How to deal with stress when moving to Cambodia

Hello Priscilla.

I cannot speak for stress related to coming to Cambodia, as I came from 8 years neighbour country Thailand. But I had the problems facing me when I left my Western European country 11 years ago.

In general I follow Oriental wisdom in getting and maintaining inner balance and inner peace.

With that in mind you can avoid stress. Stress is nothing more than the fear to not being able to remove the obstacles that are in your way.

That fear is bigger if you have not prepared yourself well enough. If you did not read about visa regulations, not about currency that is used, not about the best way to travel safely, not about where you really want to settle, you ask for stress, because you haven't a clue what is coming your way and how to deal with it.

I used, in my business life already, to make a "To do list", complete with questions and possible answers. Each question answered was deleted. When the list was empty I knew I was well prepared.

Of course obstacles appear unexpectedly and you have to deal with them. Personally I believe if you are not able to deal with problems you should have stayed in your nanny state where there is an office for any kind of question.
If you, like me, left your country with just one suitcase, a travel bag and a camera bag you have chosen your destination, sold, given away, threw away all that you could not take with you and depart.
Of course a "fresh" new passport, drivers license, credit card, insurance and enough cash money to finance the travel, $30 or $35 ready for visa, passport photos made. Copies of all documents in case you lose some, money divided in parts and locked in different pockets of your trousers.

First is mostly a long haul flight, then change planes and a short flight, arrival in Phnom Penh.
You have of course already booked accommodation, you know about the taxi mafia at the airport so you walk to the exit gate where trustful taxis are waiting for much less fares.

I come back to my general "rule of life". Keep and maintain your inner balance. If something or someone disturbs your inner balance and with that your inner peace, remove it and restore your balance. Example if you live in a place that you don't like, bad roads, dust, mud, much traffic, don't let it disturb your inner balance, move on to a place that lets you keep your inner balance and peace.
That way you avoid stress. You avoid imbalance inside you, leading to headaches or other ailments.
You are in a position to change as much as you want, you rent only, so you can move out easily. Only when you have found the place where you can be happy and in balance, you can say I have found my destination.

Joe

It is the stress I like to escape by moving to Cambodia. I have not stress about the move, I am looking forward to it so much!
I have stress about disolving everything over here. Getting everything done, sold and arranged. All this paperwork pffff. As I said before: Western Europe is over-regulated! Nanny states for who can not handle themself and a big brother states for government and large companies to check, control and manipulate the people.

I like to come in get some accomodation and do nothing, just nothing and than relax and start slowly the plan I made.
I planned everything in detail. But I also know that nothing will go exactly like planned.
But as Joe said, I am prepared. I have read everything on the internet, without believing everything.
Can't wait for the day I will land in Cambodia!

JoeKhmer

Thank you for this post, I’ve read it twice!

“Stress is nothing more than the fear to not being able to remove the obstacles that are in your way.”

This is so true, I intend to make it my “mantra” for stressful situations in the future. As it happens, I’m particularly sensitive to stress, because I’m suffering from a chronic ailment that (obviously) gets worse in stressful situations, even though it’s not caused by stress.

I’ve been “practicing” this new attitude the last few days, and it really helped - just take a deep breath, think about what’s happening and why, and take the next step, and everything looks a little better, even if I’m still in pain.

(And sorry if I hijacked the thread)

You know we were all in that situation, me a few years ago , but just making a huge move is impowering

Kurterino wrote:

JoeKhmer

Thank you for this post, I’ve read it twice!

“Stress is nothing more than the fear to not being able to remove the obstacles that are in your way.”

This is so true, I intend to make it my “mantra” for stressful situations in the future. As it happens, I’m particularly sensitive to stress, because I’m suffering from a chronic ailment that (obviously) gets worse in stressful situations, even though it’s not caused by stress.

I’ve been “practicing” this new attitude the last few days, and it really helped - just take a deep breath, think about what’s happening and why, and take the next step, and everything looks a little better, even if I’m still in pain.

(And sorry if I hijacked the thread)

You can do yourself a favour by introducing the deep breathing technique. It leads to 3x breathing per minute and because of deep breathing also the small lungs are filled with oxygen which then stimulates kidneys and bladder to function better. It's easy. Lay down and breathe in, not like we men are used to, from your chest, but from your belly [women do that automatically]. Lay a hand on your belly and feel it move up when you breathe in, slowly belly and then chest fill with air, then hold shortly and breathe out slowly. This in and out breathing should take about twenty seconds, meaning you breathe only 3x per minute. This makes you feel relaxed and because your body is effectively provided with oxygen you will feel great after 5 minutes. I practice it often although I have no stress, it just makes me feel good.

Cheers

Joe

Thanks! I did know about the deep breathing technique, I’ve used it primarily when I had problems falling asleep, and also for self-hypnosis (although I’ve never really successfully got into the same state as when i was with my hypno-therapist).

I will use it in the way you described it, before I just focused on the breathing itself, not trying to make it as regular as possible. I’m sure that will be even more beneficial.