Secret #55: Belonging with Meg McKelvie
Feeling like you don’t truly belong—no matter how hard you try—can leave you lonely, anxious, and questioning your self-worth. In this transformative episode of Life’s Dirty Little Secrets, we unravel the real nature of belonging: what it means, why we ache for it, and how to find it from the inside out.
Hosts Emma Waddington and Chris McCurry is joined by licensed clinical psychologist Meg McElvie, an expert in cognitive behavioral and acceptance and commitment therapies, for a profound conversation that turns the concept of belonging on its head. Together, they explore the three layers of belonging—social, internal, and spiritual—revealing why true belonging starts within and is our birthright, not something to be earned.
Discover the difference between fitting in and authentic connection, the evolutionary roots of our yearning to belong, and how cultural pressures sabotage our sense of self. Meg shares practical strategies, from mindful self-inquiry to nature rituals and expressive writing, to help you reconnect with your sense of belonging. You’ll also learn why helping others feel included is a radical act of self-acceptance and social justice.
If you’ve ever struggled with loneliness, social anxiety, or felt like you just don’t fit, this episode is your invitation to remember: you’re not alone, you don’t have to change to belong, and your place in the world is already yours. Listen in for a compassionate, eye-opening guide to finding connection—starting with yourself.
Highlights:
Innate yearning for human belonging
Inside-out approach to self-acceptance
Shame and self-stories around inclusion
Cultivating compassion through shared humanity
Radical social justice via belonging
ORDER Justin Case Sits with Anxiety: An Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Workbook for Ages 8-12 (ACT Workbook Series for Kids)
TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 Understanding Belonging’s Facets
05:03 Exploring Personal Belonging
09:13 Accent and Identity Journey
10:30 "Birthright of Belonging"
16:00 "Exploring Internal vs External Belonging"
17:36 "Understanding Yearning for Belonging"
23:18 Understanding Mismanaged Yearning to Belong
27:41 Exploring Inner Self Challenges
31:13 Nature and Belonging Practices
35:59 Belonging Through Helping Others
37:44 "Finding Belonging Through Helping Others"
About Dr. Meg McKelvie
Follow @meg-mckelvie on LinkedIn
Dr. Meg McKelvie is a therapist, consultant, and trainer specializing in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and a co-founder of ImpACT Psychology Colorado. She earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Colorado Boulder. Before entering private practice, she served as a psychologist in the Family Program at the Rocky Mountain VA Medical Center, where she was a nationally recognized trainer and consultant in Cognitive Processing Therapy for trauma within the VA healthcare system. Dr. McKelvie is dedicated to reducing suffering through the lens of ACT and to deepening our understanding of the universal yearning to belong and how it shapes the human experience.
Follow us on Facebook @lifesdirtylittlesecretspodcast and on Instagram @lifesdirtylittlesecrets
Reach out and let us know you are listening and what you would like to hear on the show - email:lifesdirtylittlesecretspodcast@gmail.com
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Secret #55: Belonging with Meg McKelvie -
[00:00:00]
Introduction and Guest Introduction
Emma Waddington: Welcome to Life's Sturdy Little Secrets. I'm Emma Waddington.
Chris McCurry: I'm Chris, and today we are thrilled and privileged to meet with Meg McKelvie. She is a licensed clinical psychologist in Boulder, Colorado. Meg earned her PhD in clinical [00:01:00] psychology from the University of Colorado, where she studied
cognitive
behavioral therapies and acceptance and commitment therapy, apples therapy and research into those areas. Prior to her work in private practice, she was a psychologist in the family program at the Rocky Mountain VA Healthcare System where she specialized in developing, delivering and evaluating. Compassionate research-based treatments for distressed couples and couples were one partners struggling with trauma. She's served as a nationally recognized consultant, a trainer in cognitive processing therapy, A CBT for trauma for the Veterans Affairs Healthcare System, and local supervisor for doctoral level trainees. She has specialized in CBT ACT and couples therapy and research for over 18 years and reproductive mental health for 15 years. She's particularly interested in our innate yearning to belong, which was our [00:02:00] topic for today, and how to increase folks sense of belonging and inter interconnection, especially for people who have been made to feel other. So welcome Meg.
