Lots to Unpack There
We’re Jess and Lisa, two best friends in our 40s living in Maryland. This podcast is about life, motherhood, leadership, and everything in between. We’re navigating the “messy middle” of personal and professional life and have learned that having someone who just gets it makes the journey less hard.
Each week, we’ll share something real from our own lives and unpack it together in real time. Our hope is that as we process and reflect, it’ll inspire and help you do the same—wherever you are.
Lots to Unpack There
Beyond Fitting In: What It Means to Truly Belong
Jess and Lisa dive into a profound discussion about the concept of belonging and how it relates to our sense of self and our place in various communities.
• Sharing the ups and downs of family life including the inevitable sharing of germs
• Exploring the relationship between productivity and waste, suggesting productivity increases when waste decreases
• Challenging traditional views by proposing that belonging starts with declaring "I belong here" rather than waiting for external validation
• Distinguishing between "fitting in" (changing yourself to match others) and "belonging" (being accepted as your authentic self)
• Examining belonging through the lens of diversity, equity, and inclusion using a dance floor analogy
• Considering the role of self-confidence and authenticity in creating a sense of belonging
• Questioning whether belonging is something we create for ourselves or something bestowed upon us by others
Join us next time as we unpack unexpected career transitions and how to move forward in choice.
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Hey, it's Jess and Lisa. We've got stories to share From our hearts to your ears. Lots to unpack there. Tune in every week you won't want to miss. Dive deep into life with Jess and Lisa.
Speaker 2:We're Jess and Lisa, two best friends in our forties living in Maryland. This podcast is about life, motherhood, leadership and everything in between.
Speaker 3:We're navigating the messy middle of personal and professional life and have learned that having someone along the way who just gets it makes the journey less hard.
Speaker 2:So each week, we'll share something from our own lives and unpack it together in real time. Our hope is that, as we process and reflect, it'll inspire you to do the same wherever you are. Hi Lisa, hi Jess.
Speaker 3:How are you feeling? I'm getting better. Yeah, a little bit. A little bit. Still got a lot of tickle in my throat, but that's what strep will do?
Speaker 3:I can't believe you're dealing with that again I know, I know, and like I look back on moments you know and think what, when did this happen? What, what transpired to initiate this infection? Once again, I really don't know. I don't know. I did the other day I was trying to get my kids to try a new breakfast item, because breakfast is like a perennial issue in our house because they don't eat breakfast at home, they eat breakfast at before care, and that means we have to pack breakfast, and breakfast cannot be made until the morning of. It's not like lunches that I can make the night before you have to make it that day because a lot of them are hot, that I can make the night before you have to make it that day because a lot of them are hot. And so I'm just, I always am having the issue of trying to get my kids to try new things. Why, I don't know like, why not just let them eat their same things over and over and over again? I don't know like I'm masochistic. I guess so I was. I made this little like like I don't know Jimmy Dean or something biscuit roll-up thing which is like I don't know Jimmy Dean or something biscuit roll-up thing, which is like I don't know like two and a half inches long and it's just like a little biscuit with like a tiny amount of egg and sausage in the middle, and so I made it for them and I was trying to get them all to try it to be like don't you want to? You know, have this now.
Speaker 3:I gave a bite to my first born child, who is eight, and he tried it and he was like oh yeah, that's kind of good, but I don't want any more. And I was like okay, fine, and I popped it in my mouth. Oh no, without thinking about it, and this was before he was diagnosed with strep. But I was like I was thinking it was maybe possible. And at that moment, as I pop it in my mouth and I'm chewing on it, I walk over to the microwave and you know, do something else with some other thing. And I'm like what did I just do? And so like I don't know if that, if it was, you know, death by a thousand paper cuts, or if that was a specific moment that actually just made that infection happen. But there are so many. My family is just so close with food stuff and sharing things, germs and stuff alike, so it's really impossible to say. But I did think to myself in that moment like that might have been a poor decision.
Speaker 2:That reminds me of when I I my oldest must have been maybe two or three or something and had a cold or flu or something uh-huh and and we were doing pretty well like keeping the germs isolated. And, yeah, she crawled into bed with me and sneezed in my face and it was just that. That. That was it. I said well, there we go. Whatever that is, I'm getting it. The countdown has started.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they think it's hilarious when I recount for them the number of times each of them has sneezed directly into my eyeballs before, and they don't understand that it's not a joke. I'm not being hyperbolic for effect. Like they have all at some point sneezed directly into my eyeballs, with them open and, like I you know, got whatever ensuing condition they were doing.
