What do you belong to? Where do you belong?

[IHeartKingThistle]

I'd love some responses on this - I'm writing a collection of poems for my MA and I'm focusing on groups of people and the sense of belonging that you get from being in a group of some kind. Apologies if that sounds pretentious - I'm trying very hard to avoid that!

Please can you tell me what groups you are part of, or have been part of, that make you feel like that, even a bit? Anything at all would be appreciated.

Football for my husband, he loves their home ground, the noise, the crowd, knowing they will all support the team whether promotion or regulation.

At work, I work for a huge bank and it’s always suited how outgoing and how I like to fix things/find better ways of doing it. I feel right there.

Sitting in my parents back garden which is joined to their neighbours back garden amongst the beautiful blooms that my dad and the neighbours cultivate, having a chat with mum, dad, neighbours, their extended family, our extended family whoever is about. They’re the people who brought me up and they are the people who support me through life.

Finally sitting on the sofa having cuddles with DS, he fits perfectly against my body and I feel whole and entirely at peace when we are sat together.

@Mother87 feeling the urge to write a poem about fruit salad

Am about to eat strawberries and blackberries😋going completely off topic

This is such a lovely thread OP!

I am Scottish, and although i’m not massively patriotic I do feel like I belong here. I felt it acutely after returning ‘home’ after living in North east England for 7 years.

I am a teacher (have been for 18 years) and it is part of my fabric as a human being. I work in a department with a group of wonderful people and I feel like I really belong with them.

Finally, I would say my daughter gives me a wonderful sense of belonging. When she was born, I didn’t feel that ‘rush of love’ that some women talk about. Instead, I thought ‘there you are. I’ve been waiting for you my whole life.’ It was like I already knew her but just hadn’t met her yet. With her, I feel complete belonging.

Oh gosh these are fab.

So many work ones - do you think some jobs are more likely to have that feeling of belonging than others, or is it pot luck? I'm a teacher - I feel it in my current school but sure as hell didn't in my last school!

I think with work you’ll find that for some people it’s the team they’ve got around them, for some it will be the values within the company and for some it will be the output, I made this or I helped here.

I play in 2 wind bands. I feel I belong there, particularly one of them.

I also feel I belong by the sea. Interesting as although I was brought up inland, I always loved the sea, and found my family on my dad's side all came from the Kent coast.

Yes, for work it's the fab bunch of people I work with, plus the fact I feel I make a difference in my job (healthcare assistant).

I have several - many are as pps have already said.
I'm Welsh. I have a visceral reaction to crossing the bridge, like my insides actually move. I breathe easier at home, I know where I am, in a figurative sense.
I teach. We are strange creatures, teachers.
Music. A gig is a truly religious experience. 100 or 50000 people singing one song is an epic experience and a privilege I will never get enough of.
I dance. I belong to a dance group and I dance. I started at 6, I still dance now mid 40s and it makes my insides happy every time.

Hospitals...I was a nurse, still registered but now in education...and I love hospitals and feel really at home in them. I visited my mum in the US when she was having major surgery and I loved having a body, comparing nursing and medical practices.

I feel a sense of belonging with the NHS. Have thought of moving abroad quite a few times in recent years and though it isn't possible due to my husband's family, I feel a sense of unease about thinking of not working for/around the NHS

That should have said that I loved having a nosy, not body (though that was handy!)

Church. I walk up the drive and look up to the clock, and I feel uplifted even before I go in through the door. The people there know me, and I know them. I dread having to leave - we will in time, with dh's work

I also feel happy in the company of other Playmobil lovers!

2nd/3rd synagogue and actually just generally being with people who are Jewish. Weddings/my halls of residence at Uni/Tequila nightclub on a Thursday night at Uni/being in Israel. I may not know them particularly but it’s a wonderful warm sense of belonging.

Busy night shift on labour ward

School gates when I see my mates turn round and smile waiting for me to join them (as a mum doing school run, not as a kid)

Hull. I rejected it, moved away, disparaged it for years.