Meg McElvie: Thank you for having me. I'm delighted to be here.
Chris McCurry: Oh, we are so happy to have you here. Um, Idea of belonging it's so deeply ingrained in our DNA and our evolution as a human species, and yet it's so hard for people to sometimes acknowledge that I. They need it and they're lonely and something needs to shift. So, you know, why is it so hard for people to, to address this in their lives?
Meg McElvie: Well, I think fundamentally there's so many, there's a lot of different facets of belonging and I think the first part is really understanding what the yearning to belong is and what all the different facets are of belonging. And some of it is actually, I [00:03:00] think, hard to put to words and hard to tease apart. So. That is, is sort of, I think one of the big, one of the challenges is what does it mean to feel belonging? There's the societal belonging of feeling part of a group. There's there's the, you know, feeling part, you know, part of a family having friends that we feel seen. And then there's also a sense of belonging that is more internal or a sense of self-acceptance or embodiment, comfortableness in our bodies. And then there's also sort of belonging from a more transcendental or spiritual lens where. We would sort of more of a wordless experience, pure awareness or selfless context.
Where we're the part of ourselves that is noticing [00:04:00] the is able to not be, is sort of unfettered by kind of the ups and downs of life and is able to. to. notice whatever is present without getting sort of too sucked into it.
Chris McCurry: Sort of a mindfulness.
Meg McElvie: absolutely, yes, absolutely. So, yeah, so there's just all these different layers of belonging and I think when we use the word belonging, it sort of hits different aspects or facets of it for different people in different times. And I think it's, that's an interesting part of this conversation is there's so many ways in to having this conversation.
There's so many aspects of this to touch on. It feels really expansive and also a lot I.
Emma Waddington: I must say, I didn't realize there was three ways to define belonging. I've always thought of [00:05:00] belonging in terms of feeling a part of I. Something, but now that I, something being a group or a community but I didn't think of it from either of those other two lenses, belonging within ourselves and belonging from a more spiritual, transcendental perspective.
And I think what I really like about having this more expansive is that. Is it possible to feel a sense of belonging? Does it matter which one, or do we need to feel a sense of belonging across all three,
Meg McElvie: You know, that's such an interesting question. Yeah. You know, what I would say is I think perhaps it's important to really bring compassionate awareness to ourselves and our sense of belonging and explore that I sort of explore, you know, how [00:06:00] like a temperature check on sort of how is my sense of belonging in terms of groups and communities and families. How is it that I feel, you know, where is my sense of belonging in myself as how do I feel a sense of calm and peace in my body? And then also sort of where, how is my relationship spiritually or the transcendental or pure awareness part of my sense of belonging? Do I have connection? Do I have. A way to connect with that part of belonging through different practices or time in nature, those kinds of things. So I think that's sort of the the take home for me after so much of diving into this is really trying to understand where we are and trying to understand. What challenges we face in terms of our own sense of belonging?
Where do we, [00:07:00] you know, and that our lives are constantly changing and you know, we may feel a sense of belonging today and then, you know, our closest friends may move away or our partner dies, or we may, you know, experience. Some extreme loss or something like that. And so a sense of belonging is always a moving target. And that's the, there's not some kind of end to it where we like achieve it or finally master it. It's a constant dance of really understanding our own longing to belong.
Emma Waddington: So is it possible.
To feel a sense of belonging in ourselves, but not belong to a community.
The Inside-Out Approach to Belonging
Meg McElvie: So that's kind of, that's in some ways where I started getting really interested in belonging is that I think a lot of times we [00:08:00] associate belonging with, I. With groups and
Part of groups.
And and I think what I came to understand through my own work and through learning all about belonging was that there is a practice of learning how to belong from the inside out and that. Can really then help us belong out into the world.
