Why Changing Your Surroundings Feels Like Changing Your Life

And so the body moves first.

My parents are moving house, my sister is moving house, I’m moving house too, and none of us planned it together.

I think moving is a decision we pretend is entirely practical. When I get the urge, I jump on Rightmove or Zoopla and look at floorplans, potential commutes, gardens (must be good for entertaining), and I like to imagine where my favourite David Hockney print will go on the wall. Building little dreams around what is, in my case at least, something a bit deeper that is quite hard to articulate.

Nevertheless, I will try to articulate it, because writing has this lovely way of opening up these things you have in your head.

Enough water has gone under the bridge in my gaff to sink a battleship.

This year I started noticing all of the things I want to throw away, or send to the charity shop, or whatever. Particularly, stuff that I usually wouldn’t think about for years at a time. There’s a box in a wardrobe in my office of notes I got from a lass at uni, she’d slip them under my door. I rediscovered it looking for a suit for a wedding a few weeks ago. I haven’t kept that out of sentimentality, I just never got around to throwing it out.

I suppose this is part two of an essay I wrote earlier this year about how houses are just an accumulation of mental and physical shit, really.

Anyway, this genre of feeling initially presents itself physically (in the body) for me, far before it becomes a thought I can attempt to explain to someone else. I usually feel some kind of irritation or excitability. In the case of the house, generally the first step is to rearrange a room. A relatable feeling might be when you jump on ASOS or go down to the vintage shop because you’re suddenly sick of the clothes you owned for years.

I think the body realises this before the mind admits that anything is up.

Changing environments can feel so urgent during periods of transition. Whatever is happening inside of you is harder to put your finger on. You can’t easily reorganise memory, identity, grief, boredom, ambition or desire. But in a vain attempt at control, you can empty a drawer, or move furniture around, and you can certainly put your life into a bunch of cardboard boxes and write KITCHEN across the top.

There is something primitive about that kind of thing that I like. You know, how we often imagine ourselves evaluating our circumstances, acting on what feels like reasonable conclusions. I think much of life seems to happen the other way around. The bodily feeling usually comes first and then a thoughtful justification follows.

We say we do things because of X, Y, Z kind of practicalities. But you know, all of those explanations can feel like admin. I think a lot of decisions are made much more on instinct, and those “reasonable” practicalities get attached afterwards, mainly so we don’t sound crazy.

It reminds me a bit of when you’re getting off with someone and something inside of you realises they’re not it.

My parents are leaving one version of our family home, and not the version I grew up in. The parental home is powerful. It becomes an unofficial archive, like the historical versions of your old life still exist there. You leave and go about your independence, but when you visit, the furniture might’ve changed, but all of the memories are still there. Maybe there’s some comfort in that, if you had a good childhood at least.

Then within a week that archive is being boxed up.

People become nostalgic about stuff they were previously desperate to leave. Once something is leaving, it becomes loveable again. It’s like, once a change is impending, you’re suddenly able to notice the light in the hallway again.

The departure improves the composition.

It’s tempting to conclude (putting practicalities to one side) that all of this makes the whole thing feel pointless. But change can still be useful precisely because it interrupts the repetitive somatic relationship between us and our lives. Maybe that might be what the body is asking for when it becomes restless. It’s a bit like having a new opportunity to be conscious of everyday life once more. That’s similar to how you feel for the first few days when you’re travelling, before the novelty wears off.

This is also why this idea of “starting again” is so tempting. A new situation offers you the possibility of a cleaner slate. This time you will not accumulate rubbish, and make the mistakes you once did. This time you will keep things organised and things won’t get so messy.

But cut the bullshit for a minute.

The fantasy is not really about all of that, it is about personal revision.

Your habits travel. So do your fears, flaws, your unfinished business, and your bad sleep. You can change the view the eyes see without changing the person looking through them.

So, let’s pack it up, put it in boxes, and carry it somewhere else.

There is a problem though, you still exist.