Speaker 2:I'm I'm chuckling a little to myself because earlier this week when your middle, or maybe it was last week when your middle child- was home or not feeling super well. And you said, well, just don't lick anybody's eyeballs, right, right. And she was like, how do I do that, how do I not?
Speaker 3:lick somebody's eyeballs. Yeah, she was confused at how to achieve that goal.
Speaker 2:Silly business. Well hopefully, I mean thank goodness for antibiotics.
Speaker 3:Hopefully you're through it, yeah, soon yeah, I think another day and I should be good to go. I'm probably working at about 50 percent better at this point, so glad of that, definitely. Like it's amazing how fast antibiotics and I try, I try to like relate this to my kids from time to time, you know just gratitude in general, but I'm like you are so lucky to live at a time in humanity when there are things like antibiotics Now, granted, they can be overused and it can do damage, but, like in general, living in a world where you don't have like I don't know if people used to die of strep when they were younger, I don't know, I don't know. But, like man, what a thing to be grateful for. Yeah, just a clean round of $5 if you have insurance, antibiotics and you are back on your feet. It's crazy. Very grateful for that right now.
Speaker 3:Oh, yes, I think what about you? You're not suffering from anything, are you? I don't think.
Speaker 2:No, the pollen is starting, and so I would say suffering is part of the human condition, so everybody's probably suffering from something at some point but I don't know if that sounds wise or negative or really positive. I can't tell where that comes, you know compassion drives me to see, to witness the suffering in others and to acknowledge that it's there. But in the acute sense I am not suffering from anything like that, like no illnesses or anything it has been.
Speaker 3:Thankfully we're kind of coming away from that season, right, you would think, as like spring you know, swiftly approaches, but my family just wants to hang on to the flu season like crazy. I guess.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's just the pollen that is starting. I can feel it kind of itchy in my eyes and all of the things that come with living in a treed environment, but my week was pretty good.
Speaker 2:I think I have been doing a lot of work I think I have even alluded to it in some of the episodes on being really intentional with what my values are and how I phrase that in my business, and a lot of good thinking about that, but I'm also trying to balance my learning in theory with my learning in action and my thinking and my doing, and so it was time for me to start doing and make some pretty big updates. And I set out and I actually did it. So I'm feeling very accomplished. I don't know if anybody will notice or even cares or if it's just something that really makes me feel more aligned, but I'm feeling pretty good about that.
Speaker 3:Well that's. I mean, that's awesome for one, but I mean, I think that's kind of the thing about productivity. I think, maybe for the most part, I don't know, I'm just I'm saying this out loud for the first time so, like, is productivity really about everyone else or is it really about you? Is it about you, the person, like checking off your list and feeling accomplished about your day or your time or your week or whatever it is. I don't know, maybe it doesn't even have to be defined, but I think about this only because, like, productivity is so central to me, feeling good about myself, right, and I wouldn't even necessarily say it's a value for me, but it just like, if I want to feel really good about myself, that's the shortest distance.
Speaker 2:I have been reworking some of our podcasts and I think you have even said those exact words working some of our podcasts, and I think you have even said those exact words maybe a month ago.
Speaker 3:There you go See. That's how central it is, I guess, to me feeling good about myself, but in terms of productivity, I don't think that my productivity is really ever for anyone else.
Speaker 2:I think there's this. Well, the idea of kind of productivity is in the eye of the beholder, but something that I was talking with others about this week was how do we define success, how do we define performance and how do we define growth, and I'm wondering where productivity would fit in those three buckets. For you, what is it about productivity that makes you feel like you've accomplished something? Same again performance and growth oh, not growth success, probably.
Speaker 3:If I had to choose between the two, the first two, yeah. Yeah, because I don't think productivity is really about growth unless, or okay, for me it's not. Really, it's not at all about growth. Me growing and me feeling productive are really not, they're not one in the same, they're not parallel adventures. It's, yeah, it's a feeling of success. Yeah, it's a success measure, I would say, but like little s, not big S, right?
Speaker 2:I don't know if I so I did feel productive, but I also think that I would probably put it in a performance space because it was doing the thing, which is what kind of performance for me is yes.
Speaker 3:I. That argument makes a ton of sense for me too. I'm I, I can go with that.
Speaker 2:I mean, you could keep it in success if you want to, but it's like the behavior, and so for me, or or the actions I was taking, and so redoing my website, redoing my copy, making sure it was consistent and aligned with me and putting really just putting it out there felt like a thing that I was doing. That will probably contribute to success, but right now it's indirectly linked. There's no, I can't say for certain that because I did this thing, now this other metric of success is going to increase, but I know that I feel more consistent and authentic in my voice on the internet. So I don't know, maybe that is a success. I'm sure I could see it both ways.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think an argument could be made for either one. I just like, when I'm productive, I feel like I get to pin like a little, a little gold star on my shirt, like walk around all day feeling like, yep, that was me, I crossed off all those things, but but there's no like I don't think. I think the reason why I said it's not for anyone else is because to me there is no external validation required. So for me, feeling productive, there's literally. I don't need anyone else on the planet to say, golly, you've been really productive today. In fact, it doesn't. It doesn't add anything if someone does say that. So that's why.