Emma Waddington: Yeah, that makes so much sense., I just love this. is it. Do you think we need to start there? Like, I sometimes, you know, in like my client work, but even with myself, I'm a I'm a third culture kid and so I moved around a lot as a child.
So belonging was always a big deal. Big deal because I moved, we shifted communities we moved to countries where I spoke different language. Sometimes I looked a bit different. [00:09:00] And so belonging really was well, the lack of belonging became a big part of what I sought, what I looked for, and what I realized was that I kind of became very good at adapting.
Becoming a bit of a chameleon and I even, you know, somebody said to me, you sound so American when you speak on this podcast. You know, that's one of my skills is that, you know, my accent can change depending on who I speak to, and I dunno if I sound so American. But anyway, the point being is that, you know, I notice that I adapt my thinking, my way of being.
And with age, I've come to recognize that as. You know, perhaps something useful and sometimes something that denies who I am and, but the need was to feel a part of something and that somehow I [00:10:00] wasn't a part of the group and the community that I was supposedly belonging to. And so is that inside out work?
Sort of really important to help me to know where I belong. Like, and that's sort of the kind of journey I've come on you know, decades later to recognize that, you know, knowing who I am, what's important, what my values are. We talk about that a lot on the podcast. You know, what I stand for, what I care about helps me.
To feel a sense of belonging, having that clarity within myself, but also to know what I wanna belong to.
Meg McElvie: You know, what comes to my mind as you're talking is this concept of.
The Birthright to Belong
Meg McElvie: That we all have a birthright to belong.
And it reminds me, you know, one of the thing, one of the images that helps me [00:11:00] really understand belonging and more of the wordless experience of it, is imagining your yourself as a baby and. You've just been born and your caregiver is holding you to their chest and just imagining sort of the, your soft hair and your tiny fingers and you know, the curve of the heel of the baby of a beautiful baby and just what that when we are born, we. There's nothing that we have to earn. We truly belong. And you know, caregiver doesn't say, oh, they're so smart and that's why I love 'em. Or, oh, they are so handsome, that's why I love them. And so I think in many ways what I'm, [00:12:00] what we're talking about with belonging is. Is how to come back to some of that, where the, what happens out there in the world doesn't we become sort of more unfettered by that.
Like that's fundamentally we have a birthright to belong and we don't have to earn that. And that is something that. If we can ta, if we can really touch into, for ourselves, can help us reorient to, to this birthright and look at the ways that we try to earn it. And that fundamentally we all have ways that we try to earn love and belonging. And how do we notice what they are and see if we can. Let go of some of those strategies become more aware of that. So it's not [00:13:00] to say yeah, I'll leave it. I'll leave it there.
Chris McCurry: So it's not an achievement. not something we have to, you know, necessarily work at, because that can actually be counterproductive. It sounds like,
Meg McElvie: Yeah. I.
Chris McCurry: like, you know, I mean, I've worked with so many kids that, you know, they're very socially anxious and they just try too hard. In their social groups and it's very off-putting.
Meg McElvie: Yeah.
Chris McCurry: actually have to coach them on doing less, um, and trusting more, which is hard. It's hard to
trust, you know, particularly if I've got a lot of self stories about how inadequate I am. And I love the way you talk about stepping around those self stories. I really like that image of. You know, not having to get rid of it, but just step around it, you know.
Meg McElvie: Yes. That kind of in instead of [00:14:00] debating with ourselves, are we good or are we not good, or are we smart or are we attractive? Just seeing if there's a way to tap into that birthright to, to belong and not have to get into that debate. So, so some of it is, there's a way in which we, as our culture put so much on. Self-improvement and you know, even in sort of what seems like a good way, right? We all, the three of us probably all share that, of like trying to do things to be our best selves. And I think some of this work really free, like sort of can free up people to let go of some of that. And truly accept that no matter how, what we still deserve love and belonging. And I [00:15:00] think that's like almost counter-cultural sometimes lately.
