Today in a meeting someone said:
The only thing humans want is to belong; to be a part of something
I honestly did NOT follow how that was related to the meeting but my brain was like YES YES YES, the basic needs of competency, autonomy, and relatedness! (Well, 100% relatedness)
So last week we were driving on some road kind of close to our old hood (but not really but whatever) and I started thinking about the disconnected feeling I had when I first moved to Chicagoland and how I don’t feel that way AT ALL now.
Sidebar: I was twenty-two when I moved to Chicagoland, and people are always all “eh, your twenties suck, blah blah, you’re so immature and you don’t know who you are, etc, blah.” It’s so… ageist. I never felt like that. I’ve been strongly this person for a long time. And I’m mature where it matters… heh. But! I did not have friends until a few years after I moved to Chicagoland, so I did have a big friendship learning curve.
Which is my point. My early twenties were disconnected and isolated to our little bubble because that was all I knew. I had to spend time getting established and WHOA does that take work. It took time to find true friends. So much time. I had to learn how to have friends and lose friends (I’m still learning). It took time to find a workout community. It took time to find the parts of our county we like. It took time to figure out where we like to shop, dine, go to the movies, etc.
It takes time to become established in your community, to find that relatedness in it, if you find it at all!
But once you do, it feels so good. It feels good to BELONG. To belong in a place.
I started feeling established and liked I belonged to the larger community at our old home, but it increased exponentially when we moved (yes, in my thirties). Our home really feels like US. Just today someone was asking about our property, and I couldn’t help but gush when I described the quiet, and all the trees, and how peaceful it is. Ahh, I love it. I’m so thankful Steven spearheaded our move (and everything else house related, then, and now).
One of my fave house pics!
So who knew this would turn in to a love letter to our home? Oops.
But to my original point – I think it’s totally normal to need time to get established in a new area, or even established in an area you lived in before, once you reach adulthood. But it seems necessary to do, because people do have the basic need to feel connected and related to a larger community.
I feel like I’d be better at it now, if we moved. But we don’t plan to until we can’t afford the taxes on our house anymore, ha (but really, cry), or until some super cool opportunity comes up.
(And I have a lot more thoughts on the topic of relatedness and how detrimental it is if you DON’T have it, but we’ll save that for another day.)
Oh I love all the themes in this post! I’m happy that you feel like you belong, and I’ve always loved how much you guys love your house! It really is just perfect for you, and being a guest there feels like you’re in some cool forest retreat 🙂
I loved my 20’s, and I loved being new to Chicago at 23 and not knowing anyone because it gave me a chance to build my own life away from home and the people I had known all my life. I made friends really quickly and easily because my job was entry-level and full of fun people my age. By the time we moved to Ohio I had a REALLY hard time leaving just because I had such a strong feeling of belonging.
Getting established in a new area is harder when you’re older, WFH, don’t know anyone, don’t have kids (a seemingly easy way to meet people) and for me, starting over was hard knowing I had walked away from that comfortable life where I belonged. But as you said, it takes time to get established somewhere new, and it’s totally worth the effort.
Yay, I am glad it resonated with you! I was riding the train home after a long day of meetings, writing this and wondering if it made any sense. Ha. And thank you 🙂 🙂 🙂 We love having you as guests!
I love that you loved your Chicago experience in your 20s and that it gave you that fresh start! I was thinking about how people make friends at work when I wrote this – it sounds like when it works, like it did for you, it’s really awesome. Did you ever struggle with the fact that people were so spread out across the burbs, or did that work out okay? (that is kind of hard for me – like the people I like most at work live so far away, so we are close at work and text and stuff but don’t hang out much outside of work)
It’s so hard to get established with those parameters!!! I am so glad you found a community at your gym! Doesn’t it just help immensely? And open you up to learn so much more about the area? Do you feel like you are getting established there now?
This went a different direction than what I was expecting from the start of the post. (Not in a bad way) I’m glad you’ve found a place–both physically and emotionally/socially–that feels like the right place to belong!
I also really liked your point about the age-ist comments about being in your 20s. It’s couched as advice, but yeah, it’s really just an annoying and dismissive thing to say to someone!
