As a life long “city girl” I know ALL the drawbacks to moving from the big city to a small town or the countryside and the hangups people have against doing so.  I’d like to get into how to cope with living in a small town and why once you are able to make adjustments it is much better for your mental and physical health to kiss the city life goodbye.

When I met my husband what attracted me to him was his rugged masculinity and individualism. What I only realized once we began to plan our lives together was that being with him meant I would never be living in a major city again. My husband is a mountain man who needs wide open spaces and property.

Here are a few of the adjustments I made over the years that have taken me from HATING small town life, to loving it far more than the big city.

Learn how to cook. 

Food options or the lack thereof are likely going to be the largest negative factor of living outside of a bigger city.  Learning how to cook  and find the ingredients for the foods I was craving the most, ended up eliminating virtually every downside I had to living in a small town.

Travel

Look at your house as an estate or a home base. We home school and once I quit my job and was able to travel, it took me from being bitter and resentful about my living situation to genuinely hating the city.  We go with my husband on his work trips every month or two. A few days in a place like Dallas, Seattle, Nashville, or Phoenix, more than gives me my fill of whatever cultural or big city activities I’d like to do, and has me so thankful to return to my small town where I am not suffocated by tall buildings and endless long lines everywhere I go.  We have decided we will probably get a couple vacation houses (one in Dallas and another outside Phoenix) that we will rent out the rest of the year. Living the simple life, and getting a taste of the city a few times a year gives you the perfect balance to meet your needs.

Turn your home into an oasis

(this takes time!!) but luckily even before you reach your goal of creating your oasis, you can focus on creating it, which takes up a lot of mental and physical energy. Turning my home into my own resort/ oasis/ vacation station is very rewarding. We have bikes, a play ground, a hot tub, my daughter has an outdoor art studio equipped with a heater for the winter and a tv for her to watch tv while crafting.  and I’ve worked on decorating and renovating our home and renovating the apartment above our garage into an airbnb rental where others will come when they’re visiting family or on vacation.

Find your places.

This means locating your favorite tanning salon, nail salon, select restaurants, and gaining increased knowledge of local events. Before you find them, you can POSITIVELY focus on finding them. This will give you a sense of purpose and a fun task to do so you don’t spend your time thinking about missing the city.

I would sooner die than ever live year round in a major city ever again. I am fine with a condo in Dallas to spend Christmas with family and a fun downtown house in Phoenix to enjoy the spring weather for a few weeks every year but nothing more.  The small town country life allows your creativity to flow, it allows you to disconnect and distance yourself from every negative cultural and mental influence that plagues us as members of modern society. It truly allows you to have it all and reap the benefits of having the best of both worlds. The thought of having a forever home in a major city or suburb now sounds oppressive and suffocating. To have land and space and freedom of movement is now so much more appealing. Horses, cows, goats, sustainability, an estate, endless possibilities to build and grow and create my own oasis, there isn’t a major city in the world that can replace the value of that.

Check out my video below, where I discuss this in detail!