You do not belong
going toward what you fear the most
“YOU DO NOT BELONG.”
This is what my teacher wrote to me.
I was sharing about my fear of being seen, the way I hide, the way I brace for judgment, the way all of it traces back to a deep desire to belong.
And she said, “But you don’t ‘belong’ Christie... why do you need to belong so damn much?”
It stopped me in my tracks.
You might be thinking, “What’s wrong with belonging? Isn’t that a little harsh?”
No – it was the exact pattern interruption I needed to receive in that moment. Here’s why.
Self-abandonment in the name of belonging is not true belonging.
My idea of belonging came from an old wound that I didn’t realize I was still living from.
It was a wound that said: You’re not safe unless you belong. You’re not safe unless you conform to the crowd. You’re not safe unless you’re accepted. Blend in because your survival depends on it.
When my teacher said that, it interrupted an old survival story I’d been running on a loop for years & years & years.
The truth is, I don’t need to live from those survival strategies anymore.
The truer thing is knowing in my bones that I belong to myself.
That I won’t abandon myself in the name of belonging to random strangers on the internet and people whose opinion I don’t cherish.
It’s in completely letting go of belonging that I actually get to belong.
Because in belonging to myself, I allow myself to be authentically seen, met, and heard — not as a caricature of myself, but from a whole-hearted, rooted, sturdy place of knowing that I don’t need anyone else’s approval to survive.
And it’s from this place that I get to find true belonging in connection & in community.
Sometimes, the medicine is in going toward that which you fear the most. You might just meet yourself there.
꩜
Christie