Speaker 3:That's why I say that it's like an entirely intrinsic sort of sort of mechanism. I guess. For me it's just like I win, I got you know, and sometimes I can feel productive without ever, really ever doing anything, and sometimes I can do a lot of things and not feel productive at all. So it's because we're using the same word to mean both things where you can feel productive, yeah.
Speaker 2:Even if you haven't done you haven't made any widgets, you haven't done anything, but you've made progress towards an idea or something else that you've been working on.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And then also you can feel productive when you do a bunch of things that matter because they're observable to move towards a goal, and I think to me there's probably an equation.
Speaker 3:Let me try to work it out, because equations are not my strong suit. Hold on productive is maybe the opposite of waste, and so amount of time wasted is a value that is put into the equation of the feeling of being productive.
Speaker 2:That's really interesting. So in order to increase your sense of productivity, you have to decrease your sense of waste.
Speaker 3:Exactly your sense of productivity. You have to decrease your sense of waste, exactly, huh, exactly. And if, like, if productivity is high but waste is high, which there are scenarios in which case let's just say they're 50, 50, you're 50% wasting your time, 50% being productive, your productivity is, for me, going to feel less than it would otherwise.
Speaker 2:Because it's diluted, because you've also have this sense of waste and the waste really like.
Speaker 3:It's a highly weighted item, right, because you're looking to minimize that. In fact, waste might be weighted higher than productivity, in my case.
Speaker 2:I don't think I've ever really thought about it that way before and I'm wondering, now that I'm looking at it, looking at my week through that lens maybe that is what I'm feeling accomplished about is that I didn't have a lot of wasted time. I actually sat down and I focused and I did the things that I said I was going to do. I also was intentional with my rest, and so that is not wasted time. Resting time.
Speaker 3:And that's the subjectiveness of waste. You really have to make sure that it's, you know, really really tuned to you. But I mean by that measure, the best thing you could really do, if that were true for you, would be to like make a list of all the things that you consider to be wasteful time-wise and then make sure you have rules around when you can and cannot do those things.
Speaker 2:Right. It also explains the phenomenon you alluded to, where you can be, or where you mentioned where you can be doing a lot of things that are not productive because they are wasteful or inefficient. Interesting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which is, I mean, I always feel the best if I have my no social media during daylight hours. If that rule is in effect and that means during the day, up into the point where the kids are going to bed, like once the kids are either in bed or going to bed that's when that rule gets sort of lifted I naturally feel more productive. I don't know what the actual output is. It might not be a measurable difference, but to me so, going to the feeling of feeling productive, it's going to naturally feel more because that one, to me, I feel like social media is a massive, massive waste. I still do it to be fair, but I feel like it's a waste and I judge myself for it. So if I don't do it, naturally that like boost is going to be there of feeling productive.
Speaker 2:Maybe that's why waste is so much. It's weighted more than productivity. Because you have that judgment, yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:There's judgment, exactly, exactly. It's like the weight of judgment is so much it's weighted more than productivity because you have that judgment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, there's judgment, exactly, exactly it's like the weight of judgment is is weighing weight of productivity yeah, it like just makes it slightly right, exactly, it's just a little denser wasted time right there, exactly Interesting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I like that. So your week has been productive. That was kind of where you left off before we went down the productive money drill Right Again, we did a little impromptu unpack snack there.
Speaker 2:A little unpack snack, a little unpack snack. But I think I would like to get unpacking if you're up for it, let's unpack, let's do the thing.
Speaker 2:So last week I went to a women's leadership conference and they had a panel during the lunchtime and they talked about all sorts of different things. But one topic that came up was around belonging. And it was kind of kismet that that topic came up because I've been doing. That's one of the things that's just kind of been on my mind lately and it definitely ties into the whole business aspect and how my identity is represented in my business and also just as in my sense of self. But one of the things they said was or what I wrote down, so I paraphrase here what role do others play in whether you belong? And it got me thinking about what had been on my mind, which was I think I've spent most of my life not really feeling like I belong anywhere and I don't. I mean I have little snippets of times and in groups of people where I absolutely felt like I belonged my group of high school friends I think we have talked about several times I feel like I belong with them. I felt like I belonged in my singing group in college and I have a group of coaches now that I am building relationships with and I feel like I belong with them I'm building relationships with and I feel like I belong with them, and so it's got me thinking about the different ways in which belonging shows up.
