a page that God has not written on your heart.” So this is where we began, we took a posterboard and listed all the things we had personally learned or experienced in the major transitions of our lives. It was powerful. This blog is not just theory from a textbook. These writings come from our stories and journey, what we’ve lived and learned over the years. KEEP READING
Many Christians have embarked on the adventure of life overseas but haven’t lasted long enough to tell much of a tale. A rough start is often the reason why. Finally, however, there’s a guide for a healthy beginning. In First 30 Daze, Larry and Susan McCrary provide Christian expats a helpful one-month guide for starting off on the right foot in their new host cultures.
The practical devotional-style book provides thirty daily Scripture references and topics about living abroad, followed by assignments for application to help the sojourner intentionally find his or her way through the crucial, but “daze-like,” time after arrival to the new location abroad.
Transition Reflections - Gains and Losses | Dr. Nairy Ohanian
Change and motion are everyday realities in today’s world. Life offers endless options for constant new beginnings. But before moving on to the next experience, season, or job opportunity, it is extremely important to reflect on the recent past. For various positive and negative reasons, people want to race forward to the new thing ahead. KEEP READING
Missionary Transitions E-Book | Ronald Koteskey
"Missionary Transitions" is a 15-chapter e-book about many of the transitions that missionaries experience. Of course, it includes the major transitions to and from the field. However, its 230 pages also contain information about the transitions missionaries go through before they leave home, while serving in their host culture, and after they return home. The book is available to download free of charge as .doc, .pdf, or .zip files for your computer and as .mobi or .epub files for your Kindle or Nook. Find it here.
Thirteen Ways to do Furlough “Good Enough” | Ashley Magruder
If there is one thing I have learned, after 8 summers in America, your furlough is not for you! This is not entirely true, but it is true that other people…family, supporters, your mission organization will have expectations of you and your time. Time, and how you spend it, will likely be the biggest question and possible contention of your home assignment. Summers for me aren’t “restful” but they can be very energizing and fun. So, how can you have your cake and eat it too while on furlough? KEEP READING
Transition is a Family Affair | Barnabas International
When your family relocates, either for a furlough or for a change of assignment, that transition experience is sometimes a “mixed-bag” of feelings for various members of the family. The attached communication game—“Transition Is a Family Affair”— has been designed to help you and your children talk about these feelings in a non-threatening manner. It allows questions to be asked or topics to be discussed at the suggestion of an external source (the game), rather than through the initiative of any single family member. Everyone is on common ground . . . each one giving his/her response (parents and children alike). VIEW GAME AS PDF
Looming Transitions Workbook | Amy Young
Amy recognizes the need for physical reminders and resources that are woven into life of a cross-cultural worker. The goal of this workbook is to create a space where you can:
Process your transition.
Make a plan so that as you board the plane, train, or get in your car to leave, you will hear, “Well done.”
Create a record you can reflect back on. Our minds can be fuzzy in transitions.
Have a physical stone of remembrance in your home. You will not always be in transition, God is with you, and you can do this.
CROSS-CULTURAL ADJUSTMENT
Beyond Culture Shock | Culture Pain, Culture Stripping
Expatriates are told to prepare for Culture Shock and expect to experience it within their first year.
But what about after that year? What about after seven years? Nine? Fifteen? What about the frustrations and tears, hurt and stress, internal (or external) cries for ‘home’? What about those days when you will do anything to get.out.of.here?
After the first year, I thought I was free from culture shock. Now I would delve deep, adapt, feel more local than foreign. So when I continued to struggle with cultural issues and when that struggle increased and peaked around year seven, I thought I was crazy. Failing. The Only One. KEEP READING
Crawl in a Hole and Other Great Advice for Expats | Jerry Jones
One: Mess it all up. How’s that for starters? The key to not messing it all up is to mess it all up. But seriously . . . it is. Get ready to make some mistakes. Lots of them. Big ones. Little ones. In between ones. Go for broke.
Mistakes are the best chance you’ve got at learning and this is absolutely the best time to make them. KEEP READING
Self-Control: How the Holy Spirit can Tame our Dangerous Thoughts | Andrew Shaughnessy
It was nearly three years ago that I first arrived in South Asia. I had come to help start Serge’s Freedom Bakery, which would give jobs to women who had been trapped in the sex trade in one of the world’s most notorious red light districts.
Those early days were the easy ones. The city, the culture, the foods, sights, and smells were all foreign, but exciting and fascinating in their newness. After a while, the new shine wore thin.
Though I never lost my love of and fascination with the people and culture surrounding me, I… we… began to witness some less than pleasant aspects of our new home. KEEP READING
What Missionaries Ought to Know about Culture Stress | Ronald Koteskey
You feel tired, anxious, discouraged, isolated, angry, and homesick but cannot think of any reason why you should feel that way. You have been on the field for several years, but these feelings always seem to be there-increasing and decreasing. You wonder what could be causing them. It could be culture stress. You may say, “I know about culture shock, but what is culture stress?” What is the difference between culture stress and culture shock? What causes culture stress?” What are its effects? What can be done about it? Can it be prevented? Let’s consider some of these questions. KEEP READING
Six Tips for Self Care While Living Abroad | James Pearson
When we move abroad we all hope—at least I did—that we will be the kind of people who integrate seamlessly into the local culture. We’ll tell jokes in the local language over cassava fries and warm beer (or whatever the local snack happens to be) and move fluidly between our compatriots and our cross-cultural friends. We’ll be perfect expats.
