It’s a feeling that resonates with life coach Annabel Smith, who has lived abroad three times in her life. If you're longing for a place you can’t return to, read this
There are many elements that go into making a place special to us. It’s the physical location, and everything that comes with it – the unique landscape, the weather, the structures, and the less definable ‘atmosphere’ of a place. But it’s also about the people in that space, people we love and who make us feel safe. And then there is the time we spent there, who we were when we were there, and the specific circumstances that were in place. All these elements are powerful in their own right – so what happens when we realise we can’t go back?
‘Hiraeth’ is a Welsh word that simply translates to ‘longing’, but its meaning is often said to run a little deeper. Some describe it as a sense of loss over a connection to a place where you no longer are – or perhaps can never return to, as you long for a more specific time in a place. Others point to it as capturing a longing for a feeling of home or a sense of belonging.
If you want another way to experience the meaning of this word, turn to the song ‘We’ll Keep a Welcome’ performed by the Treorchy Male Voice Choir – who sing the lines: ‘This land of song will keep a welcome/ And with a love that never fails/ We’ll kiss away each hour of hiraeth/ When you come home again to Wales.’ The song was written to capture the melancholic feeling of hiraeth that those living away from home experience, and is an immersive way to get a sense of the complexity and depth of this longing.
It’s an experience that resonates with life coach Annabel Smith, who has lived abroad three times in her life.
“Homesickness, for me, is about a lost sense of familiarity and belonging,” Annabel reflects. “In a career with a lot of travel and time spent living abroad, I longed not just for the green fields, good chocolate, and proper cups of tea of home, but also the sense of ease and understanding, of knowing where everything is and how it works. Of being safe, and invisible if I wanted to be.”
Having lived in both Kenya and the US, alone and with a partner, there were some very specific things that Annabel found herself longing for.
“I longed for a slow-burning English spring with all the familiar landmarks of snowdrops, longer days, first green leaves, birdsong, and the holidays getting closer,” she says. “Some years it was almost painful to see snow still on the ground in April, when at home everything would be green and growing.”
In a study of people from other countries living in the Netherlands, published in the journal Environment and Behavior, it was found that homesickness was most common among those who were aged 30 to 39 years old, who had been away for six to eight years. Considering a possible cause for these feelings, researchers pointed to the possibility that, even after the surroundings had become familiar, they still felt like outsiders.
It’s a theory that makes a lot of sense. The elements that go into making us feel at home in a place go far deeper than just understanding the surface of it. With time, we become tied to a place – we move with the rhythms of the local seasons, adjusting our lives slightly with the change in weather and the variations in the lengths of the days, and knowing instinctively how to navigate our surroundings. And while this is something that could happen later in life, when we find a home in a new place, the bonds that we form with places in youth are often the most poignant.
It’s a phenomenon that’s at the heart of homesickness and hiraeth – but to return to the problem at hand, if this is something that plagues us, what can we do to soothe it?
“I find writing helps, whether it’s about somewhere that’s still here or long gone,” Annabel says. “To remember the details, the smells, the quirks, the fabric of the place where I was happy (most of the time). Then write them down, taking time to find the right words. It’s good to do something when you’re homesick – I would draw, if I could.”
An element of hiraeth is longing for something that you may not ever be able to fully get back, and this is also something that Annabel has encountered along the way.
“For many years, I worked in schools with international students who were a long way from home,” she says. “Some of them didn’t know when they would be able to go back, or whether their home would still be there. I always asked them if they would like to tell me about their home. Talking about the places we’re homesick for can make us sad, but it helps, too. There were lots of happy tears.
“Now, as a coach, I work with a lot of clients who are expats or who grew up in more than one country. Talking about that helps them explore their identity and sense of who they are, which can lead to quite profound revelations and changes.”
A key element here is about not burying those feelings, or trying to push past them in order to adapt to life in a new time and place. Instead, there’s something soothing about turning to face feelings of homesickness, and to explore it from a full, sensory perspective. As is so often the case, sitting with our difficult feelings is one of the best ways to honour and work with them. To return to the example of the song ‘We’ll Keep a Welcome’, which so perfectly captures the spirit of hiraeth, even from a place of longing and melancholy, something beautiful and comfortable can be created.
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