Speaker 2:I've also thought about the times when I didn't feel like I belonged and what was present in those moments where belonging was not. It wasn't an experience that I had. I remember thinking when I used to work for the government. I went from kind of division to division area to different area. There was one group there where I, one office where I felt like I belonged, but most of the time I was like, oh, I just don't fit here. I don't know what that is and why I don't fit, but I don't. And ultimately I think that was one of the main reasons why I left government work was because I didn't have, I didn't feel like I I really belonged, and I always kind of looked at this as like an external thing, like it was something that that was bestowed by the organization you know like an organization makes it so people can belong or not, and I think there's a piece of that.
Speaker 2:That's true, an organization has to have the right, it has to be inclusive in order to have the sense of belonging. It has to allow people to bring their authentic selves in order for people to feel like they belong. But as I've been thinking about it over the years, I'm seeing more and more of the role that I play in whether I belong and whether I can belong, and so the question I wrote down as I was processing what this person was saying was what would it look or feel like to belong everywhere you go? What would it take to do that? Like, what parts of myself would I have to show in order to belong? And I think where I've landed is that, in order to belong, you have, you have to believe that you belong, irrespective of what other people put on you and the environment that they create. And so there's this weird kind of push-pull whether or not you want to be there is a separate issue.
Speaker 2:But I think and what the panelist was saying is that she said I belong in every room I'm in, and I thought, wow, I wish I had that confidence. And then I was like well, confidence in what? And then I thought, well, I guess it's confidence in myself and the safety of the environment in which I can show myself. And so then it got me down this deep wormhole of well, what does it mean to be seen? What do I have to do in order to be seen? So I don't know if any of that makes sense. It's kind of abstract, but that's where my brain has been thinking about cultivating a sense of belonging. I don't have a team anymore that I lead, but I have a family that I lead, and so what does it mean to create a space in which my children can belong and really be themselves, and and that other people can feel like they belong with me when we're in community?
Speaker 3:together. This is like the opposite of an unpacked snack. This is like an unpacked feast.
Speaker 2:It is an unpacked feast and there are so many different pieces of it Right, and it's been percolating for a long time. I mean I left the government in 2015. And so it was at least 2014 that I started thinking about this and it's just kind of been growing and turning and moving in different ways. And at my last company, I think, I had a lot of walls up and that definitely contributed to me feeling like I didn't belong, like I felt like I deserved to be there. But that was different, like feeling like I deserved to be there was different than feeling like I belonged was different than wanting to be there.
Speaker 2:I mean, they were all these discrete feelings and I've told other facilitators, organization development professionals, this theory of you know, in the term of diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, diversity is kind of a fact of what's the difference. Equity is what is the playing field and how level is it? What access do people have? Inclusion is inviting other people, other voices, into the fray, but belonging you can't give somebody belonging. That's something they have to feel for themselves, and the organization can be hostile to belonging, but can it create belonging in the absence of somebody declaring I belong? Yeah?
Speaker 3:And I think you know. Going back to something you said a little little while ago, I think what you were hitting on and I think I agree with this, though this is the first time I'm really considering it is that in order to belong, you yourself have to feel you belong first. Like that's hurdle one, and it doesn't. You don't even get to ask the question do other people see me as belonging here If you yourself do not see that Exactly Like first thing?
Speaker 3:Right so like first hurdle cleared I belong in this room, this is, this is a place for me. Then you get to, kind of like, ask the broader question do the other people who are in this room with me feel that I belong? But after you determine for yourself that you belong, does the second question matter.
Speaker 2:Right, and so what has been blowing my mind about this is, like a lot of times, when we talk about whether or not we belong or not, we're talking about hurdle two and beyond and how other people need to decide that we belong. Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah Also, that should maybe happen, but we skip hurdle one, which is what does it mean for me to belong? What does it mean for me to belong Right, looking at the self aspect of it and what role I play?
Speaker 3:Right, as opposed to fitting into a specific culture or a specific skill set or a specific I mean God forbid the way you look or act or see the world. You know you look or act or see the world. You know external factors, similar levels of status in the room. But I think when you get to the point of asking I'm presupposing this person, you are asking yourself the question of do they think I belong? You're still questioning whether or not you belong. So, like you haven't answered the first question yet and therefore are not really in a position to ask the second one, because by the time you answer the first one affirmatively, the second one it matters a lot less.
