i keep moving cities and i'm still lonely

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]I feel like I need to come clean to you guys about something. I have moved 26 times in my life, including to four of the major US cities since graduating college just a couple years ago. I'll let you guess how many years. But I have also just spent in the last two months, I've spent more time on the road and out and about than the city that I currently have an apartment in, which it's an interesting existence. I've done digital nomad stints before. I work in tech, so I have more flexibility perhaps than in other industries. I've gotten to take advantage of this and see a lot of the country. But every time that I make one of these moves, I tell myself, I want it to be the last time. I want it to be finding my home and the place that I can nest. But I feel like I haven't found that yet. And it's something that I've really been seeking. My newsletter subscribers already know about this journey I've been on in the last four weeks, but I've really been trying to find a place to call home. And what I'm looking for has changed over the years.

[00:01:12]I think that when you travel as much as I do, when you live and experience as many different places as I have, there's an immense benefit in that. There's so much rich cultural context that you can glean from experiencing things unfamiliar to you or being plopped in an environment that is so foreign to the way that you grew up. It's definitely expanded my worldview pushed me when it comes to my political beliefs. So much of myself and my identity has changed based on where I was living. Whether it was LA or San Francisco, New York, DC, Madison, Wisconsin, I did some time in London. I've been all over the place.

[00:01:54]But this time feels really different and I've been I've been grappling with that.

[00:02:01]It's actually been really challenging a life stage to be going through when I've had a lot of friction at home. my, you know, I'm been dealing with a lot of caregiving responsibilities, family trauma that I've been dealing with and trying to sort out what I want out of this life. I think that a lot of us can relate to it. So, I really just wanted to yap today about this. I don't even like that word yap, but I really do. I just want to talk about it. I just I think that we all can learn from each other on this one. And I really also want to go explore the town that I'm in right now. There is a store not too far away and I really want a bottle of wine and to sit in the backyard. This is the type of town where I actually can have a backyard at my Airbnb, which is not something I'm used to. So, let's go check things out. Now, if we haven't had the honor of meeting yet, my name is Kate Cassidy, and typically on this channel, I talk about themes in tech, media, culture, how they kind of intertwine and relate to our lives. But I feel like this is a very personal topic that's very important to me these days because I literally have been traveling around for four weeks now trying to find the next place to call home. Oh, I have a rock in my shoe. Let me fix that. I think it's still there.

[00:03:19]One second. So, good news. I have acquired my wine, my little bottle of Veno. I got some Savvy Bee for the night, which is my my joking inside joke with my sister. We call Savanyon Blanc Savvy B and Cab Sav. We call Cabernet Savinon Cabs Sav. You are now in on the joke. And those are also my two favorite types of wine. So if and when we ever meet in person, keep that in mind. I do need to go grab a glass. And I also do need to change my shirt because I won't bury the lead any further. I'm currently in Austin and it is hot here. So I do believe I've sweat through this shirt.

[00:03:55]Let me be right back. Okay, I'm set. I hope you are set. I hope you have grabbed your wine or tea or whatever beverage of choice. I sometimes get made fun of for never drinking my tea. That will not be the case with this wine, let me tell you. So, I really debated framing this video in a way that's kind of that popular format. Like, I've lived in X different cities and let me tell you about what it's like living in each one of those. If that is something that you're interested in, I'm so happy to dig into it. If you care about what it feels like living in LA versus San Francisco, New York, DC, wherever, I can make that video. That's not this video.

