Location Stockholm syndrome

I’m sitting in a cafe of my home city, the rust belt town of Rochester, NY (it’s about 6 hours from NYC, we’re not even close to the city) right now, thinking a lot about my situation.

I graduate in about 60 days from university, and I’m sort of at a loss as to what to do next.

For context, I live in my parents’ basement (I am thankful but slowly going insane), never left for university, lived here my whole life, and make a long commute to school every morning.

On paper, I’ve done decently well for myself. I’m working for a YC startup virtually while still in school, I’ve built up a network of professionals from my laptop, I’ve done consulting for some really cool people…

But the thing I am grappling with is something I like to call “location stockholm syndrome” or maybe “location dissonance”.

There is this tear in my brain between a few mentalities:

1. Location doesn’t matter, just push through it and make more money, moving is going to be too expensive (though when I type this out it doesn’t really make any sense and is probably a cope)

2. You need to leave to another city with more life in it, isolation isn’t good for the brain and you’re probably going insane, and you need to fully become your own person

3. What if the new place is scary? What if it’s worse than here?

I think when you have never left home before, never lived alone before, the brain becomes hypervigilant, extremely scared of uncertainty, and tries to pull self sabotaging moves.

It starts to feel impossible to make happen.

It’s like that scene in the Matrix when Morpheus tells Neo: “There is a rule that we do not free a mind once it reaches a certain age. It is dangerous. They have trouble letting go.”

I don’t want to become that. I want to leave before that sets in. I want to let go.

This city is a great place to raise a family, but not a great place for a restless 21 year old. I'd rather be scared and moving than comfortable and stuck.

Let me know your thoughts on all this. Where should we move? Feel like I 100% need the energy and diversity of a big city like Austin or SF.

Message me at aidangleghorn@gmail.com or shoot me a text at 585-752-2232