Moral confusion in a foreign land.

When humans move abroad, they often find themselves between cultures — no longer fully belonging to the one they left, and not entirely absorbed into the one they’ve entered. This in-between state can be fertile ground for growth, but it can also create a kind of moral confusion.

Some begin to adopt values, beliefs, and behaviours from their new surroundings — not from genuine integration or understanding — but out of convenience, survival, or social advantage. The core values they once lived by can begin to blur. Respect may turn transactional. Kindness becomes conditional. Integrity negotiable.

They pick pieces of culture like items off a shelf — using what benefits them in the moment and discarding what demands responsibility, reflection, or humility. One might uphold tradition when it gives power, but abandon it when it calls for compassion or sacrifice. They become fluent in the language of adaptability, but silent when truth asks them to choose.

And in doing so, they may lose the thread of their own authenticity.

True belonging, whether in a foreign land or within one’s own skin, doesn’t come from adopting what serves us in the moment. It comes from standing in integrity, even when the culture around us shifts. From choosing truth over convenience, and humanity over performance.