Speaker 3:Well, I don't. I mean, I think, I don't know, maybe I'm, maybe I'm trying to act in absolutes and there's no absolutes in any of this, but like if you are asking yourself whether people see you as belonging and questioning that, then you haven't fully cleared that first hurdle.
Speaker 2:I think that's probably true. If you're asking if other people think that you belong, before declaring you belong, then you're putting their opinion of you above your opinion of yourself. But I think once you have accepted that I belong here hurdle, you can also ask do other people also agree that I belong? Because if they don't agree that I belong, then that might change whether or not I want to be here, which is a totally separate question.
Speaker 3:Yeah, good rephrase on that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. And when I look at it from an organizational standpoint there's. So how to create a culture of belonging when the people like that's hurdle two. And so you have to empower people to show up as themselves, which means you don't have a homogenous culture, which means you have diversity.
Speaker 2:The opposite of belonging is fitting in, because if you fit in then you're not yourself, because nobody is exactly the same, and so belonging is saying this is who I am, I can show these aspects of myself, I can be authentic and, as a result, I belong here and also I want to be here and these other people, because these other people are willing to accept me. And so it's like you can't just say from an organizational perspective well, of course you belong here because you're a blank, like you work at this company or you are this way. You say you belong here because you're you and we have to make space for you, but also you have to be you, and so there's this weird chicken and egg kind of thing. But I agree, if individuals are not willing to say I belong here, or they're not willing to be seen or be themselves, I belong here or they're not willing to be seen or be themselves, then that kind of undermines belonging.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was trying to like work down that DEI framework and trying to say to myself like, okay, let's say, I am diverse in some aspect of myself and I do have equity and I am included. If you have all of those things, can you still not belong or not feel like you belong, or is that inherent in having those other sort of things checked off?
Speaker 2:I don't want to answer this in absolutes, but a common metaphor that is given is the dance floor. The dance floor analogy is are people invited to the party? What types of people are invited to the party? Is maybe diversity, equity is? Does everybody have a seat at the party? Does everybody have enough room? Does everybody have what they need to have a good time at the party? And knowing that people might need different things to have a good time at the party, yes. And then inclusion is asking people to dance, and I think belonging is to own that I'm a terrible dancer but I'm going to go out on the dance floor anyway. Or that I'm a terrible dancer but I'm going to go out on the dance floor anyway. Or that I'm a terrible dancer and I'm not really comfortable dancing. But you guys have fun, I'm cool, I'm here, I'm having a good time. I can bring in whatever level of engagement I want to bring into the dance floor.
Speaker 3:So belonging might look more like somebody who's decided to take pictures of people dancing Sure and do that rather than dance themselves. If they don't want to dance, they still belong there. They're still contributing. And see, I don't know if I'm conflating things by even saying contributing, because I don't know if that factors into it or not, but in their own way, being a part in the way that they want to be Right, would mean belonging. I think. I think that. I think that makes sense.
Speaker 2:I think, yeah, you just hit on it. It's showing up in the way you want to, right, because I might not be confident in the way my body moves. I just don't like the way I am, I have. Maybe I'm self-conscious, and that's okay, or maybe I just don't like to dance, and that's okay too. I think it would not be, it would not be conducive to a sense of belonging to say everybody has to dance, because that is fitting in If everybody has to dance. I think it's Right.
Speaker 3:And also some people can't dance, like physically can't dance, physically can't dance Right.
Speaker 2:So that's an inclusion piece. Is is this a dance party in which everyone must dance in order to be there? So I don't know. I don't know that the metaphor fits perfectly, but I guess that's why I wanted to unpack. It is because this idea of being seen and really putting myself in a position to be vulnerable and to be quirky and whatever whatever other words that I would use to describe myself those things have to happen. I, I am. I had not really considered before making that declaration of I belong here, because I don't know that I really have ever well, aside from those few times that I've I've really been able to have that sense of whatever it is that I've got going on. People will accept that or that. I will accept that to the bigger point.
Speaker 3:So taking it a step further into, like an action sort of framework, if someone wanted to know whether or not they believed they belonged in a certain scenario or in a certain group, or whatever it is, what questions might they ask themselves to get to the ultimate answer of yes or no?
Speaker 2:I believe that belonging is a feeling.
Speaker 1:Uh-huh.
Speaker 2:And so I might want to like what does it feel like to belong somewhere Right? And when I ask myself that question, it's like I can think of all of the times in which I was just so goofy, weird, funny, whatever, and I had people who were not mocking me, they were just laughing alongside me. Oh my gosh, the pictures. We have a whole photo album from high school where we, for some unknown reason, dressed up in crazy costumes and went to a grocery store dressed up that way. Like what were we doing? I don't know, but it was fine because we had each other.