It went a different direction for me too! I thought I was going to talk about people who don’t have a sense of belonging and that was only an after thought at the end. Ha.
It is! And it’s like, I’m sorry if your 20s were bad, but that doesn’t mean everyone’s are. (And really, I AM SORRY if a whole decade of your life felt that off because that is horrible!)
Gorgeous picture of your house!
It does take a long time to get established, make friends, and feel like you’re connected to the place you live…regardless of how old you are. After being here 30 years, I would have a rough time if we ever had to move from Leuven…it’s a good feeling to know that that probably will never happen unless we choose to.
Thanks!
How long did it take you to feel established there? Do you feel like it took extra long as you learned the language? Did having kids help you feel connected to the community?
I guess I probably started to feel connected when my kids were about halfway through grade school…yes, having kids helped a lot, also with learning the language – once I started taking them to school and interacting with other parents and teachers, it really took off. And once you know the language sufficiently, you can start getting involved and making friends. So I guess it did take a long time – about 10 years!
Did you ever feel like you were still learning the language as the kids were?
10 years is a long time! Totally worth it though!
I still feel like I’m learning the language! LOL!
Your question is interesting, though, because I never really thought about that. Thinking about it now I think that with the kids it was different, they were learning as native speakers, and were also learning English simultaneously, which was a totally different process to what I was going through.
I love this post! One of the reasons I never want to move is because that establishment process is sooo difficult. Factor in social anxiety and shyness and it’s just a process I don’t want to do anytime soon. I also hate when I have to use my GPS to get anywhere, even the grocery store or the library.
I love how much you love your house! It’s so pretty and it’s probably so nice to be away from it all. <3
Thank you! 🙂 And yes, it’s already hard and the anxiety and shyness will make it much harder. I do believe you could find some cool book loving gals anywhere but it would take time and EFFORT and UGH.
Thank you! We love being away from everything. This is how I grew up, and I tried living with neighbors and it’s just NOT for me!
There are plenty of things about my upcoming move that I’m dreading, but having to find a new community is definitely up there. That, and leaving the community I’ve established in Chicago. I won’t be leaving it all at once, fortunately–that’s the nice thing about moving to the suburbs rather than to another state, or even out of the Chicago area: I can still go back into the city when I want/need to–but man, I have people here! I don’t want to have to find new people! I’m glad you feel such a sense of establishment in your current place 🙂
I hope still being close to your old community helps you after the move. I know you’ll be super busy after the move, and have so much on your plate, but have you started to think about the steps you’ll take to build your new community after the move?
We’ve had two really big moves in our marriage and you are right, it really does take some time to find your place. I will say it was a bit easier the first move, when our children were very young and that’s when you bond with other parents that you meet at school and scouts and sports. The last move, ugh. Kids were now a lot older, it was not only hard to break into the parent section because they were very established – and also, I didn’t really want to make the effort at that point. So it took longer to find friends because we didn’t have that kid connection to make it easy. We finally did – through running, hah! Seems like it always takes something to find your group.
Thank heavens for running during that second move, right? I didn’t think about it being tricky when you move when your kids are older but that TOTALLY makes sense!
I’m saying “YES!” to so much of this because it really resonates with me. I’ve found that being in my 40s, moving to a new area and searching for that right ‘fit’ that will just click for me (be it professionally or even recreationally) has been so much harder than I expected and predicted. In some ways, I think that we are more connected now than we were when we lived in CA because have more family around, but it’s a different type of connection. However, I’ve felt less “seen” over the past few years, and less connected, and I think that my recent injury has impacted me so much more than it would have in other circumstances.
Anyway, this was such a timely post – thank you!
I am glad this post was timely for you! It’s interesting to think about being around family and whether that is enough of a connection, you know? For some it may be, but others need people outside family and more from their community.
How is your recovery going?
Thanks for asking about the recovery process. It is going well – surgery #2 is scheduled for July. I’m dreading that but also ready to have all of the surgeries out of the way!
I hope you have a smooth recovery from that one!!!!!!