Do you regret changing your nationality?

My credo. Not a single regret.
Not even a single letter, ya know what I'm sayin'?

I obviously can't speak for everybody; I can only answer personally. And my answer is: no, not at all.

In fact, the longer I live in Japan, the more reassured and confident I have become in knowing that I made the correct choice (for me). Perhaps this is because my primary investments in Japan are my Japanese family and Japanese friends. I've enjoyed watching my immediate and my extended family grow up and be happy and advance their careers in Japan; I'm made an effort to be on good and close terms with my extended Japanese family of in-laws and their children. Their upbringing and lives are built on the foundation of the country and society of Japan. There are probably other countries where this could have happened too, but in my case, my family is in Japan, and this is their home. Having the unconditional eternal right to be in Japan protects my ability to enjoy my maturing "investments" in their point of origin where they are growing and flourishing.

I'm middle aged and have started to settle down. Of course, I still have to work hard for quite some time to provide for my family and to secure and protect a future for my spouse and children, so I have the same anxieties that anybody else has about securing the future. However, I look forward to growing old and watching my family grow and expand through time. Japan provides a stable base for both them and me to be happy.

Sure, life has its challenges and not everything is perfect and not everything works out or goes my way. There have been setbacks and sadness. And there probably will continue to be major difficulties that lie ahead for me and my family in Japan. But in the long term grand scheme of things, we've all built a stable foundation based on the country and culture and history of this country. When you look at the big picture, being a permanent enfranchised citizen of Japan has provided me a platform of stability that not even a foreign resident's Permanent Resident status can provide. I know that no matter how bad things get, Japan can be my unconditional home until death do us part, and I have the same national's rights that give me a (very small) say in the governing of this country — and I earned that right not because of my past but because of my pledge/oath to be with Japan for its future.

Do you miss not being able to "Exercise" your previous nationality?

Every country gives rights that are exclusive to its legal citizens. The most obvious rights that most nationalities give to all their citizens are:

• the right of abode
• and the right of suffrage.

The Right of Suffrage

Politics the world over is the party in power vs
the opposition party or parties; not that different

The 2016 United States Presidential Elections will mark the second federal election that I am unable to vote in; the last federal election that I was eligible for was Obama's run against McCain in 2008.

I have always enjoyed participating in politics; I have done far more than just diligently vote in every local, state and federal election that I've been eligible for in the United States. I was also registered with a mainstream party and volunteered for candidates (both national and more local) doing phone and local canvassing work.

When I gave up my U.S. citizenship, I worried that I might miss being ineligible to participate in American politics. To my surprise, though, I discovered that participating in Japanese politics, especially during the second decade of the 21st century, has been far more exciting and fulfilling. Although I have only been a Japanese national for a little over a half a decade, I've had the opportunity to vote for:

• the House of Representatives (direct and proportional; voting for people and parties)
• the House of Councillors (direct and proportional; again, voting directly for people and for political parties)
• judges for the high court
• local city councillors
• the Governor of Tokyo

I've had the opportunity to volunteer and distribute campaign literature for candidates who have worked their way up from city councillor candidate to a member of the lower house parliament; politicians in Japan are more than happy to court legal voters, including naturalised citizens, for their assistance.

An unexpected side effect of losing the right of suffrage in America is how much it has helped my sanity. I no longer concern myself with the insanity that is the American national election cycle, pumped up on figurative steroids due to the 24-hour internet and cable news cycle and endless amounts of money due to Citizen's United. Like everybody else in the world, I obviously do care who runs the so-called leader of the free world — not just because American foreign trade and military policy affects Japan, but also because I still have friends and family in America who are affected by its domestic policy.

However, I've found that involvement in Japanese politics, both domestic and foreign policy, to be just as exciting and fulfilling, as I see how they affect my and my family's present and future life here.

The Right of Abode

The theoretical Right of Abode situation is when a family member, like your mother or father, experiences an accident or disability that requires one's presence for an extended period of time — beyond what is given to you by a short-term visitor visa, which is how I currently visit the United States for personal and business reasons.

So far, I've been lucky enough to have not yet needed to do this. However, there are many cases of the State department provided extended visas for extraordinary circumstances. Because I can prove a blood and legal relationship to my family in the United States, and I come from two wealthy countries (Japan & America), and I have stable roots in Japan, I present a low risk to immigration with respect to fleeing off the grid and becoming an illegal.

