How to Bloom Where You’re Planted

“Bloom where you’re planted.” It’s kind of a motto among military families. It refers to the idea of thriving in any environment you find yourself placed in, and I’d say that’s the very job description of a military spouse. It’s no small thing to have your roots pulled up regularly and manage to find your bearings in each new location, often while helping little ones navigate the transition, too, but the average military family does this every 2-3 years. Whether you’re someone who moves frequently or just once or twice in your life, we all have to adjust to changing circumstances sometimes, and no matter what our new surroundings are like or how much we might long for what we’ve left behind, it’s essential for our hearts to believe that blooming in this new place is possible.

So how do we thrive when we’re transplanted somewhere completely new, sometimes to a place we would not have chosen? I’d suggest it begins before we even get there- not so much in our preparations but in our expectations.

Managing Expectations

During my time as a military spouse, I’ve discovered that I need to coach myself as I prepare for a PCS (military move) to have both low expectations and high expectations, regardless of where we are headed. The low expectations come in the form of acknowledging that I might experience a post-PCS crash when the adrenaline that got me through all the tasks required for the move runs out, I suddenly find myself physically and emotionally exhausted, and I don’t yet have a support system to help get me on my feet. The high expectations come in the form of remembering that I will make those friends, find my way around the community, and find my place in it, just like I always have. I may not be able to imagine the specific people that will become my people there, because I don’t know them yet, but God always provides those relationships in each new place, and I can trust that He’ll do it again anywhere He takes me. In the meantime, it’s another season of opportunity to anchor myself to Him and experience Him as my best friend- a true gift in disguise.

So, we bring the inner angst down a notch and remind ourselves that it’s going to be hard (and that’s normal), and that it’s going to get better (it always does). Then what do we do to start blooming in our new place? First, we have to establish some roots…

Exploring Where You’re Planted

An essential step in coming to enjoy a place is to go out and experience it so that you can find out what there is to love about it. You might not have a ton of energy to pack up the kids and go adventuring every day (I’ve had post-PCS seasons where I could barely get off the couch for many weeks, especially when I was pregnant), but do what you can, a little at a time. Check out a couple of the major attractions, but find the little places, too, like the best playground or the McDonalds with tables that light up when you touch them or the little trail behind your house with the wildflowers blooming. It’s ok to miss your old places (and being somewhere different will highlight the fact that you no longer have those things), but look for the good where you are now. You don’t need to get caught up in an anxious bucket-list mentality, but cultivating gratitude for the things you do experience is crucial to thriving. There are lovely things to be found in every place, even if it’s the last place you want to be.

My family and I weren’t particularly thrilled about being sent to Oklahoma, and we never grew very attached to the place, but there was enough to appreciate about it that, when it came time to move again, I found myself walking along a now-familiar trail for the last time, heart overflowing with gratitude for the lovely things about this place that I was about to leave behind- the gifts God gave us in this specific place. There were the bright blue dragonflies we often saw on our walks. The little dinosaur-shaped ramps at the bowling alley and the driving carts at the grocery store. The tornado shelter we were lucky to have under our garage and lucky never to have to use. A SuperTarget a stone’s throw away from the base (not going to happen in Okinawa or Alaska, my friend). Memories of taking our kids to their first NBA game, and a date night at the outdoor theater on the water. There were bison, prairie dogs, child-sized leather cowboy boots, grade-A steak, and always that big, wide-open sky painting marvelous sunsets in our backyard almost every night. If I can wax poetic about a duty station I didn’t love, you can too, friend, in time.

Sure, there were many things I loved and missed about our previous homes, things that were absent in this place, but when you compare apples to oranges, it’s not going to lead to happiness. We love those places in large part because they became ours, and this place will get woven into our identity in time, too. We need to appreciate each place for what it is and find gratitude in our hearts for both, even as we grieve what we’ve said goodbye to. It was in this place where my son lost his first tooth, my daughter got her big-girl bed, we welcomed our 3rd baby, and we made friends we will be connected to forever.

Connecting Where You’re Planted

That leads us to the next essential aspect of blooming in a new place: making friends. No matter how amazing (or less-than-amazing) a place might be, it’s usually the people you meet that make the experience most meaningful. Most of us know this from experience, and it’s the fear that we won’t make friends that can be the biggest hurdle to believing that life in our next place will be good. You will make friends, friend. But it will happen a lot quicker if you put yourself out there. Who knows, maybe you’ll get lucky and someone great will reach out to you right away, but sometimes the people around you don’t know who is new and who isn’t, or they’re preoccupied with their own stuff. So as much as you’d love for someone else to do the initiating, it’s crucial to put yourself out there, especially if you’re on a cycle of moving every few years and would like the time to let the relationships deepen.

So strike up a conversation with the woman on the park bench or say hello to someone at church. Get their contact info and plan a meetup. Join the spouse’s group, or a book club at the local library. Invite your co-worker over for dinner. Host a game night for your neighbors. Work on finding a sitter so you can go try out a new hobby or reconnect with an old one you loved, and meet people doing it.

Expect to make friends, and go out and meet them, but don’t expect your new friendships to be carbon copies of your old ones, or to meet one person that checks off every single box of your ideal best friend. Just as you need people to appreciate who you are and what you can and can’t give in this season of your life, appreciate each person you meet for who they are and resist comparing them to others you’ve known. It’s actually one of the best things about living a transient lifestyle- the ability to meet so many new and interesting people, all with unique personalities and life stories. Its a gift to know them and to become a little, or big, part of each other’s stories.

So, sure, keep in touch with your good friends from old places, especially when you’re feeling lonely, but give the people in your new place a chance. You need each other, here in this place, even if you don’t know it yet. Under that big Oklahoma sky, we and our new friends experienced adoptions, births, and even deaths that wove our lives together forever. These people who had been strangers to us only a few months before were there for us, and we for them, when our families across the country couldn’t be. Whatever happens in your family’s life in the next few years, these are the people you’ll experience it with, and your hearts might be knit together for good. So go out there and find them. You’ll only regret not doing it sooner.

Investing Where You’re Planted

I believe that God has a purpose for us in each place he takes us, and that goes beyond what we get out of each place. We are also meant to give. As you find your bearings in your new place and start to make connections, consider how this place might be better off because you’re there. There’s something about you that this place needs, and what that is is as unique as you are.

Part of being a plant that flourishes is bearing fruit, and in the context of engaging in our places, this comes in the form of service. It doesn’t have to be something formal, like volunteering with the Red Cross or joining the PTA, though it might be. It could just be offering to babysit for a neighbor or making a home cooked meal for a single servicemember or cheering someone up with your stellar sense of humor. I actually did meet a woman who was a comedian at heart, and she started recording some hilarious monologues that always brightened my day.

What are the things you are capable of doing during your current season of life that could be a blessing to someone else? It’s likely that you’re doing some of these things already, without even thinking much about it, because it’s a natural manifestation of who you are. In fact, military spouses are often great at this because we know what it’s like to be the one with the deployed spouse or the kids who don’t have any friends to invite to their birthday party and we’re so grateful for the people who have reached out to us, so we’re tuned in and ready to pay it forward. And this is a huge springboard to growing to love our new people and our new place, by taking care of them.

Owning Where You’re Planted

It will take a little time, but soon you’re going to know your new neighborhood like the back of your hand, you’ll have some dear friends you feel like you’ve known forever, and this place that you may not have found appealing at first glance will have become dear to your heart, because a part of your story happened there.