Emma Waddington: This is kind of blowing my mind a bit. It's kind of thrown the idea of belonging. It's turned it on its head. So I have always thought about, you know, I talk to my clients about finding your tribe and finding a community. That speaks your language. Not literally, but in terms of your values.
But I can see how we put belonging into the hands of others in that we, if we do that, we're saying, I only belong if dot.dot. I speak like them. I look like them. I value what they do. Like, so what I'm hearing is that others don't decide whether we belong, we decide or the, that the [00:16:00] power is in ourselves.
So why do we need others?
Meg McElvie: Well, I think that we move from that space, right? May, you know, you were asking earlier, do we need all these aspects of belonging? And so maybe kind of, maybe that's what we're getting at is like. Maybe what we're talking about is this tension in our culture of wanting to focus on the outward. So like I think about a bit, so belonging from the inside out, belonging from the outside in or, you know, there's these two, these different aspects of belonging and maybe what I am kind of pointing to is that we can do this belonging work for ourselves first, and then when we go out there. Seek that connection that is truly, you know, part of our biology. We need that social connection. We will have a different way that we will show up with other people once we've, and part of it is that we're [00:17:00] re remembering we're just, it's this process of reconnecting with our belonging and re. Constantly trying to understand our sense of belonging as a tuning fork or a healthy signal that helps us get what we need in our lives.
Chris McCurry: So, so when we seek out belonging. In a wider circle there's a healthier tone to it or a different quality to it. A le less desperate, less needy, whatever that may be. If I'm
hearing you correctly.
Meg McElvie: Yeah. Or even just like more specific. Right. It's like it, it a lot when we tap into and understand the ying to belong as a signal rather than a, like a a flag of our shame. We can then really bring compassionate curiosity to that and it will help [00:18:00] lead us to what it is that we need. So, for example. We can tune into, do I need, you know, gosh, do I need to go and sing with people because I wanna feel that type of resonance with a group. Do I wanna hike with someone individually? Do I want to you know, join a supper club? Like, do I want to have more meaningful conversations? Do I wanna play with people? Do I wanna do pickleball because I want that playing aspect to be in my field and my relationships. Like, so there's perhaps like, do I long, do I not have enough close in friends? Do I have too many acquaintances? Like, just sort of all these questions. Do I have all these friends that I feel close to, but I don't really share my heart [00:19:00] with. So perhaps it's just about gaining some real, like really putting our ear to the ground about what it is that we need and when we. Get sort of stuck in the shame of feeling that we don't belong. We can't actually tune into the signal. It becomes sort of fuzzy.
Emma Waddington: I like that. So actually when I think about I don't belong, you're absolutely right. There is that shame of what's wrong with me that I don't fit in, like fitting in and belonging. Brene Brown had a um, what did I put this quote? She's got a quote about this, true belonging. Does it require you to change who you are?
It requires you to be who you are. The difference
between belonging and fitting in where fitting in means adapting yourself to be accepted. True belonging comes when you show up as your authentic self and are still [00:20:00] accepted.
Meg McElvie: Yes.
Emma Waddington: I think then that's what you're speaking to, the sense that, you know, we can't. It's too much noise when we're trying to fit in. A bit like what I was saying earlier on, like my childhood was a lot about fitting in and trying to be a part of a community 'cause it is so scary and so threatening.
And I think that's the kind of monkey we are. We are, you know, we wanna have a group. We feel safer in a group, but we can deny ourselves by trying to fit in.
Chris McCurry: That reminds me of something Steve Hayes used to say. You know, back when I was Learning Act, he'd say, we can't put our clients in the untenable position of having to change in order to change.
Meg McElvie: I
love it.
Chris McCurry: yeah, we've gotta start where you are, which I think is the name of a PEMA Children book,
Emma Waddington: And it sounds so much easier than it actually is. Like sometimes I think,
Chris McCurry: how do we actually do this? But
go ahead, finish your thought. Lema.
