I don’t think “belongingness” is a real word. But I found an essay with this title on the internet and like the idea of being in a state of belonging. I like the way the word makes me feel, it’s inclusive. I’ve recently begun again to edit my book about my experiences as a remote area nurse. I began it over three years ago and began my blog at the same time, to accompany it visually. I thought I’d have the project finished in a few months but creative efforts have their own timeline and with this one there’s been gaps of months with no writing.

What a writer sets out to write and what a reader perceives are not always the same thing. I asked a good friend who I respect as a reader to read the first draft of my book and he said “oh it’s really a love story isn’t it?” I met my husband during the time I’m writing about and he features in the book but I hadn’t meant it to be any sort of love story. That comment of my friends confused my sense of direction for awhile, probably necessarily so. After a break in writing of many months and after only editing two or three chapters the word “belonging” came to me. And with it a flood of questioning thoughts all around what it means to belong.

In particular I was thinking of what it means for a non-Indigenous person to live and work in an Indigenous community. But the topic is much broader than that. Monty Pryor, an Indigenous Australian writer, in his book “Maybe Tomorrow” tells this account at a school:

White kid: Can you make me an Aborigine?

Pryor: I can’t make you an Aborigine. But I think deep inside you’re asking questions and you’re listening and you’re learning. It’s sort of making you into an Aboriginal person in your heart. Because that’s what everybody has to do, is to be open. Then the learning will come.”

To know what it is to belong we need to listen to ourselves, deeply, and to what’s going on around us, closely, and learn what it is that makes us glad to be alive. The ancient poet Rumi said to follow what we love and it will never lead us astray. I think it will also lead us to the serene state of “belongingness”.