It turns out I am not one of those people. And during my eight years living mostly in East Africa I never met anyone who was. Some people came closer to it than I did, but no one lived up to this ideal. KEEP READING
RE-ENTRY and DEBRIEF
Returning Well invites you into a guided conversation with your Creator that will reveal and apply invaluable insights as you reflect on your recent season of cross-cultural service. By using Returning Well, you will discover how this season influenced you, how to re-integrate well, and what moving forward in faith means for you. VIEW IN AMAZON
Just like a space shuttle struggles and strains to re-enter the earth's atmosphere, so those returning from living overseas can find themselves confused and in a state of panic at coming home. While people anticipate that going overseas will require major changes in their lifestyles and thinking, few anticipate the difficulties they will face upon return.
Not only is Re-Entry a practical and helpful book for every local church and mission agency who sends workers overseas, but it is fun to read. Peter Jordan shares many anecdotes and insights into aviation and space travel.
What happens when you return from mission work? Will you begin to compare your local church and the ordinary workday lives of its members to your exhilarating experiences in missions?
Re-Entry/ Home Assignment Tips
Nairy Ohanian, D.Min, 2016
1) Take your Temperature:
How are you feeling? Hot, cold, lukewarm, burned out, exhausted?
Before you board the plane to return, take some time to assess; how am I doing? How is our family doing? Preparing yourself and your children emotionally and spiritually is vital. Know where you honestly are at. This helps in two ways: it can help determine how you spend your time away & how to answer people when they ask the all loaded question... How are you doing?
2) To Do List and Wish List:
Sort & discuss what are things we have to do and what are things we want to do. Visit Sending organization, attend a staff conference, visit churches, see family/relatives, (sometimes that is a have to and sometimes it is a want to!), vacation, etc. Make sure all the family is clear that there are Musts and Wishes, so no one is shocked when you are at your third church in one single Sunday!
3) Each Heart Matters:
Carefully discuss and determine what each family member needs from this time away. What will personally renew and refresh each person. Take time to talk with the kids with age appropriate options and choices; friendship connection, shopping, visit colleges, grandparents, beach time,
family time, mom and dad time, sightseeing, etc.
4) Communication 101:
Once you know where you and your family are emotionally and what you must do and wish to do, clearly communicate that with the necessary people whom you will see. This saves much heartache, miscommunication, and hurt feelings. Realistically express what is best for the family to Member Care or mission agencies, home church pastors, parents and grandparents, siblings, and friends. They want your best too but do not know what it is. Practicals such as airport pick up, borrow car, child care, marriage weekend, camps for kids, churches appreciate knowing, rather than guessing.
5) Your Reality Show:
Be realistic about what you can and cannot do in two weeks, one month, or six months, whatever your time away is. Remember you will come back on another trip. There is no need to do it all, see everyone in your phone book on this one trip.
6) Bookends:
A family time, just your immediate family or yourself and friends, for a time to rest and play is recommended at the start and at the end. Often you immediately race into visits and activities, already weary, and then holiday at the end when you are even more exhausted to enjoy. Cushion both ends with a down time, to rest, play and reflect.
7) Church-lobby or Coffee-shop:
Constantly being asked, “How is it going there? Are you doing well?” is often problematic. Be prepared for both the 30 second response and the extended one hour conversation, according to the context. Think ahead of time how to answer. This saves disappointment for you and them; regretting they asked if they get the wrong version!
8) Between Two Worlds:
Remember grace upon grace; to yourself and to others. You are really living in two worlds. Your adopted culture has influenced your attitudes, beliefs, habits, hospitality yet others things are still your passport culture. These two realities will clash at some point on your re-entry trip. Take a deep breath, recognize you have feet in two worlds, extend grace, be humble and be grateful that you are Bi-Cultural at this season of your life
9) It’s Not all about You:
Some people may not be interested in your story. Or you only get 3 minutes to share about the last 3 years! That happens. Be gracious, give it your best 3 minutes ever, and trust that God will touch and lead the interested ones to you. Be intentional to ask about their lives and concerns.
10) Self-Care and Sabbath.
No matter how full your schedule, maintain healthy habits for yourself and family. Sleep, try to eat healthy meals, exercise, journal, read the Word and pray, have fun with a friend and don’t discuss your mission work, observe a weekly day of Sabbath rest, play a game, walk in nature, call your mentor, etc. This will make an enormous difference in your time away.
The Le Rucher model of personal debriefing for cross-cultural field workers was developed in France and is being offered in Rwanda, the Netherlands, Germany, and Montana in the USA.
Le Rucher certified debriefers have been making debriefing retreats available under the leadership of Sarah Lanier (author of the book “Foreign to Familiar”) at Fellowship Valley Christian Retreat Center (located just north of Clarkesville, Georgia) since 2013.
Debriefing retreats serve to help cross cultural field workers ‘unpack’ their time in service. Much ‘baggage’ is often gathered through the stresses of cross cultural and team dynamics. In debriefing, we listen, and walk alongside the individual or couple for the purpose of bringing it all to God.
