Would you see living abroad as being successful

[Whattimedoyoucallthisthen]

If someone you knew had left the U.K., moved abroad and started a new life, would you see that as them having been successful?
What would you think of them?

I live abroad in a very ordinary job.
It's neither a success nor a failure, it just is what it is.

That definitely helps.

I'm thinking more the people who do nothing but moan about how bad X area is, how there's no opportunity, nothing to do etc.. but they'll never leave. I don't get that!

No, not really. I would just assumed they wanted to move.

Define success.

I live abroad. I wouldn’t consider it a success as it’s just where I live. I’m very happy and healthy though, but I likely would be wherever I live.

The only real measure of success in life is happiness.

So a single parent with three kids in a minimum wage retail job who enjoys said job, loves their kids, loves the house they rent and is happy with their life is far more successful than a CEO who earns hundreds of thousands and lives in an incredible house but is miserable as sin.

Yeh, I would move to findca job. Well, I did when I was young. It was scary though! Maybe I'm a big scaredy cat but I went off to London terrified, had my life's savings in my cardigan pocket!! Went to office angels on bow Street 😆 still remember it well. It was a great experience to toughen me up a bit. To prove to me that I wasn't "unemployable".
Londoners were so nice to me. Feel so much admiration for people who relocate when they're older.

"For the few who learn the language, integrate decently and work in a role that requires the country's language , then yes, it is an achievement. And I'd call them successful."

How strange. Why would it be more of a success to speak the local language if it's required for your job than if it isn't. I'd argue the opposite. Those who learn the language to integrate properly even if it's not required for their job have made more of an effort.
That in itself doesn't make someone successful though. You could still be in a job that doesn't make you happy, doesn't pay well, etc.

Yes, and potentially it's easier to be a single parent living closer to relatives.
On the other hand, some other countries have childcare that is much more subsidised than in the UK so moving somewhere like that would open opportunities to parents of small children.

I wouldn't see living abroad as successful or unsuccessful in itself - any more than moving house within the UK. Success ultimately means achieving your own wishes and goals; and moving abroad may or may not contribute to that.

I lived and worked a abroad for a number of years. I never saw it as anything other than taking an opportunity that arose.

Not on its own, no.

Depends but yes, a lot of people who move abroad like to brag on SM about how great their new country of residence is and how shit the UK and then move back home as soon as they need benefits and free health treatment, yes I'm looking at you DSIL.

Some people think me living in the Netherlands as exotic and ‘courageous’ but neither are true. I was taken aback when the cashier at B&M told me she had never left the U.K. Each to their own.

I think it demonstrates a reasonable level of adaptability and resilience but there's lots of ways those qualities can be expressed.

I live abroad and in no way successful! The only successful thing is my 3 kids are fluent French speakers now but literally that is it ! Tbh if we hadn't moved abroad, my work career and definitely that of my husband would be way more successful! But once we were here, kids in school, bought a house, it's hard to move back.

Expat contracts aren’t often like that anymore. Even back in the day, they were often not as generous as this is portraying.

It still takes a lot of courage even as an expat to go, especially if it means the spouse leaves their employment or takes children.

An expat most certainly can be fired in the country they’re living in. The host country sees the employee as being employed from the start of employment in said country rather than the actual start date in the U.K. There is zero protection in the U.K. whilst the employee is abroad and British protection only starts when returning and having signed a contract of x number of years continuous employment.

Neither successful nor unsuccessful in itself

Yes. I always measured my own success by it too and when I had to come home due to family illness I thought I'd 'failed.'

I'm aware how ridiculous this is. But there was something about going for it and building your own life that seemed like the epitome of freedom to me.

People use all sorts of things to feel superior and inferior.

I have a friend who still boasts about the three months she lived in Europe twenty years ago😂. Tells me it gives her a broader perspective on life.

I don’t think success or world outlook or happiness is determined by where you have move or travelled to. Some of the most narrow minded and insular peopel I know have travelled the world and lived in many, many places.

No it doesn't guarantee success. What I think depends on which country a bit too. Someone I used to work with doing a similar job to me left to work in Australia, this alone doesn't make me think he is lore successful, just he wanted the change and was brave enough to go for it

I think you are confusing success and quality of life. You and your friend have different g views on what constitutes a good quality of life and that is fine because quality of life is subjective. It sounds like either you or your friend or both are caught in a loop of one upmanship, trying to justify who has the better life or greater success. If she is happy then be happy for her, you can be happy too, she doesn't have to be green with envy for your life to be good

Arf at Italy being the Mecca that only the very successful can break into 😂
What nonsense.

I know lots of people who have moved abroad, some old uni pals and some people I met backpacking in my 20s, i also know people through my parents who retired abroad. I wouldn't label most of them as successful, the young people all work obviously but 1 I know is a travel agent in Australia, she has lots of holidays etc but she doesn't own a place and never settled down. Another person I know moved to nz again has a job she could do here, nothing out the ordinary she just does it there, doesn't own a house, never married. It's so funny she really thinks that everyone thinks she's successful and is somehow jealous because she moved abroad, I really don't see it this way. Then I know people who moved abroad who are high flyers earning silly money, they are successful if money is a measure of that, own properties, have a family out there etc but it's not something I'd aspire to. So I don't see it as successful, more just a choice about where they decided to live.

No, I’d think they, well, wanted to live somewhere else for various reasons.

My work colleague moved to France because you could get more house for your money. My friend moved to Dubai as income is virtually tax-free & it’s hot. Neither of those examples screams “I’m more successful than thou or anyone else”

"they are successful if money is a measure of that, own properties, have a family out there etc but it's not something I'd aspire to."

Yet, you said in your own post that you consider women who aren't married and don't own their home to not be successful. By your own standards, these people are successful.