[00:04:37]This video, I kind of want to talk more about my current experience of what I'm searching for because it feels much more present and much more challenging honestly. And I think we can start with where I am right now. So, as my newsletter subscribers do already know, I am currently on a bit of a tour of the US to try and find the next place that I want to call home. And I've been to a couple different cities so far. I'm currently in Austin and it's something that's feeling like a allencompassing pursuit of mine. I think that because I was raised in an environment where we moved around a lot. I think I had moved 13 times before I turned 18 before I was at the end of my high school career. And that's a little hyperbolic. There were some there was there was definitely a lot of constants, but I do not have that same same rooted nature that I think many people are ingrained with. And I don't have that same attachment to physical things. Be it a physical space like your childhood childhood home that you grew up in or physical items that you collect over the years. I tend to be a little bit more transitory, transient, have a bit more floating of a nature, which I think has been such a benefit in some ways again in terms of just collecting interesting experiences. and it allows me to go out and hit the road and feel comfortable and adaptable wherever I am. But I'm starting to get to an age where I'm wondering if it is more of a downside, the fact that I haven't been able to tether myself to one place and really lay down more substantial roots. I think it's something that is starting to weigh on me more and more and that has been a big venture of mine over the last couple weeks. And I'm also getting to the age where conceptually there are certain check bo boxes to check or milestones that some people may be hitting around me. And I think that one of those especially in the US we think of the American dream. We think of homeownership. And in any place that I have lived in the past that has been so so unachievably out of reach that that is part of the reason that I came to Austin. I was looking and I was like, wait, this is actually a place where I could conceivably own a home. However, what I have started to feel now that I'm here in the place checking out the town, it's a cool town. They say keep Austin weird. I'm like, it's still pretty weird, you guys. It's still pretty weird. This is the one place that I've ever spent some time where I feel like I would be a very active part of the gentrification problem. not necessarily in terms of like a white person moving into the neighborhood, but from a socioeconomic perspective, I do think that all this remote tech money coming in is definitely changing the place and you can feel that. So that's that's definitely a thing that's leaning me against moving to Austin. But I've also just started to realize and never say never, life is long, never say never.

[00:08:03]But I've started to realize that what is a home? What is a space? What is having a physical house that you own or a backyard if you're not surrounded by the people and the community that really light you up inside? And are those I don't know like that to me is what I'm realizing is home in my life. It's not it's not necessarily owning a physical house. That's not a house. that is totally a shed, but it just happened to be the structure that's that's in my arms reach and in view right now. But it's it's to me it's the community and I think what I'm realizing more and more is that is something that you have to build and it is a practice. It isn't it isn't a place. It isn't one person. It isn't your family. It is a practice that you have to work on all the time. I do feel like I've been operating a bit under this assumption that if I found the place that would be most aligned with me that community would just somehow follow and spring up. And I think I've been putting so much weight into the place, like I need to find one thing and it's going to hook me and it's going to keep me there and there's going to be some sort of big spark lightning bolt moment where I realize, oh, I I need to be in this city versus another city. But truth be told, I think I might be realizing more and more that it doesn't necessarily matter where you are. It's what you build when you're there. And I know that that sounds like the cliche, the wherever you go, there you are sort of thing, but I don't know if it's an age thing. I don't know if it has just taken me living in this very moving around nomadic existence to face it more and more or if it's been this couple week journey of trying out different places. I think what I'm just coming to realize is the next chapter of my life, it really feels so much more even than it has been in the past about intentionality and community building. I think that those are going to be huge pillars for me for the next couple years. And I just hope that I'm ready for it. I think that I am. I think that I a lot of my life has been leading up until this point obviously, but I do feel like nesting is going to be kind of tricky for me. Just picking the place and then saying this is what I want for a while. I think that's going to be hard. As as some of you, especially the subscribers who have been with me for a while, know, there's been multiple iterations of different studios in my random different apartments across the country. I was snowbirding in Palm Springs this year for March. And it's it's not really in my nature. I definitely think by nature I like to travel more, but it's getting it's weighing more and more on me. and it's not feeling as fun and free and uplifting as it used to be. For example, I used to travel kind of across the world. I really just liked checking out different places and, you know, basically doing a traditional digital nomad, working in Costa Rica, going to Bali, going to Vietnam, doing all that sort of stuff. And that hasn't been hitting the same in the past couple of years. I think because maybe my body and maybe my energy has known before my my brain has or something. There's been some sort of disconnect between my body realizing you want to start to settle down and to nest and to build and to put down roots and then part of me conceptually being like, "Oh, no, but I'm still young and I want to have fun and I want to get my kicks in while I still can and I should be traveling. I should be doing all of these things."

[00:12:21]The last couple trips I've taken, I'm almost sometimes have to push myself at the door. And I usually have a fantastic time once I do push myself out there.