Emma Waddington: [00:21:00] no let's do that part because I think, As clinicians, we through these
Ground.
Chris McCurry: I need a map.
Emma Waddington: yeah, it's really hard. So how do we start where we are?
Meg McElvie: I think, the primary place to start is with this. Shared humanity, right? That actually are yearning to belong is evolutionarily wired. It's like hunger or thirst and that it is I think it's, you know, when I read Steven Hayes's chapter on belonging, it's, I wanna point everybody to that as well.
'cause this is such a rich. Chapter that really got me thinking
Chris McCurry: And remind our listeners why book that's
Meg McElvie: that's in the, A Liberated Mind. Yes. So I, you know, be as a contextual behavioral therapist belonging to me. Is so [00:22:00] brilliant because this framework is sort of, a way to fundamentally contextualize some of our deepest shame and our deepest fears, right? Like that, that this yearning to belong is actually what connects us to all of humanity and so win. We look at people's behaviors from this lens. It it really, it, I alm, I see it in my therapy room where it almost sort of melts people into the chair, you know, where it's like, oh, that's why I do all of this toxic striving, or, oh, that's why I have to look a certain way. Oh, that's why I spend so much time trying to look good or whatever it is that their behavior, it is that they struggle with this sort of what [00:23:00] we might describe as trying to earn their yo love and belonging or what is also called mismanaged yearning to belong. When they understand it from this lens to me, I'm like, oh, this is so brilliant. Like, is Steven Hayes? It's like the ultimate contextual framework where then you can sort of relax into the the empathy of like, of course, this is what I do. I of course I want to belong. And these are all the ways that the culture that it's that acceptable to try to belong.
And so, I think that. The, that is sort of one of the ways to begin is with this evolutionary perspective with understanding and and bringing compassionate awareness to what is our relationship with belonging and what are the ways in which we try to earn our love and belonging [00:24:00] and looking at sort of that mismanaged belonging such that. What we wanna do is allow the belonging to do its good work and not get sort of derailed, so to speak. So they, our yearning to belong. That's gotten derailed derailed by trying to achieve. Now there's nothing wrong. We just kind of wanna get it kind of back to doing its good work, pulling us towards what it is that is mattering to us. So that would be where I would begin is just really an inquiry.
Emma Waddington: I love that. And so the curiosity comes with that moment where you don't feel like you belong and being curious instead of. You know, they default, which may be a [00:25:00] criticism. What's wrong with me? What do I need to work harder at? You know, why am I not, you know, that smart or whatever it is that might be driving some of that shame.
It's going well, you know, belonging is a normal human need. It's a natural human need connects me to everybody else. What's happening here for me? And so when we are feeling. Lack of belonging. Well, how would it show up? So obviously there's a shame. What else happens, what other, the feelings can be cues.
Meg McElvie: I think that's a really good question.
Emma Waddington: So I'm wondering if that's also useful. 'cause shame, it's really loud, isn't it?
Chris McCurry: Well, it could be jealousy, there could be resentment, there could be sort of a sour grapes kind of thing. Well, you know, I didn't want to be part of, you know, sort of like grudge. Remarks. I wouldn't wanna be part of a group, you know, club that would have me as a member. You know, it's like, we'll talk with them then if they're not gonna include me. [00:26:00] So, yeah, I mean, it could manifest in all kinds of ways.
Meg McElvie: Absolutely. I think what comes to my mind is just looking at self story and how it might tie into belonging, right? Like. I have to be special to be loved. I'm fragile. I'm the only one. I'm a victim. I have to be the best. I can't handle this. I'm uniquely messed up. I'm not good enough. I'm in need of great care.
So, you know, I think so many of our self story, if. If we kind of ni go down and well, what would that mean about you and what would that mean about you and what would that mean about you? I generally find that a lot of the roads lead to belonging. So you're looking, you're sort of looking at where are the the stuck points that someone shows up with and is there some [00:27:00] flavor of belonging there? Of yearning to belong there.
