376. 7 tips for moving to a new country in your 20s
The Psychology of your 20s
iHeartPodcasts
4.8 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 19 January 2026
⏱️ 33 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Moving to a new city is one of the most exciting (and emotionally challenging) things you can do in your twenties. Whether it’s for work, study, love, or a fresh start, leaving behind what’s familiar often brings a mix of freedom, fear, loneliness, and growth all at once. It’s a rite of passage, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.
In this episode, I’m sharing my personal experience of moving cities multiple times in my 20s, including moving internationally for the first time, alongside the psychology that explains why this transition feels so destabilising—and what actually helps.
We explore:
• Why moving increases stress, emotional exhaustion, and homesickness
• Why it takes around 6 months to truly adjust to a new city
• The role of routine, repetition, and place attachment in feeling settled
• Why “going home too often” can slow down adjustment
• How novelty, social effort, and structure protect mental health during transitions
If you’ve just moved, or are thinking about it, this episode will help you feel less alone, more grounded, and more confident that what you’re feeling is normal, temporary, and part of the process.
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For business: psychologyofyour20s@gmail.com
The Psychology of your 20s is not a substitute for professional mental health help. If you are struggling, distressed or require personalised advice, please reach out to your doctor or a licensed psychologist.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.5 | Guaranteed Human. |
| 0:08.5 | Hello everybody. |
| 0:10.0 | I'm Jemma Spike and welcome back to the psychology of your 20s, the podcast where we talk |
| 0:15.4 | through the biggest changes, moments and transitions of our 20s and what they mean for our psychology. |
| 0:29.1 | Hello everybody. Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to the podcast. It is so great to have you |
| 0:35.0 | here back for another episode. Today we are talking about a ride of passage for so many of us, |
| 0:42.0 | but also one of the scariest things you can do in your 20s, moving to a new city, |
| 0:49.4 | whether it's after you graduate college or for college or just for fun, for work, for a relationship. |
| 0:56.8 | Leaving what we know and the place we call home can be honestly, it's romantic, it's exciting, |
| 1:03.8 | it's also deeply conflicting, right? |
| 1:05.6 | There is the allure of a fresh start and then there is also a deep fear. |
| 1:14.5 | Fear around, like, am i even going to like this i'm i going to make friends am i going to be able to afford it am i going to find the places and |
| 1:20.5 | the routines and the community that i love i have moved around a lot in my life but especially in mys. I'm on my third city of my 20s so far. And you guys know I've just moved internationally for the first time. I now call London Home. And I think all the experiences that I've had before have actually given me a bit of a routine and a formula that I am currently |
| 1:44.8 | following to adjust to this new city and to make this place feel like home. And so I want to |
| 1:51.3 | share that with you all. I will say it isn't without its challenges. I don't want to romanticize |
| 1:58.2 | it too much because part of the reality and I guess the price you pay |
| 2:03.3 | for a new beginning is that it's going to be hard and you are going to be sad and there will be |
| 2:09.3 | lonely times. I won't lie. London has London's kind of knocked me on my butt. I've been pretty |
| 2:15.9 | lonely. I haven't really found my groove yet. |
| 2:18.5 | I miss my dog. I miss my dog. It feels like I'm literally grieving somebody. But having a plan is sometimes all you kind of need to break out of that funk and just let you enjoy the process a little bit more. |
| 2:33.0 | Because that's what it is. It's a process. It's going to get |
... |
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