Speaker 2:And so when I think about that sense of belonging, it's like I can show up just as I am. I don't have to cover anything, I don't have to modify, I don't have to have the burden of thinking very carefully before I speak. I can be a lot more unfiltered, which isn't to say that I want to be thoughtless or just blurt things out, but that I know that I have the grace to be human. I think that's kind of what belonging feels like to me. And when I think about what are those barriers to belonging that I've experienced there's been. Maybe it's an experience of where I've accidentally slipped and I've been reprimanded for that, and that tells me that the environment expects me to be perfect instead of human. But I would wonder if that is a common experience or if others might have a different time when they felt like they didn't belong. Or maybe it's a lack of understanding of where someone's coming from, or a lack of curiosity where someone's coming from.
Speaker 3:Yes, oh man, so many thoughts are racing through my head Because I was thinking about you would have been in the larger group of the grocery store and you definitely would not have belonged in that particular case you would have I mean, you would neither have belonged nor fit in. You would have been an outsider. I guess in that scenario, but because you had a group and you were part of the thought process and the conceptualization of that group to really really like make this an intellectual discussion, not about a bunch of high schoolers who just decided to be stupid for no reason, but like I don't know. I was just thinking about that because there was a common aspect, there was a commonality between you and it was a decision. I'm just trying to tease apart the different aspects that made you belong in that scenario.
Speaker 2:I hear what you're saying. I think the group component of that specific event was strong. But I would say, if I mean that's an extreme case where I was dressed up in a costume, but if I just dressed differently as an individual and I felt very comfortable in my skin and what I was wearing and could say I belong anywhere that I am, I could walk into a grocery store. I could walk into a grocery store, no problem, because it wouldn't matter to me that other people in that grocery store thought that that was weird or whatever. I wasn't. I'm not looking to belong at a grocery store, I'm looking to get my groceries and so I I'm kind of like what is the social need? Like what is the grouping that even matters for belonging? Is it a family? Is it a team? Is it a company? Is it a society? Like what? In what context are we? How are we defining that system of where we feel like we?
Speaker 3:should belong. Yeah, I mean, I started this, this discussion, with the thought of oh, you know what? I've never really thought about belonging and therefore I must have always belonged in everything, in every scenario that I've been in. But in fact, as I was thinking about it, while you were talking, I was realizing that different versions of my authentic self show up in different scenarios, different groups, in different things like that. So have I always belonged, or have I always ensured that I was close enough to belonging? And does that equate to belonging if you don't have to think about it, if you don't have to question it, like, does belonging only matter if you don't belong?
Speaker 2:I think we have a basic human need to belong. As for your question, I don't know. I think maybe that is something to answer individually. How important is it for you to belong, and to what extent? I think because, if I look back on all of those moments when I didn't belong, I don't think anybody else would have said you don't belong. They would have said but you're so competent, of course you belong in this office, but I didn't feel like I belonged and so maybe it was because I didn't want to be there. I don't know. I remember saying I just don't really seem to fit in, and fitting in is the opposite of belonging. So if I didn't fit in, okay, but also I didn't really feel like I belonged either.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I do want to point out, because I have had family members and people that I have known that are part of counterculture, that specifically don't want to belong, don't want to belong to what we would consider to be typical, mainstream, you know devices but that anthropologically there is a huge, huge impetus for belonging, in that you will more likely survive. You know now we live in an age where you could literally hold up in a cabin and just come to town twice a year for your food and still survive and be perfectly happy if that's what you want. There was a time when that was not the case and you would literally completely, completely die but that there are people and groups and I think it's worth at least noting that there are individuals who want not to belong, specifically in certain scenarios probably.
Speaker 2:I wonder if this might be another case where we're using the word belong to mean fitting in and also the word belong to mean having self-confidence and in terms of like identity politics, keeping our identities small means not saying I belong with that person and this group and this other group, because then you know you are associating some aspect of your identity with the groups and so in that, that way, like I don't want to belong to any of those groups, because I don't feel entirely aligned, but I do have a desire to be seen, a desire to be loved as I am, and maybe that's really what belonging.
Speaker 3:And I would say to the of the people that I have known that specifically want to run counter to mainstream, they still very much, if not even more so than usual, have that desire to be seen and have that desire to be authentically themselves and have that desire to find belonging in the non-traditional sense of it, in terms of it being the way that society might tell you it has to look. You know they still want to find their tribe, their people, their environment, but they want it to be on their terms and I think that's both brave and kind of wise now that I kind of like think about it.
