The Emotional Pull of Places Can Keep Us Stuck

Source: Francesca Noemi Marconi / unsplash

When Eve left New York to visit Dakar, Senegal, in December 1998, she had no idea the trip would change her life forever. It was meant to be a short holiday with her then-boyfriend to visit his hometown. There is a saying that travel is a form of education, but sometimes, that education can transform us. When we visit a place, leave it, or experience a huge life transition, our minds can remain stuck in the past.

Feeling “like a child being torn away from their mother”

Eve (her real name), an African American woman and mother of three, grew up as a Methodist Christian and earned a master’s degree in clinical psychology.

During the trip, Eve was overwhelmed by the culture shock and how life in Dakar differs from that in New York. She also felt “an inexplicable sense of home, despite the differences in lifestyle, language, and people.” Reflecting on her experiences, Eve shared: I had an “…emotional reaction to various geolocations. Some places make me feel extremely anxious and uncomfortable, and some are familiar and welcoming, like home, and I don’t know why….”

The trip lasted only 10 days, after which Eve was supposed to return to the U.S. She never truly made it back. While she physically returned to New York, she became depressed, crying for weeks as she yearned to go back to Dakar. The memories of Dakar—the people, music, sights, sounds, smells, and food—consumed her thoughts, intensifying her longing.

When asked about her feelings after returning to New York, Eve said, “I felt a sense of loss, like a child being torn away from their mother. Yes, I felt really down for a few weeks after leaving, almost like a mild depression.”

Eve’s story was detailed in one of our recently published research papers on cognitive immobility, published by Diaspora Studies, a peer-reviewed journal. One key aspect of cognitive immobility we identified in the paper is what we described as the persistent reexperience and reconstruction of past events or life experiences—a defining feature of Eve’s experience.

Persistent reexperience and reconstruction of past events or life experiences

This is one of the features of cognitive immobility: persistently remembering or reexperiencing the scenes, sounds, smells, and sights of a past location or life experience. Initially, this process may provide solace if current circumstances are unfavorable. However, when we keep going through the emotions—be it joy, grief, regret, or distraction—for an extended period, the process of reexperiencing can become unconscious, trapping individuals in a cycle that defines cognitive immobility. Over time, this may lead to stress, anxiety, or depression. This can happen to anyone.

Such was Eve’s experience upon returning to New York from Dakar. Though physically in New York, she felt trapped in Dakar, unable to stop reliving her time in the African city. She described this reexperiencing process when she said:

Yes, I relived my experiences there over and over in my head. It was during the month of Ramadan. My father-in-law insisted that we get married the first day we were there, the food was great and family everywhere. My husband had 30 siblings! We would walk to the mosque in the dark of every morning for the prayer. We were technically married already at the courthouse in New York right before the vacation, but my in-laws were not aware.

At this point, Eve constantly reexperienced the scenes, sights, people, food, and other elements of Dakar. She felt stressed and sad, believing she had lost those experiences. This sense of yearning and loss resembles mourning, a characteristic of cognitive immobility.

Could cognitive immobility help explain why some Western women move to Maasai communities, embracing rural life with few amenities, or why others from Australia, the U.S., and Europe are moving to places like Bali?

Eve made several trips back to Dakar to retrieve what she felt she had left behind. However, each time she returned to New York, she would fall back into the cycle of reexperiencing, feeling stressed, and longing to return to Dakar.

Finally, less than three years after her first visit, Eve and her Senegalese husband relocated permanently to Dakar, Senegal, where she continues to live to this day. From the beginning, “she saw Dakar as where she would be happy to live and die.”

This is the story of a New Yorker who became “trapped” in an African city where she found “a sense of belonging in a community she now calls home.”

There may be millions of others experiencing or having experienced this process. They should know they are not alone and can explore ways to counter cognitive immobility.