Emma Waddington: And so, so I can imagine that when you deep do the deep dive and it sounds easier than it actually is, you know, to stop, you know, these self stories can be really loud, you know, and then, you know, being able to follow the road deep inside of us. It can take some work. Obviously with therapy that's, you know, one of the avenues.
But even on our own, maybe through journaling, through writing, through just being curious, but being very courageous and brave to go, what's under that? You what is it that, you know, I make that mean, what does that say about me? And I imagine, you know, within that inquiry we get sadness. We get.
That sense of [00:28:00] loss, that sense of rejection. And perhaps when we get there what do we then do with that?
Meg McElvie: Well, I think we just, like, we would in a, from an act perspective, we just, we wanna hold the pain and bring compassion to it and then work to understand what is that telling us about what matters to us. And what is really mattering inside these you know, this belonging pain, right? Like it's pointing us back to, gosh, it really matters to me to belong, to be part of a group, to feel connected to myself inside my body. So there is really. Just this, you know, just like ACT would talk about just a connection between that, the pain and values around belonging.
Practical Exercises for Belonging
Chris McCurry: I know you've, Meg, you've talked about. Some [00:29:00] exercises that can get people in touch with this, the free writing and expressive writing. Can you speak to that a little bit?
Meg McElvie: So I think that, one of the things that can be really helpful is one of the mediums is reading poetry and
kind of, and then doing some, you know, I find that reading poetry can connect us to the sort of the cloth of our humanity so that we don't feel so alone in our experience. You know, if someone. You know, of a different culture and a different time is speaking about belonging in their poetry. To be able to read that and then maybe use that as a prompt to write about our own experience around belonging. And that, you know, sometimes writing in groups, taking writing classes or you know, reading our writing aloud. There's all kinds of different. Mediums for that. But I think [00:30:00] overall we're tapping into our own kind of feelings around belonging potentially.
But then we're also potentially doing this in groups and connecting to literature, memoir, poetry that, that often there are themes there of the yearning to belong and maybe feeling like we don't belong in moments.
Chris McCurry: And again, that common humanity where people have been talking about these very issues, these themes for, you know, thousands of years really.
Meg McElvie: Yeah. And really there's so many different practices that we can do to connect with our own sense of belonging. You know, just even you know, some of the being in nature, you know, is something that I think we, I text on earlier and that I was remembering this article that I [00:31:00] read about how birds. Have a lot to do. Listening to Bird Song can really help our mental health. And and I was thinking about how that relates to belonging and what if. I sort of was having this fantasy of like, what if Bird song and listening to birds is actually a proxy for some like wordless experience that we have.
When we go into nature of feeling a part of the cloth of nature and that the birds remind us of our connection, that we are connected in nature, we are part of nature. We are an animal. Just like the bird. And so, you know, other, in other practices like yoga and meditation and, finding ways, body-centered practices like tai Chi coming back into the body where we can, we reconnect with our natural [00:32:00] goodness, our birthright to belong. Our, you know, pure awareness. These kind of broader experiences of wordless belonging that is less about what is around us and more about what's happening inside of us.
Chris McCurry: I mean,
Emma Waddington: yeah, go ahead Chris. Go ahead. Oh, just,
as you were speaking, I was thinking of, you know, all those practices listening to the birds being out with nature. Take us away from the content of our minds.
Meg McElvie: Yeah.
Emma Waddington: would seduce us into these narratives about us and them judgments and so it sounds like
how we come to belong requires us just to outside, like you said, outside of ourselves [00:33:00] stories, but that our minds. You know, aren't always our friends and don't always tell us the answer. You know, don't always point us to the right direction. That sometimes it does. Sometimes our minds are useful, but sometimes, you know, they talk to us about difference and rejection and threat.
And that can really get in the way of the sense of belonging.