Speaker 2:Right, exactly, I mean, I think that's probably that if I were to bottom line, where I'm at with this idea of belonging, it's that it should be on your terms, yeah, On the individual's terms. And that means it starts with the individual and ends with the individual. So it starts with the individual saying I belong here. It maybe goes through a do other people think I belong here? Because then it ends with me saying and therefore I want to be here.
Speaker 3:And I, yeah, I think you're. You're so spot on as usual. I've taken an esoteric, you know trip around the block, but I'm I'm wondering. So what happens in this scenario of I believe I belong here. This is the right spot for me. I am contributing, I have the right skills, I have the right everything I am. I am a person who belongs in this space, but everyone else disagrees Is that belonging or is that not belonging?
Speaker 2:I. I also wrote down in my notes acceptance does not equal belonging, and so I think if you feel like you belong, then probably you do. I wonder how often this happens. I don't know.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Somebody feels like they belong and they are not accepted, and how long they stick around in that group Because there's this exchange of energy that seems to boost a sense of belonging. And if that were absent, I don't think I could maintain my sense of belonging for very long, because there's a reinforcement that happens and for me that would look like, hmm, I don't think I want to be here, yeah, and so, regardless of their acceptance, like I'll take my belonging someplace else where I'm appreciated.
Speaker 3:Take my belonging ball and go home. Yeah yeah, very good point. Very good point there. And I wonder if you know, in the scenario of I feel like I belong, no one else in the room feels like I belong, I wonder if you kind of start back at that DEI sort of checklist and think, ok, maybe this person isn't seeing as belonging to this group because they don't have those other things, maybe there isn't equity, maybe there isn't inclusion, maybe there isn't diversity of thought and that's why the belonging cannot exist in that group scenario.
Speaker 2:Right, it's the all of those things maybe have to be present to create an environment in which belonging can thrive, Because if you're the only of whatever grouping, however you define yourself, where you're the only female manager on your team of male I don't know anything about that as an example.
Speaker 2:That has absolutely no bearing here, of course, but if you were or if you identified in any way that was not otherwise represented, I think that the inertia to overcome is greater, because now you kind of need more of that, not validation and the like external sort of way, but you need more energy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the energy exchange you talked about, it's the energy exchange.
Speaker 2:Yeah, these are all still kind of. I've been thinking about it for quite a long time but they still feel first drafty because I haven't really said these things out loud and it just has me thinking about. You know how often have I been guilty of kind of looking at hurdle two and being like, well, hurdle two is not there, so I'm just going to completely absolve myself of responsibility for hurdle one, when in fact, if I don't jump over hurdle one, I can't make hurdle two happen, because I didn't even give myself a chance to belong.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, it's almost like belonging is sort of the nirvana state of DEI. It's kind of like if you've done everything else right, belonging can thrive and can at least, I mean, at a minimum, be present, but without those other things there is no pot of gold at the end of the DEI rainbow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I guess that kind of means that there is a certain requisite amount of others that have to be present for belonging to happen. If you're by yourself, belonging is just self-confidence maybe, and if you're in community with other people, then you will naturally, by virtue of having more voices, more thoughts, more minds, you'll have more diversity and then kind of equity and inclusion happen on maybe a bigger, bigger system.
Speaker 3:Yeah to me they're cultural aspects. They are things everyone kind of has to agree to. They're like social contracts to some degree, and when everyone agrees or at least when the majority agrees in those social contracts, then you can kind of check that off and say like, okay, the majority enough of the majority believes that there is equity and there is a need for inclusion and therefore including all different thoughts is acceptable in this culture.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I realized I brought up belonging in the case of DEIB and I think when I initially was thinking about it, I was thinking of it almost irrespective of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like, really, what is the feeling of belonging and not just what role is it, does it have or is the interaction in the system with DEI?
Speaker 3:And I think they are separate things. System with DEI, and I think they are separate things. I mean we laid those out hurdle one and hurdle two. They are separate. But yeah, if you're going to have it in a group dynamic, then there's naturally system rules that have to be in place. So go back to your question. What was your question about belonging in general, like what is it that you wanted to unpack, and did we get anywhere even remotely close to answering it?
Speaker 2:The question was what would I wrote down? What role do others play in whether you belong, and what would it look or feel like to belong everywhere you go?
Speaker 3:Okay, what would it look or feel like to belong everywhere you go?
Speaker 2:And I think we did kind of get there. I think, if I'm just looking at belonging as an individual phenomenon, it looks like self-confidence, and so it means being able to feel self-confident, to have to show up as myself in whatever space that is, and to not conflate acceptance and belonging, because whether or not somebody else accepts that I'm there that's hurdle two it doesn't change whether or not I belong there, but whether or not I accept that I want to be there and that I accept that sense of belonging. That's where kind of the whole dynamic plays together. So reversing that.
