Why I Moved to the Countryside — and What It Taught Me About Myself

There was a moment, many years ago, when I was standing in my apartment in the heart of a big city — beautiful, thoughtfully designed, every detail carefully considered — and I suddenly felt that there was no room left in it for me. Literally. As if the space had been taken over by projects, expectations, roles and obligations. That was the beginning of my journey away from the city. At first, we moved for a few years to a small townhouse just outside the city. But it was still crowded. There were cars everywhere, constant noise, and a tiny garden that never quite gave me the sense of escape I was longing for. I had simply changed my “place to come home to at night.” The whirlwind of work and all the other obligations was still there.

The decision to move to the real countryside didn’t happen overnight. It grew inside me for years. And when we finally did it — my husband, our child and I — everyone said: “That’s brave.” What I felt most of all was: Relief. We left our corporate jobs. We closed a chapter of our lives for good, knowing that our income would be much smaller — but still enough.

“Simplicity is not poverty. It is a choice. And it takes courage to choose it against what the world expects of us.”

Living in the countryside teaches you about time. Not the time measured by calendars and clocks — but real time, the kind that flows differently in summer and winter, in sunshine and rain. You learn that not everything can be planned. That the garden has a mind of its own. That chickens have no idea when the weekend begins.

But above all, I learned how to listen to silence. And how to listen to myself within that silence. In the city, there was always some kind of noise — both literal and metaphorical. Here, the only real rustling comes in the evenings, when the wind moves through the forest.

I’m not encouraging you to move to the countryside. Truly. We each have our own place on this earth. But I do encourage you to look for your own little pieces of paradise. Maybe it’s a garden on your balcony. Maybe it’s an hour in the morning before the children wake up. Maybe it’s a circle — a space where, for a moment, you can step away from the noise of everyday life.

A Piece of Paradise is not an address. It is a state of being. And you can find it almost anywhere — if you know what you are looking for. 

I invite you to A Piece of Paradise — both literally and metaphorically. The Circles in Sompolno take place right here, on our little homestead.