I think that "building roots" is a level beyond "establishing yourself as valued member of community" and likely requires a generational commitment, but there are some fairly easy methods by which one might achieve the second, even if you aren't exceptionally good at being social. For example, I have discovered that working as a part-time substitute teacher at the neighborhood elementary school will establish you as a member of the community in good standing within a year, although my caveat would be that this is more true in a neighborhood or small town where help is needed than in an affluent highly professionalized realm where this might brand you more "useful servant." Further note here being that affluent, highly professionalized, commuter-suburban realms rarely function very well as community-base for anyone.take2 wrote:for some people who are exceptionally good at being social / building a community then 10 years is more than enough time to build roots.
A few of my close female relatives are exceptionally good at this task, and they largely achieve it by joining groups such as local sports teams, choirs, churches or non-religious church-like organizations, and by always and everywhere introducing themselves to other people, making connections, and frequently arranging and hostessing all sorts of social events at their own homes or elsewhere. I'm only borderline extroverted, so it looks pretty exhausting to me, but it definitely can be done. It has also been my experience that having a male partner who is a roaming and/or established extravert will embed "just reasonably friendly" me within his social milieu very quickly. A couple rounds of "What are you doing with this bum? Ha-ha-ha." and I am part of the gang. It has also been my experience that it is more difficult to establish myself in a community if/when my male partner is quite introverted and unwilling to do couple things. In fact, it's quite a bit easier to establish myself in a community as a single person than when I have an introverted partner who is unwilling to do couple things or a partner who is a socially-offensive extravert, but when I have a partner who is socially pleasant then we are "golden." Unfortunately, the last male partner I had who actually qualified as entirely "socially pleasant" was married to another woman.
and making such a consequential decision. More likely (definitely in my case) it's a weighing between an uncertain variable that gets worse and worse vs other sets of variables that may be better. The boiling frog metaphor applies insofar the rising temperature = rising risk. As the risk slowly increases, certain frogs are well aware of it even if they stay in the water. However, at some point, a few frogs will actually decide to jump. It's likely (as I debated with @Ego above) that this will be determined more by simply having other opportunities offered that make the risk solution obvious (e.g. by being inherently mobile) than suddenly seeing "the writing on the wall" on a given day and then making the move. In other words, most cases are of the "frog is acutely aware of the writing on the wall and will take the first chance out when given but not make their own chances". As such people who have more chances AND who are aware of the need to leave are much more likely to get out. For example, almost all major early 20th century European philosophers managed to leave Europe sometime during the 1930s. Returning to the metaphor, informed frogs who tend to be jumpy are much less likely to be boiled. Both awareness and jumpiness are required though. Plenty of smart people stick around in situations because they convince themselves that they are somehow an exception from the consequences of their own beliefs. They know, but they don't jump.