Speaker 3:Can someone ever belong if they don't have self-confidence?
Speaker 2:Well, I think that goes back to something we talked about maybe last week or the week before, this idea of the phrase I love you, where you can trust the love, but do you trust the you?
Speaker 3:And if you don't have a sense of self, then certainly I don't think self-confidence can thrive, because I would imagine there are people who belong in the groups they belong to but do not feel self confident about themselves, and maybe it's macro versus micro, maybe it's self confidence on a in a vacuum, in an isolated way. Do I have self confidence in this group, in this scenario, in this exact thing that I'm looking to belong to, versus I have generalized self confidence and I feel pretty good about myself Most of the time, as I think that is pretty much the end state that most people try to get to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maybe instead of self-confidence, it's a desire to belong. Okay, but I do think there has to be a trueness of self, because otherwise what is it you want to belong to and how do you belong?
Speaker 3:Okay, that feels more right to me, that feels, that feels better to me, a trueness of self, because you can't know if you belong if you don't know yourself well enough.
Speaker 2:Yes, right, yes, I think that's what I mean by self-confidence. It's like trust in who you are.
Speaker 3:I think that that rings more true. Yeah, yes, self something. Maybe we're, maybe we're still're still working, maybe there'll be a part two to this one. I feel like. I feel like belonging definitely deserves more than one unpacking as you said it's an unpack feast.
Speaker 2:It's a feast, indeed a banquet, but it is. It is kind of one of those those fabric type things that it just it's through everything and then, once you start to see it, it's like wow this is here.
Speaker 2:There's one of my coaching colleagues has a podcast on belonging. I'm like, oh man, I need to start listening to that. She told me about it and I was like, oh, that's actually what I want to unpack on Friday. But so we didn't unpack about belonging and she, you know, has a PhD and is actually really smart on these things and I'm just like this is what's happening in my brain and I just want to get it out.
Speaker 3:So which I mean, that is, that is the kind of the basis of our podcast is not being an expert, but having things in our brains that we want to talk about. So maybe the part two needs to include her, maybe, maybe that could be an Easter egg. We don't even know. We don't even know if we just made an Easter egg there.
Speaker 2:Maybe I need to listen to her podcast and then listen to all the ways that everything that I have said has already been said a million times in all of these academic forums, or has been refuted in all of these academic forums or has been refuted in all of these academic forums.
Speaker 3:It's very possible. And, listeners, we hope you're along for the journey with us as we determine if everything we've said has already been said before in some way or another. But I love this topic and I love your thoughts on it and it's truly not anything. And I think deeply about a great number of things.
Speaker 3:I probably don't need to and I don't know that I've ever thought deeply about belonging in this way. So I'm really glad you brought it up and I'm really glad I get to now sort of noodle over it and see how it applies in my life. Because now I'm like looking at all of my different cultures and systems that I'm a part of and going oh, that's a good question for you, elise. Like do you belong in this system? Like I mean a couple easy ones off the top my family, like I 100% belong in my family, but I've also had a really, really strong role in shaping that, in shaping that, and so I feel like I'm I kind of I'm a bit of a ringer in that way to belong, because I'm probably the largest piece of determining what that culture looks like.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I think that is kind of. The question is, what role do any of us have in shaping whether or not we belong?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think that's a great starting point for part two.
Speaker 2:Not for right now. Yes, well, thank you for unpacking that with me Bringing it up To be continued, I suppose Absolutely.
Speaker 3:We're definitely going to have to circle back, to use a nice corporate term to round us out here.
Speaker 2:Ah, yes.
Speaker 3:Thanks, Jess.
Speaker 2:Thank you, talk to you later Talk to you soon.
Speaker 1:Bye From our hearts to your ears. Lots to unpack there. Tune in every week you won't wanna miss. Dive deep into life with Jess and Lisa okay, belonging is oh.
Speaker 2:I'm kind of kind of messing this up.
Speaker 3:Hold on, let's let me let me work through this and extend the metaphor.
Speaker 2:So we can synergize our data streams. I could keep going if you want me to.
Speaker 3:No, it's okay. It's okay For whatever reason. As I'm looking at you on Zoom, your microphone just keeps tricking my eye into me thinking that you're wearing a bear costume Because it looks like it's like your tummy is a different color than the rest of your outfit, which is kind of a brown color, and, like I've thought it now like four or five times, I haven't said it, so I just needed to like I needed to get that out in the universe, so it wasn't just rolling around in my brain anymore.
Speaker 2:So oh my God, thank you. Thank you for that. Not a bear, no problem Wow.
