I’ve been thinking a lot about the longing to belong over the last few days. How the lack of it and the pursuit of it can have such an impact on our lives, for better and worse.

“Long” originates in Old English and means “extending considerably from end to end; lasting.” So originally belong would have meant being lasting, enduring. It was only later in the 14th century that belonging took on the sense of being a member of something, or being the property/possession of something or someone. That in itself is very telling about how our values have changed isn’t it?

The need to feel like you belong has its roots in deep survival instincts from way back in human history. At a basic level, if you weren’t part of a larger group then your chances of survival, of staying alive, were drastically reduced. Being part of a group meant you were protected from danger, you had greater food hunting and gathering capability, life was easier as you supported each other in necessary activities and responsibilities. Of course you also had access to that greatest of human needs – social connection.

Belonging to a place was just as important. When our ancestors were nomadic then we simply belonged to the earth over which we wandered and whom we revered. We knew where and how to find food, water, shelter, and clothing materials from the bounty the earth provided. We understood the movements of the seasons and the changes in the weather and knew to take only what we needed from any area before we moved on.

As we began to settle in one place, then we learned every detail of our chosen location; we knew it like the back of our hand and began to shape it to provide all we needed. Although we were now altering the landscape and exploiting it to a certain extent, we still felt intimately enmeshed with it, a part of it. To this day many surnames describe the places our ancestors lived. My own maiden name, Nash, means “dweller by the ash tree.”

How many of us can say we know our home landscape intimately these days? Not only have we become more isolated from the earth but also from each other. It’s more usual now to live a long way from the support of family, to have no sense of or participation in a community around our homes (mainly due to constraints of time and energy), to buy food easily from all over the world without the need to know how to forage or grow it where we are. So I began to connect many of the problems and issues in the world right now with this lack of a sense of belonging, or a desperate need to grasp at a semblance of it at any cost.

The Israel/Palestine war is rooted in the need to belong to a homeland which is disputed by both sides as their sole property and possession. Political party membership and support has become a way to belong through similar views on how a country should be managed and, very often, protected from perceived external threat. It creates division, where one country or party or race is wrong and the other is right. I speak more of this in my poem, Love Bomb. Where money is king then the company you work for can exert a huge power and influence over you. As a result, you feel obliged to try and belong when and where you don’t really want to. You can force yourself to fit in to a structure and limit your self-expression in exchange for security, protection, survival, a kind of certainty in a very uncertain world, however uncomfortable.

Belonging has been a motivating theme in my life, moving me around the UK, in and out of groups of various sorts, honing my way of living and being to see what feels best. On moving here to West Wales, I actually named our cottage “Perthyn” which is Welsh for belonging. I do love this particular location and can imagine myself remaining here. In reality though, like so much else on the spiritual path, I think by the time I came here in my early fifties, I finally understood that belonging can never be found externally. It’s not in a location or a “tribe.” It’s found within me as a state of being and it’s been there all the time.

As a human I belong to the earth, to the universe, to the cosmos. My body is made of stardust, a combination of the same elements that make up all life on this planet and beyond. I am part of the web of life and as a cell in its organism it’s impossible for me to imagine myself as separate from it. Just as I can’t imagine my hand being separate from my arm. The question is whether I accept, feel, and know this to be true.

As eternal Spirit I’m part of Source, the loving consciousness and life force that creates and permeates all things. I individuate in this body so I can experience a human existence with its necessary degree of felt separation, and I return to the One-ness with the information I’ve assimilated during that lifetime. Once I truly grasped what that meant then I no longer felt alone, or that I didn’t or couldn’t belong. I think we all carry within us the memory of that divine unity from which we originally emerge, consciously or unconsciously. You can spend a lifetime chasing it while you’re here on earth, through relationships, jobs, achievements and recognition, and none of those things will ever replicate that sublime at-one-with feeling you know deep within you is possible. That can only come through remembering the part of you that’s part of the divine; to fully accept, know and be who you truly are.

You cannot make yourself belong to something or somewhere outside of yourself. You just need to realise that you already do belong; no matter where you are or the people who surround you. Think about that for a moment, and imagine how drastically that could change human interaction in every circumstance. I can’t imagine there being talk of mass deportation, the pursuit of war, persecution of any kind of difference, or abuse of the earth if everyone knew and felt this acceptance and belonging in their bones.

Open yourself up to connection with your immediate environment. Wherever you’re living, even if it feels far from ideal to you, you can be in relationship to the life you see and sense around you, trees, animals, sky, wind, water, earth, and fire. They are a part of you as you are a part of them. I greet and communicate with all the life I encounter around me every day, from spider or snail to the sun, when it blesses us with its bright face. I’ve long let go of worrying about how that might look to other people.

Explore ways that enable you to experience more fully a connection to the life and consciousness that extends far beyond you and encompasses every living being. It doesn’t matter what you call it – God, Goddess, Source, Great Spirit, or just Life – or how you choose to do it. There are so many wonderful and varied practices that have been tried and tested by others and are freely described in books and articles. What matters is that you feel and know that interdependent presence within you and linking you to every other living being. Decide to become the belonging you already are. You belong to earth. You belong to Spirit. You belong to Life. You belong to yourself.

After I’d written this I was curious about what others have said about the longing to belong. I’ll leave you with some of their insightful words, which seem to chime with my own thoughts:

“You are only free when you realize you belong no place – you belong every place – no place at all. The price is high. The reward is great.” – Maya Angelou.

“True belonging never asks us to change who we are. True belonging requires us to be who we are.” – Brene Brown

“The heart of the matter: You should never belong fully to something that is outside yourself.” – John O Donohue

And finally this beautiful poem by David Whyte: “The House of Belonging“

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