Like this. Except White & Illegal.

Although in my opinion, if I was immigration and skeptical, I'd actually consider people like myself to be a high risk because the odds of me being detected as an illegal immigrant in the U.S.A. are low:

• I have an official birth certificate (a breeder document for another ID) saying I am was a natural born American.
• I have a social security number and other registered connections like financial institution accounts.
• I speak native accent-less American English, and have American mannerisms and am a phenotype that is commonly associated with natural-born Americans.

As I'm a law-abiding citizen, I would never try to do this, of course. ☺ It should be noted, however, that my name is in a U.S. State Department database which prevents me from trying to obtain a U.S. passport.

Getting Transferred or Needing to Work in your Home Country

Dear Apple: Japan called. They said to stop copying
the Look & Feel of their flag.

The other scenario often brought up regarding possibly regretting changing one's citizenship is: "what if you get a career opportunity in your home country that's too good to turn down, and your nationality prevents you from moving back there and working there?"

I've actually encountered this scenario: my (former) employer, a multi-national U.S. corporation with its headquarters based in California, wanted to transfer me from its Tokyo subsidiary to its headquarters in Silicon Valley.

Was having changed my nationality to Japanese a problem? Not at all. They were willing to hire an immigration lawyer to set me up with either a L-1 visa (giving my spouse a L-2 visa) or an H-1B visa to make this happen.

Even though they offered to pay all of my legal and relocation expenses, I actually turned down the offer and switched jobs because I didn't want to be relocated to America; uprooting my family when they were happy here in Japan, in the gamble that they'd be just as happy or happier in America, wasn't a risk I was willing to take. Besides, I didn't think I'd be happier in northern California. It's not that I dislike the place or the country. It's just simply not part of the lifestyle that I had become accustomed to.

More Important than Being Able to Return to Live and Work in my Country of my Birth-Citizenship: Being Able to Return to Live and Work in Japan

What is more important to me than the ability to stay in the United States for more than 90 days is the ability to return back to Japan and stay in it unconditionally, under the exact same status (national), immediately and without delay, no matter how long I've been away or how many times I've left.

Detractors: Getting Asked About Regrets by non-Japanese

I actually did have tattoos and regretted
them; the laser removal was expensive.

Every once in a blue moon, I get asked this question. A lot of times the question is innocent, even though it's a rather delicate question to ask in that if it's not done with tact it can sound judgemental or rude. Can you imagine asking a person who's still married if they regret marriage? Sometimes it's a passive aggressive technique used to disguise their opinion ("you'll never be accepted in Japan" or "those who naturalize will regret it") as a curious question.

Of course, giving them your honest answer will rarely change their mind; if you say "actually, no, and I'm happier in Japan now than I have ever been" they will simply think (and sometimes say) "you haven't been here long enough to know better" (said even to senior citizens who have lived here decades). So I guess I'll have to wait until I'm on my death bed before I give an answer they'll accept.

The only people who will ask you this (or tell you "you will never be accepted or fit in"), by the way, are non-Japanese and Japanese that spend a disproportionate amount of their time around non-Japanese. They have usually lived or spent an influential part of their lives focused outside of Japan. If asked what is the basis for their beliefs, they will either cite other non-Japanese or "international Japanese" who speak English or have strong overseas influences, or they will cite famous naturalized people who failed in very spectacular and public ways.

As of 2016, in my over half-decade of being "naturalized" in Japan, I have never, not once, in the thousands of interactions with Japanese-in-Japan-who-only-speak-Japanese, been given any inclination of negativity regarding choosing Japanese citizenship.

A good exercise to do before naturalizing, is waiting until things are at one's absolute worst in Japan (perhaps you're in between jobs, having financial difficulties that are Japan related, having career troubles, or having relationship troubles or loneliness — and if you don't have these problems, then imagine you do), then pretending you don't have your old nationality to "fall back upon."

Once you've done that, and discovered that your source of contentment within Japan is not limited to the material things beyond modest standards of living, there's no reason to look back with regret. Simply keep looking forward, including past whatever obstacle you currently face.