Meg McElvie: Absolutely. And that, you know, from an RFT and ACT perspective, it's the languaging like you're saying, that can really get in the way. And I think perhaps for me, that's why the sort of the experience of reconnecting with the baby before language. [00:34:00] That part of ourselves that has always been there, that is not, is unfettered by this, the languaging that is can cause us so much suffering.
Sort of all the debates and the back and the forth and that, am I good? Am I not good? And that there is something outside of language and when we can reconnect with that. And our natural goodness and our birthright to belong, that is wordless. We can step outside of the suffering of language.
Emma Waddington: Chris, I think you're muted.
Chris McCurry: Oh, I was muted. Sorry. No, I was saying that some of that language can be used to distance ourselves from other people to say, well, they're not worthy or [00:35:00] they're different. I mean, we're seeing that a lot these days where our common humanity is getting you know, discouraged even politically and what have you.
And, uh, and that undermines our sense of belonging and it undermines our compassion for other people. And it undermines social justice and the ramifications are quite severe sometimes.
Meg McElvie: Absolutely.
The Radical Act of Creating Belonging
Meg McElvie: And you know, I think that brings us to sort of this idea of belonging work as sort of a radical act of social justices and how I. When we bring that in with our clients and ourselves you know, nobody, we, none of us belong if other people feel that they don't belong. And so, one thing that can be really powerful and one thing that I found is that what happens when [00:36:00] you go out into the world and work towards helping other people feel that they belong? Creating a sense of belongingness for others. And how might that impact your sense of belonging? So for example I teach I volunteer teaching adaptive skiing to people with disabilities. And so when I go there and I'm working towards inclusiveness and belonging for other people, it's actually one of the places that I myself feel the most belonging and. So that's something to really also keep in mind is that when we do this work to break down barriers for marginalized communities or to help connect other people with a sense of belonging, that it actually surprisingly may help us feel that we belong as well. I.[00:37:00]
Emma Waddington: That's
so beautiful and
yeah.
Chris McCurry: No,
Emma Waddington: I got ahead
of the game here.
Yeah. You
know how this happens. It always
happens at this stage where I'm prompted and I to launch on something else. but
Chris McCurry: free to launch. I.
Emma Waddington: oh, thank you. He's so patient. This is how we've managed this for the last 14 years. I just thought it's so beautiful and so radical.
This idea that, you know, if others don't feel that they belong, then we won't feel a sense of belonging and actually nurturing other people's sense of belonging will ultimately bring our own sense of belonging. And like the ultimate of belonging is to help others.
It feels quite, I mean, it feels very moving and very [00:38:00] beautiful and counterintuitive like so many of the powerful movements are, and an incredible invitation for us as humans. Like I think that, you know, it is the ultimate goal. To cultivate a sense of belonging as a species. Like we talked about that with, sorry, our previous guest, you know, as a species.
And even when he was talking about even within the animal kingdom and within nature, like is that the ultimate goal?
To be able to cultivate that sense that we belong. We don't need a group, we belong as a species. And yeah, it's an incredibly, obviously an incredibly difficult thing for us to do as humans.
Meg McElvie: Yeah, it's very timely work. [00:39:00] And it gets us outside of ourselves once again. Right. You know, when you move into a space and you are noticing. Does, is there someone here who's new and might I approach them and invite them in and and notice who needs to be brought into the fold? It's a powerful and subtle practice that can really focus our attention outwards and have benefits for all I.
Emma Waddington: Wow. I love that. Really beautiful.
Chris McCurry: Excellent.
Thank you so much,
Conclusion and Farewell
Emma Waddington: yes. Thank you. It's got me thinking. We will have links to your websites in our show notes as well as a couple of books and, we will look forward to the book that you have to write about this because it would be a great benefit to [00:40:00] so many people and it's certainly something that you speak to with eloquence and compassion.
Meg McElvie: Well, thank you so much for having me. It's such a delight to talk with you.
Emma Waddington: Skin.
Chris McCurry: All right.
