In which the author explores the factors behind the increasing normalness of living in a foreign country.
The idea goes like such: everyone has a “circle of awareness” that limits what your mind spends its time on during a normal day. Travel grows this circle. Staying in one place shrinks it. Garlic does nothing. (The last part means nothing—try saying with an Emeril voice for fun.)
Thus when first traveling to a foreign country (let’s say, hmm, Japan) one’s circle takes a huge leap dimension-wise. As such the first bit of time in one’s new setting is filled with comparisons between one’s current location and one’s home country. This is because one’s circle has grown to include both locations.
But as one stays longer in any place, one’s circle of awareness gradually shrinks to pre-travel sizes. Simultaneously, with a smaller circle, one feels more comfortable with daily life. And thus the foreign country doesn’t feel so foreign after a while.
This is precisely how I feel at this point in Japan. Life here feels about as normal as it can get. I do everything—shopping, skating, going from place to place—without so much as a second thought or thinking, “That’s not the way we do it in the States.” My circle of awareness has shrunk to pretty much encapsulate just Okayama City (since I don’t travel inside Japan much).
The flip side is that I don’t think about home that much, and if I do it’s mostly in the distant sense of, “Oh yeah, I have to go back there someday.” I don’t follow U.S. news, so the only updates I get are personal news items from my family. But the main reason I don’t think about America that much is simply because it’s outside of my circle right now.
I also think this is part of why it’s difficult to find support for missions. A lot of supporters have their own circles that are too small or crowded to handle the mission field. Finding support for a mission trip means getting people to widen their circles of awareness to comprehend the need in the field—more than that, comprehension to the degree that people are willing to open their pocketbooks. Not an easy task, but that’s the way missions work.