Cultural stress..who, me?!

I learned something the other week. Cultural stress is real...and I have been struggling with it. Yes, it's true. Think, "Hello, my name is Stacy Nofziger and I have been struggling with cultural stress." Confession is good for the soul, you know! :)

No, I didn't think I'd find myself immune to the transition of moving from the US to the Czech Republic. Not really, anyway. I knew that life would be different in some ways and similar in other ways to my life in the US. But, I guess I never really thought much about how I would be affected by it. 

You see, a few weeks after Christmas, I started feeling kind-of blah...not having a whole lot of motivation to do much...not feeling like I was making progress in language or relationships...just feeling indifferent. I didn't understand why. In fact, I probably just assumed I was having an "off" day...or week. 

Until I received a very helpful email from the Human Resources Director at EMM. 

The email included a document to help me process my experience thus far into my assignment. It also talked about this ambiguous thing called cultural stress. According to the document, "All workers go through cultural stress, whether they admit it or not. No one can avoid it. This cultural stress is the result of encountering ways of doing, organizing, perceiving or valuing things which are different from yours and threaten your basic, unconscious belief that your enculturated customs, assumptions, values and behaviors are right. This kind of stress is often not identifiable, but is accumulated over time by small events or experiences."

It lists the five characteristics of cultural stress as: 

1. Change in social roles

2. Loss in being able to communicate well through spoken language

3. Changes in routine

4. Involvement with a new community

5. Understanding of your role

Without realizing it, and without being able to even put my feelings into words, I had hit EVERY ONE of these points. No wonder I was feeling blah and unmotivated! 

No, things didn't change automatically, but it is amazing how simply knowing that everyone struggles with these things at some point in their transition helped to normalize my experience. I didn't feel like I was the only person to feel this way. What a relief! 

Yes, I still struggle with some of the factors of cultural stress. But, now, I feel like I have tools to walk forward, instead of stalling out and growing more frustrated.