But lately, when I’m there, or if I meet someone from there, I get a sensation deep in the pit of my stomach that says I’m at home.

I’ll never live there again - I have no need to. But it’ll always live in me.

Also, schools. The smell, the way the corridors echo, the ridiculous and entertaining kids, all of it. Home.

I believe I belong to the town where I have grown up. My family are here, my friends, my children and their friends. I know a lot of people. It feels like home. Always expected I would move away and start a life, but no, I'm still here and life is good, if not familiar

I went to Florida and absolutely hated every second of it. I went in one of the large gift shops, I got near the counter and heard the person working there talk. He was talking Bengali and I actually felt like hugging him, it was the first time since I arrived there that I felt content and that i belonged anywhere. I'm not from Asian descent but live in a town with a high percentage. My 19 year old daughter also seeks out people from Bangladesh if she's somewhere and feeling anxious?

I am also great friends with a group of mums that i met on here 7 years ago. I am much more open and honest with them than in real life and consider them very good friends; we are a little community and have been through a lot together.

I met up with a cousin I hadn't seen since I was about 7, I have only met him a few times and we hadn't seen each other for about 30 years. We both instantly felt we were family, I haven't felt that with any of my other family before.

This is a really difficult one to answer. I have a handful of good friends but I don't see them very often but I'm in contact with them regularly. I'm fairly solitary in that sense. I enjoy doing things with my DH and DC's. And I enjoy crocheting and sewing and walking or the gym. And despite my outward appearance I'm a little "old before my time" regarding the things I enjoy doing. I don't go to the gym with anyone, as I prefer to go alone to get a good workout and can't think of anything worse than trying to have a conversation with someone when I'm working hard.

So I think I "belong" exactly where I am. I'm incredibly happy where I am.

I don't think you have to be part of a group to feel like you belong somewhere. Or at least I don't feel like I do anyway.

Oh yes, and I belong to London. Everyone here is from somewhere else, we are all so different socially or geographically, and yet we have made it our wonderfully eccentric home together.
we're not ALL from somewhere else! I feel very strongly connected to London, it's where DH and I both grew up and I love everything about it whilst appreciating that other people feel the same about where they come from. I'm a member of the London Topographical Society and local history society.
I was part of the autism community for many years when DS was younger and I still have good friends from those days. My book club is another group in my life, I'm a member of the Humanist society and I'm very strongly connected to my close and wider family.

I thought I would never fit in anywhere or ever find a sense of belonging. I was always the odd one out and known as a loner. That all stopped as I got a bit older and realised there are other geeks out there and it's now acceptable to get really enthusiastic and over-excited about comics, sci-fi and tv shows etc. There's such a great sense of belonging and acceptance that I'd been missing my whole life. I was also told I'd grow out of it, I'm in my thirties now and the older I get the more powerful the geek becomes. Waves @Lima45* *

Waves back at @LokiLocks (great name!) It's true there's a lot of acceptance in the geek scene. And it's great that it's becoming more normal. I'm now the cool aunt to my nephews because I know all about their superheroes 😊

I don’t feel like I really belong to any group, but I’m OK with that.

The closest sense of belonging I feel is when my national football team are playing. (Especially when we’re doing well and everyone is in a good mood!)

I’m part of a volunteer group but I’m not sure that gives me the sort of tribal feeling of belonging.

When I was a teenager, I was very much part of the emo scene and that was wonderful. Especially as a fan of my favourite band. It really did feel like us against the world. It was almost cult-like but it was wonderful- all these misfits finally finding a place where they were accepted for who they were.

Oo what a fab question. I was going to say in books, around books. But also in mountains. By open water. And so pleased someone else said in guiding. I’m also ex-military, so the pull of inculcated bonds are strong for very good reason. I belong in lots of physical places, but get the biggest rush of rightness from research, and ideas. That thrill of excitement that makes you grin just for the sheer enjoyment of being and thinking. It’s a solitary thing. You might experience a sense of warmth admiring it in others - but it isn’t a belonging to a community. It’s an internal space. I miss it.