5 unexpected EQ blows of moving home and how to best overcome them

Lessons learnt form moving into Shiageto Towers 4.0, aka The Knife Block, aka IQEQFQ HQ 🔪🏡

Apparently moving home is one of the top 3 stressful things most of us will go through in life 😬.

I should know: I recently bought and moved into my dream flat 🏡.

After 6 years of renting, I had found THE place; the one I intend to live in for a good while, to grow my life and business from 🙌.

Whilst there was was much to look forward to, there was one small problem between me and living in this dream apartment: I had to move out the old place and into the new one…plus, did I mention, I’d decided to redecorate the new place in the one week between buying and moving in 😳.

I really was not prepared for the impact it had on me emotionally, physically, professionally and socially 🫩.

Only now, almost 8 weeks later, can I finally say that I am truly living in the place and beginning to get my life back to a new normal.

During that time I’ve been through an emotional rollercoaster 🎢.

I’ve finally had time to take stock of all the emotional things that befell me during the move and wanted to share them and some suggestions on how to overcome them in case you are about to go through a similar adventure.

The EQ things to be aware of

1. Moving home is a series of Stress bombs waiting to explode 🤯 — Between the buying process, the packing, the moving, the fixing, the cleaning, the saying goodbyes, the unpacking, the decorating, the flat pack furniture the unexpected events, the learning new processes, the meeting new people, the not having furniture, and so forth, there’s a lot to think about. Plus there is always something more to do 😫
2. Very few things will go according to plan and everything takes longer than planned 🕒 — from the flat pack furniture that was missing pieces, to the delivery that got screwed up, to my car getting broken into 😫
3. You will hit decision overload 🤔 — even if you are not renovating or redecorating there will be infinite decisions to make from what room to set up first to where to put things. In my case I also had to make a ridiculous amount of decisions in the space of one day all about colour schemes, door handles, carpet choices, wooden floor coverings, etc. No wonder I felt exhausted all the time 😫
4. You will feel like an idiot constantly 🥹 — “How do I operate this?”, “How do I close this?”, “Damn it, I locked myself out again!” [all real things that happened to me] 😫
5. You will learn a lot about friendship 🤨 — real friends will actually come and help with moving, cleaning, painting, etc. Good friends will visit with gifts or send cards and bottles of champagne. Lesser friends will say congrats. The rest will show their true colours 😫

10 things to help overcome these EQ blows

1. Budget more time, Money and goodwill than you originally planned ⌚ 💷 🤗 — doubling everything is a good start
2. Supercharge your decision making 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↔️— go all in, think about things at the extremes and don’t make half decisions
3. Accept a bit of discomfort and embrace the imperfect 🫣— the guest who turned up when there was no bed was a perfect lesson in this; discomfort passes quickly, teaches you a lot and nobody apart from you cares about perfection
4. Prioritise ruthlessly and remember it’s ok to pause things ⛔⏸️ — missing out on a few social events won’t kill you and you can always catch up on most things later
5. Let go of things that aren’t that important 🚮 — this could be possessions, tasks or people
6. Befriend the previous owners and your neighbours 🫂— there really are no stupid questions and these folk will be a shortcut to most things (plus if you are lucky you will end up sipping champagne at your neighbour’s apartment on your first night in the new place, like me)
7. Keep the momentum ⏩ — don’t put things off as everything temporary becomes permanent pretty quickly; do everything you could possibly want now and stretch yourself as much as possible
8. Try everything out and create new routines sooner rather than later 🆕 — be it finding your local falafel joint, embracing a new Exercise regime or starting a hosting habit (even if it involves all the tidy up and then repeat and repeat)
9. Make time for some fun during this period (in moderation, see point 4 above) 😁 — for me I managed to squeeze in a trip to Wimbledon, the theatre, an exhibition and a festival
10. Don’t forget the finishing touches 🌿 🎨 — elements like plants, art, etc will counteract the pain you’ve experienced along the way

3 Mantras that helped me during the toughest moments

1. “Eat the elephant one bite at a time” 🐘 — when everything seemed too overwhelming
2. “Nobody will care as much about this ever as much as you do right now and future you will thank you for that” 🤝— when I thought about doing a task half-arsed
3. “This is an investment in your future” 📈— when I thought about making the cheap decision

Conclusion

Suffice to say, I don’t want to have to go through that again in a hurry but I am incredibly happy with the end result; I have an amazing place to build the next stage of my life from 😊.

As the memory of the pain fades over time, this blog will serve to remind me what it was like 📝.

More importantly, if it can help even one of you future movers lessen the pain by even a little bit then my work here is done 🙌.

Faris

Faris is the CEO and Founder of Shiageto Consulting, an innovative consultancy that helps firms and individuals sharpen their effectiveness. Connect with him here

Success = IQ x EQ x FQ

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Originally Published on https://farisaranki.medium.com/

Faris Aranki Strategy & Emotional Intelligence

Having spent over 20 years delivering strategic change for the corporate and non-corporate worlds, Faris has experienced first-hand the fine differences between strategic success and failure.
His work has spanned numerous companies (from global behemoths to small start-ups), in numerous countries, across a range of sectors, supporting them all to unlock strategic success.

He came to realize that often what hinders institutions from achieving their goals goes beyond the quality of their strategy; it is their ability to engage effectively with others at all levels and remove barriers in their way. This has led to his passion for improving strategic effectiveness within all businesses and individuals and the foundation of Shiageto Consulting.

Over time, Faris has worked to distill his knowledge of how to solve complex problems in a structured manner combined with his skill on engaging effectively with others and his ability to quickly determine the barriers to a strategy's success. This knowledge has formed the foundation of Shiageto’s workshops, courses and methodologies. Faris believes that any firm or team can adopt these improvements; all it requires is a little of the right support -something Shiageto provides!

On top of leading our business, Faris is now an accomplished speaker and contributor for a variety of outlets.