Entry Four
Home. Belonging. The theme and foundation for Fundamental Hunger. This fall will mark one year since searching for a new home. What were you doing almost a year ago today? How do you feel knowing how much time has passed?
Being uprooted, and constantly changing locations has disrupted my security. I have created memories, but what this adventure has also shown me is that my inner child moved constantly. Home was always changing, and it didn’t last. I have re-created this and held this story in an entirely new way. It’s been heartbreaking, honestly. It has also been a necessary challenge. I have had to look myself in the face and confess that stability is not familiar. I have needed to embrace what home means during a time where I do not have a physical space I can call mine. I have also had to let go of my identity with who I think I am with a home. I have needed to feel my value diminishing because I placed my worth on my physical territory. I’ve needed to find grace when I shame myself about not having this one life essential.
It hasn’t been simple, and I’ve also made it more challenging. It has been almost a year, but I am still here. I hope that you can admire the fact that you are still here, too. Below, enjoy my 90 Days of Belonging entry from the magical portal of February 22nd! This was written at the beginning of our 2022 home journey from a sublet in Brooklyn.
February 22nd, 2022:
What a magical portal of a day! Every-time I remember, I get a hit of magic and wonder. It’s sunny right now before the rain kicks in and I walked around Clinton Hill to grab a coffee and then came back to our sublet.
Home has always been a major part of my belonging. Growing up, we moved often. We lost two homes to financial distress and the second time ended with my parents disliking each other more than the first time. I don’t have a childhood home. I haven’t had one for years. I know many people don’t, but I get a tinge of envy from people who have the same rooms they had since high school. A place to go back to that hopefully reminds them of where they belong, and where there is always space for them to return. My adult life has looked pretty similar. Living in other people’s spaces and yearning to create my own sanctuary without the help of anyone.
In 2020, I signed a lease for my apartment in Soho. It felt like a miracle. It was also the home that my current partner, Tommy, viewed after our first couple of dates while I was out of town. When I first moved to New York I walked through almost every single neighborhood. Part of the reason was pure excitement and exploration, and the other part was because I am attuned to how a place makes me feel. I wanted to get to know the city, and where I felt a “yes!” I was able to rule out neighborhoods as future homes, by allowing my body to lead the way.
I remember walking through downtown Manhattan and standing on the corner of 6th and Spring and thinking “I will live here one day.” It was winter of 2019 when I said this. The city was festive, and I looked down on Spring Street and I felt alive. One year later, I had an apartment around the corner. I was finally living in the area that called me to New York to begin with. I did it. It was my home, in the city that’s always made me feel like I belong. An entire city that felt like home. How special is that?
In October 2021, Tommy and I decided that we had outgrown that apartment and it was time to move on. Committing to this decision sent me into a tailspin. Letting go of that apartment felt like letting go of who I was and what I had achieved. It was terrifying, which is also why I knew I needed to do it.
Since letting go of that apartment, Tommy and I have visited the west coast and shared space in the homes of our loved ones. Now that we are back in NYC, we are in another temporary place for hopefully not much longer. It feels good to regroup, but I’d be lying if I didn’t long for a place that was my own. A place that is ours. To truly settle into myself and create the sanctuary I can see in my mind and feel in my heart. I have never allowed my fear to stop me from pursuing the next thing. Leaning into something new and experiencing something more is something I highly value.
But there have also been moments in my life when I was running away in hopes that I could belong somewhere else. Chasing distractions so I didn’t have to face my present emotions and acknowledge how not at home I felt with myself. Growing up my mother always had an eye on what could be fixed. What wasn’t good enough. Where she wasn’t satisfied. I hold that same tendency. I tend to see what is out of place, what could be “better,” what needs to be improved. I see that it is a reflection of how I treated myself for so long. Obsessed with finding the flaw. How do you belong to you when you are constantly pointing out what isn’t working? It doesn't allow you to belong amongst peace, freedom, joy, and authentic development.
It can be scary to let go of certain identities. To let go of needing to fix, because then what would I do if I wasn’t trying to change something? Who am I outside of trying to be better?
Who are you, when you aren’t relentlessly repairing yourself?
But what if that is where life begins? Envisioning what I would be doing if I wasn’t trying to change every little thing. I think this is a form of security I have underestimated. I have sheltered myself in a state of altering my surroundings. Today I am faced with finding security no matter what. Security outside of my external world, and safety amongst the distress.
What if I said yes to this expression of security?
Journal prompts:
Who are you when you aren’t trying to change something or someone?
Where are all of the places you have physically lived? What is your reflection and relationship to those places now?
What does security mean, feel, and look like to you? Is it a definition that you are still clinging to? How does it need to evolve so you can live a little bit more freely, and breathe a bit easier?
Don’t forget, you don’t have to do anything alone. If you want to share how your own journey of belonging is impacting you, leave me a message at the number below.
Better Call Salwa: 347-903-7057
In the meantime, remember that you can always be your safe haven.