Belong: A 2020 Reflection

Detail: The Face She Shows  from the Shields Series by Crystal Marie

January 1st, 2020

It seems surreal to write that date. Yet isn't it just a few numbers on the calendar? A mere place marker in time? So many resolutions and intentions being set by the metaphors that number brings to mind: 2020. To some, it is about the years they've lived so far, in hindsight, taking stock of the events that have shaped them. For others, it is about clarity, entering a new era with wisdom, seeing with 2020 vision what lies before them. And then there are those who are reviving the slogan from the same decade in the previous century - the beginning of the roaring 20's. A decade of innovation, revelation, and rapid change.

Here on the home front, I've been quietly taking stock of the last 20 years of my life. From the monumental decision to move away from the Midwest corn country where I was born and raised, bringing my kids to live in the suburbs of the big city, just 3 hours north but an entirely different culture away ,that summer of '99. To my subsequent remarriage, just a few years later, and all the years since that time, of letting go, little bit, by painfully little bit, of who I thought I was, and who I thought I was supposed to be. 

I didn't know it then, at least not on the surface of things, but that move represented a search for something that had always eluded me. A place where I truly belonged. 

If you would have asked me at the time, I would say that I wasn't running toward something, but away. Away from the sexual harassment in the workplace, away from the habit of joining my father at the bar so frequently at night, away from the fruitless searching for his approval and affirmation, away from the messages that I was too sensitive, too flawed, too late to ever expect anything more. 

My lot in life, from the stories I was told, was to find the right man. That if I could just change myself enough, and just lower my overly romantic expectations enough, if I could just accept what I could not control enough, if I could just try hard enough, be forgiving enough, playful enough, sexy enough, compliant and agreeable enough, I would somehow fit in. Be acceptable. Find my place at the proverbial table. 

Storyteller and behavioral researcher, Brene Brown writes that fitting in is becoming who you think you need to be in order to be accepted. Belonging is being your authentic self and knowing that no matter what happens, you belong to you. 

Such a simple wonderful explanation of what it means to belong. The first time I was introduced to this concept of belonging to myself, of carrying within me the sense of belonging that I was searching so hard to find outside of me, was about 15 years after that big move. The one where I had identified what it was I was running from, but hadn't quite figured out what it was I was running to. 

A friend explained having had this revelation of understanding - of being able to walk into any room, any space where people had gathered, and feel connected, not to someone outside of her own body, but to herself. So much so, that it didn't matter if the people widened their circle to invite her in. She brought her own sense of acceptance, of belonging. 

I remember smiling, making noises of agreement, nodding as if this concept made perfect sense to me. Mind blown. Wow! What a revelation! But behind my smile, was the feeling of not quite grasping what it was she was telling me, as if it were another language I was struggling to comprehend. The scene from a recent explosive fight with my husband still freshly playing out on the screen of my mind. Of having been taunted, belittled and raged at, until I broke- returning fire for fire, until I found myself locked out of my own bedroom, in my own home, screaming and pounding on the door in protest that I did not deserve to be treated like that. Begging through my tears to be let in. 

It seemed I'd spent a lifetime begging to be let in.

Later, in describing this scene to my counselor, of the indignation, the humiliation, and the shame that had consumed me in the aftermath. Of my regret for allowing myself to be triggered, for the way I'd handled my end of the fight, for those words still hanging like a cloud in the air: "let me in! let me in! This is my home! I belong here!", I felt a discernible shift of the earth on it's axis, as she cocked her head and replied: 

"It sounds like you're the one that wasn't convinced."

I wish I could say that was the moment that changed everything. So fond we humans are of a neatly wrapped package. Those stories of overcomers we adore and share: underdog overcomes false beliefs and negative circumstances and just look at her now! Superhero- an overnight success! All it took was one wise line, perfectly spoken, at just the right time. Glenda enlightening Dorothy: "You've always had the power. Close your eyes, tap three times." 

But you see, that kind of awakening really only happens in the movies, limited to the 90 minutes allotted to the thing. Those words were not so much an epiphany, as they were an invitation. The tilt was not of the activity of the earth, but of the seismic shift in my own mind. Whatever it was that I needed to find wasn't out there. Not in the size or shape of the perfect house, not in the perfection of my own behavior, or the security and approval from finding the perfect man. Not in all the achievements, or the clicks and the likes, and certainly not in any one perfect moment. 

It was more like a series of moments. A yellow brick road of moments that led me around and around. Looking. Searching. Seeking. 

Is this the place? Is this where I belong? 

Until finally that moment when the layers of all of those moments fell into place and the scales started to fall away. The layers that obscured my vision, the messes, the shields, the masks, the shells, all that I designed to protect me, were revealed to be the very things that were keeping me from the truth of it. 

I already belonged.

Belonging. To belong. In the telling of her own long slow awakening to what it means to truly belong, Brene' Brown spoke of an interview she came across, featuring her hero, Maya Angelou. In it, Ms. Angelou shares of her own understanding: "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. . . More and more, I belong to myself. I'm very proud of that. I am very concerned about how I look at Maya. I like Maya very much." 

As I sit here on the brink, looking back over the course of the past 20 years, running from what didn't fit, searching, seeking, begging for a place that did, on this 1st day of the year 2020, with both hindsight and clarity, it is this word that I've decided to claim as my focus for the New Year. Belonging. 

Belong. 

I belong no place. I belong every place. 

I belong to Crystal Marie. 

I like Crystal Marie very much.