[00:12:30]But it's just getting it's it's getting harder and harder every single time. And at what point do I just notice that this is a repeating pattern and something that I should actually listen to and pay attention to? I think I'm realizing that right now. I'm on week three of these travels of trying out different cities.

[00:12:54]And I think that that lesson, it's like I'm almost learning this lesson in real time. And that's an interesting thing about YouTube, I will say, is this. Uh oh, I hope you guys saw that big bug. I I just Never mind. I feel like there was a big bug hovering around me. One sec.

[00:13:14]An interesting thing about YouTube is it starts becoming this time capsule where I can now look back on the last one and a half almost two years of my shifting personality and the way that my mentality is changing. The way that what I need is changing, what I talk about is changing. It is so fascinating. And if you have ever considered creating and I haven't started yet, this is your little push to do it, it almost becomes like journaling. You know how some people they have years of journals stacked up where they can flip back and be like, "Ah, what was what was 28-year-old Kate thinking once I'm like old and on my rocking chair on my front porch like what was she thinking?" They can go back to it. I feel like I'm gonna have that with YouTube and that's just like a really cool side effect of starting to create. But I think I'm just growing up in real time.

[00:14:15]I am going to go on a tangent now, but one of you commented in the last couple months and you said something to that exact effect, something like, "Wow, she's she's growing up. She's starting to mature." And I just hadn't I kind of pushed aside the comment because I didn't really understand it at the time.

[00:14:36]I was like, "Oh, okay. Yeah, of course I'm aging. Everyone does." But it's becoming more it's it's deeper than it has been in the past. Because especially in the last year, having dealt with for the first time in my life, something truly out of my control and being stretched to my emotional limits in ways that I could never have fathomemed before. All of which I wrote about in a piece recently that I think just really encapsulates how challenging an experience I went through in the last six months. I think that that level of loss and grief, grief and and just being pushed in new directions emotionally, that trauma added a whole new texture to my life. It added this depth that had not existed before. And it's also made me start to rethink and repprioritize some of the things that I'm dealing with in my life. Like I think that that also I'm realizing as I'm kind of I'm really doing this on the fly you guys. I'm really thinking out loud on this one.

[00:15:50]But I think that this trauma that I've dealt with in the last year has also shaped what I'm realizing I need out of my life and out of community and out of where I call home next. What I can tell you is I'm not going to be staying in my current apartment. I'm not going to be in that environment that much longer.

[00:16:11]There's reasons that the Washington DC area where I grew up, reasons it's not aligned for me as adults. Again, I'm going to make a video on that soon. But I do I I'm just realizing that this trauma, this last year, this wandering around has started to push me in a direction that I would not have expected. Truth be told, it's a little bit uncomfortable and very vulnerable to open up about this one with you guys.

[00:16:40]But I think that a lot of people have a similar experience. So that's why I feel comfortable talking to you about it. And I hope that I hope that we can share some wisdom. I hope you can share some wisdom with me in the comment section below. But I very much feel like I'm in this uncomfortable middle period. Wow, I'm getting eaten alive by mosquitoes, but the show must go on. I feel like I'm in this uncomfortable middle section right now where I've been searching. I've been yearning. I've been wanting to have things figured out. And even calling it a middle section or a middle period is actually a misnomer. It's it's incorrect because you will never have everything figured out. It's that logical fallacy of the arrival fallacy which I I talked about in a previous video. I feel like I've been wanting to find the place and the place will be the thing, but the truth is and what I'm realizing is I actually need to build the place. I need to be the one to make it what it is. And I have full confidence in myself. I, like I said, I'm pretty adaptable and I love building and I love gathering. I love people. People are my favorite thing. I think that's one of the big themes on this channel is I work in tech, but I often find that it does not have that human element and people almost think of humans as like an afterthought in the way tech is designed. And I think that that is I think that's a loss in many ways. But I digress. I do think that it's starting to get exciting to me the fact that this next chapter will be about diving even deeper with people and community and enriching my existence in that way. And it's going to look different. It may not be as fun and glamorous and like I'm moving around all the time because I think when I was younger, I just was addicted to like moving and shaking. I was hustling and bustling. I was around the world. I was jet setting. I thrived on being tossed into chaos time and time again. That was so fun and invigorating to me. And no doubt it still is in some ways, but it's changing. One, I can't do that level of adventure all the time anymore. I'd say I'm now on maybe a quarterly, bianual, annual basis of having some sort of big adventure that pushes me, pushes my boundaries in different ways. But what's almost getting more exciting instead of jet setting and trying different places out is actually the thought of starting to create and curate and cultivate the many C's the alliteration create cultivate whatever I just said do that with community and I'm getting really excited about that. I actually would also, this is a big dream of mine, is I want to meet more of you. I want to build this community even deeper than it is today. So, if you're at all interested, I I am this kind of transitory nomadic state right now. I'm traveling around the country a lot, and I may come to a city near you soon. I'm gonna start to put in my newsletter where I'm going to go in advance so we can maybe do little meetups. So, if you're interested in that, definitely subscribe to the newsletter. I also am going to share some more details on just generally. I'm I want to do more events and I am working on launching a little bit of a community platform. So, more to come on that soon.

