Gotta Find Where I Belong

My Dear Stranger,

I’ve carried a feeling I could never quite name. Even as a child, before I had the words for it, I knew something wasn’t quite right. Not wrong in a dramatic way—just off, like a song played in the wrong key.

A quiet heaviness in my chest, a whisper in the back of my mind, "this isn’t it… this isn’t where you belong.

I grew up moving through places and moments as if I were always slightly out of frame.

No matter how hard I tried to fit in, something in me stayed untouched, restless.

I could smile, I could laugh, I could stand among people, yet somewhere inside me, there was always this quiet distance, a sense that I was visiting a life that wasn’t fully mine.

And it wasn’t about the people, or the city, or the life I had,

It was deeper, like the rhythm of my soul was out of sync with the life around me.

I watched other children settle into their worlds so naturally. They seemed rooted, grounded, certain of where they belonged. I, on the other hand, felt like I arrived early—or late—to something everyone else understood instinctively.

I learned how to adapt. I learned how to blend in. But belonging was never something that stayed.

It passed through me like light through glass, visible but untouchable.

There has always been this voice in me that says, "You have to go. Not in a frantic way. Not out of anger. Just a steady knowing. A whisper that returns even when I try to silence it.

Go where? I don’t know. I’ve searched for answers in places, in people, in dreams I thought would finally anchor me. I’ve mistaken attachment for home and familiarity for belonging. And every time, after the comfort fades, the same feeling returns—gentle, persistent, unavoidable.

Sometimes it scares me. This constant urge to leave without a destination. This sense of being in transit even when my body stays still. I wonder if there’s something wrong or broken in me for never feeling fully settled.

Or maybe I was simply born with a soul that remembers another kind of place—one where breathing didn’t feel like effort, where existing didn’t require explanation.

My Dear Stranger,

I ask myself often, How will I know when I’ve arrived?

Maybe it won’t be marked by anything extraordinary. Maybe it won’t come with fireworks or certainty. Maybe it will arrive quietly, disguised as peace. A morning where I wake up and my heart doesn’t feel heavy before the day begins. A space where silence doesn’t echo loneliness but feels warm and kind. A place where I don’t feel the urge to leave parts of myself behind just to be accepted. When I can stay without my heart planning an escape. When love doesn’t feel like something I must earn, but something that simply is.

Sometimes I wonder if belonging isn’t really a place at all—but a moment. A moment when my soul and my body finally rest in the same home. A moment when I no longer bargain with myself just to stay alive in a life that doesn’t feel like mine.

Maybe one day, I'll find that place, a place where I no longer have to hide my tenderness. Where my sensitivity is not something to apologize for, but something that is understood. A place where my presence is not tolerated, but welcomed. Where love doesn’t feel like a burden, and staying doesn’t feel like a negotiation.

Sometimes I think belonging isn’t about finding the right place—but about becoming honest enough to recognize it when it appears. About letting go of lives that look good on the outside but ask me to abandon myself on the inside. About choosing truth over comfort, even when truth means walking alone for a while.

My Dear Stranger,

There are days when I feel tired of searching. Days when I wish I could settle, stay, and root myself like everyone else seems to do so easily. But even then, something in me refuses to lie. It refuses to call something home when it isn’t. It refuses to stay where my soul feels unseen.

Until then, I will keep moving,

I keep walking. Slowly. Gently. Sometimes without direction, sometimes with only faith as my compass,

not always in miles or maps, but inwards.

I move toward what feels lighter, what feels truer, what feels closer to who I am when no one is watching.

I trust that every step—every wrong turn, every pause, every heartbreak—is shaping my understanding of home.

Closer to honesty, closer to the truth of who I am beneath all the masks I’ve worn.

Closer to the kind of life that feels like it fits, without forcing.

Maybe the belonging I’ve been searching for has never been out there waiting.

Maybe it’s been waiting inside me—waiting for me to come home.

And maybe one day, when the noise settles,

I’ll feel it at last: the soft, steady rightness of being where I was always meant to be.

My Dear Stranger,

Maybe one day, I won’t feel the need to ask anymore.

Maybe one day, the question Where do I belong? will dissolve into a quiet certainty.

Maybe one day, I will sit somewhere, feel my heart soften and rest, alive, and enjoy a moment,

And without needing to name it, I will know.

But, until that day comes, this is my truth,

I am still searching.

Still listening to the pull, where the music brings its melody.

Still honoring the feeling that tells me I was made for something that feels like home.

And maybe that, too, is part of where I belong.

Your stranger,

Vie