Belonging is a hot commodity and a fascinating word. At its tamest, it can mean nothing more than affiliation, as in, “I belong to the Millennial generation.” At its more potent, it can indicate a profound statement of identity and love, as in, “I belong to Kelsey.”
We can all be quite fickle with our affiliations. Whether it’s a team bandwagon or a fair-weather friend, there are many cases in which we are eager to shift our belonging from one person or group to another.
But when we’re talking about this deeper, more intimate belonging which has the power to shape our identity—we tend to hang onto that pretty tight. I would even say we go to great lengths to hold onto it at all costs. And when circumstances arise that force this belonging out of our hands, it can be very painful to lose.
I count myself fortunate to have experienced this second type of belonging many times in my life. I have restructured my life around the people and communities to which I’ve belonged. I have naively assumed that my belonging would go on indefinitely, undisturbed by life transition or interpersonal conflict. And I’ve found that some of the most agonizing moments of my life have been when I’ve had to choose to relinquish my belonging somewhere in order to prioritize my own health and growth.
Any loss of belonging spurs a deluge of painful questions. In these scenarios, church splits and breakups really start to resemble each other: “Did I communicate myself clearly and kindly enough?” “Will he/she/they ever understand where I’m coming from?” “Should I keep the photos of us on my phone?”
This last one is cliche for a reason. It raises the question: can my positive memories of this belonging remain positive, even though I no longer belong and the relationship has ended?
As I have grieved the loss of belonging in multiple communities throughout my life, I’ve found that my mind gets stuck on a loop with that last question. It’s unanswerable. On the one hand, of course those memories are worth keeping and cherishing. They are memories of happiness and connection that cannot be tainted by any loss. On the other hand, we shape our memories each time we remember them, and when we bring new information and experiences to our remembering, those memories take on new meaning. We may notice cracks in the facade of “good old days” we hadn’t noticed before. We may realize that our happiness was not as real as we had supposed.
It’s so difficult to avoid the temptation to absolutize our experiences. When we are in the midst of belonging, we give ourselves over to the narrative that whatever or whoever we belong to is entirely without flaw. When we lose that belonging, those people and communities become villains. It was rotten all along; how didn’t we see it? These are both ways of soothing the pain of our desire to belong. We should remember that these mental tricks arise simply because this pain, this need, is so great. We feel it so acutely.
In truth, we receive profound gifts in our belonging to one another. And we receive profound wounds. It is unfaithful to justify the wounds with the gifts. It is also unfaithful to erase the memory of a gift merely because it was followed by a wound. This is a song that attempts to honor both the gifts and the wounds.
We kept the feast, we kept the fire alive
Held hands and held open the door
You laid down your head like you had finally arrived
Sure you knew what it was for
Long was the table, long would we linger there
Then pick up the crumbs from the floor
Bread for hunger and a song for despair
This must be what you are for
You gave all you had making a dream come true
You couldn’t believe it was yours
Then found out the dream never belonged to you
Now you don’t belong anymore
Now you don’t belong anymore
But we kept the feast, we kept the fire
Yeah, we kept the feast, we kept the fire
We kept the feast, we kept the fire
Will I ever know what it was for?
Beautiful Drew!
I love what you've written here, Drew, and the way you are thinking about how to hold and honor it all -- the gifts and the wounds. Thank you for naming it. You're not alone in the wrestling. And it all matters.