[00:20:33]But, I do think it's just that's how I'm going to be deepening my reality in the future. There's Someone's like playing music.

[00:20:48]Sorry, I got caught off on my spiel. I actually had to run see what that music was that distracted me so much. There was, I kid you not, there was a Latino cowboy walking down the street playing the accordion. So, if people have ever questioned if Austin is still weird, uh, I think that's your answer right there.

[00:21:08]Back to what I was saying, I have been wanting to build something for a while.

[00:21:12]I just don't know exactly how it's going to take shape. So, it's still very much an evolution, but I'm very excited by it. And I think that there is so much interesting opportunity out there right now with the loneliness epidemic, with so many of us feeling disconnected because of our screens and our addiction to social media and just generally feeling stretched very thin economically in life, having that financial pressure be so huge that sometimes community building feels exhausting. I think that I want to do something in that. I really, really, really want to deepen deepen the connections that we have here. Like I said before, I really am starting to feel like my channel is just about facilitating conversations. And I think there's like a misperception, not exactly a misperception. There's some reality here that there's like this parasocial relationship element to YouTube. Obviously, there is. But here's the thing. I have also in the last year started to meet more of you because more of you have noticed me and come up to me on the street or at any random tech event. It's usually at a tech event.

[00:22:23]Actually, it's always been at tech events, but I'm at the tech event. So, if you're ever at a tech event, I might be there. But I'm always so thankful when subscribers stop me and say, "Hey, say what's up." Chat about whatever they're thinking about. That has been one of the most rewarding things. And it's really made me realize like we don't need to be so parasocial like this can be just social. We can we meet in person, not all the time, but I've met a couple of you in person. And that has felt so rewarding and and it's been amazing to hear about the way that what I've been thinking about is also stuff that you've been thinking about. and just continuing that conversation that we have on YouTube and in the comment section, continuing that in other places, whether it be live, trying to have meetups and events or be it on another platform and starting to just have more of a space for those conversations. We have so many people here who are all deeply engaged, deep thinkers, and craving connection and like being intentional about that. So, I think that there's something here. It's something that we are exploring more. By we, I mean me. It's something I am exploring more. But I would really love your feedback on it. So, please drop that in the comments down below. If you've made it to this point in the video, thank you so much for just hearing me and seeing me as I'm on this journey to try and figure some things out and gain more alignment in my life.

[00:23:54]And also just opening my eyes to the reality that what has gotten me to this point, the last decade of expansion and growing my worldview and experiencing different things, realizing in real time that that may not be the theme of my next decade. And it's it's uncomfortable. It's requiring me to mature and grow in ways that I just have never done before. But I'm so happy to be just capturing it all on YouTube and getting to discuss it in real time with you all. If anyone has any wisdom for me, please comment it down below or subscribe to my newsletter and respond to one of my upcoming emails because that's where I get deeper and more personal is in my newsletter. I really would love to hear how you have been grappling with community in your own life and understanding the themes of growth in your world and what does it mean? What does home mean to you? I'm trying to figure it out. I would love to hear how you think about these things. My name is Kate Cassidy. Thanks so much for tuning in.

[00:25:09]We will talk again very soon. Bye.