Close-knit groups are intimidating.

When they’ve known each other for years. When you’re new or temporary or not a Harry Potter fan. When you’re in college but still act like a kid sometimes.

We all want to belong–God gave us an inherent need for community. And we find ourselves in so many situations where we’re not part of the group. 

What do you do when you’re not included?

At Work

For me, it’s at work.

I admire people who spend time with their coworkers outside of work (shoutout to McKenzie and her coworkers at King’s Island!), because that’s never been my experience.

Once I interviewed for a job where the bosses told me everyone was like a family there and the employees even had a group chat for fun.

After I started working there, they never added me to the group chat. 

Maybe it died off, I don’t know. But I felt excluded (and disappointed).

It’s hard to build friendships with your coworkers when you’ve convinced yourself that they’d rather be talking to each other.

“It’s hard to build a friendship when you’ve convinced yourself they’d rather be talking to someone else.” 

Four jobs later, I now work at a Hibachi restaurant. 

My coworkers talk around me in Indonesian and Spanish. They live together in a big house, work together full time, and I’m just an American who works a few nights a week.

We literally don’t speak the same language. 

But somehow I feel included.

And you might not believe what got me there. 

What is it?

There’s no way to measure belonging. It’s not tangible. It’s even harder to quantify than physics (that’s a joke).

With emotions, you can at least say “I feel very sad” or “I feel a little sad.” But with belonging, it’s pretty black and white.

We either feel like we belong or not. Or we don’t care (talking to you, lone wolves).

We can look at someone standing on the outside of a group and say, they’re excluded. But do they feel excluded?

If I tell you I’m one of the few fluent English speakers at my workplace. If I tell you my coworkers laugh at jokes in other languages when I’m standing right in between them, you’d guess I’m excluded right?

But I feel like I belong.

So maybe it’s just a mindset.

And when you have the right mindset, it’s not hard to include yourself.

How to Include Yourself (it’s simpler than you think)

Here’s the thing…you have more say in whether you belong than other people. 

When you feel excluded, someone excluded you, but it’s not always someone else. 

If there’s a tight-knit group I want to join, but no one in that group knows I want to join, they’re not excluding me. I need to include myself. 

I need to ask to join them when they’re making plans to visit the local ice cream place later. 

I need to smile when they make a joke in another language instead of ducking my head and wondering if the joke was at my expense. 

You have more say in whether you belong than other people. 

I need to include myself.

Because the truth is, we’re the ones to pull out. We pull out before someone gets a chance to reject us, becasue it feels safer that way.

You have more say in whether you belong than other people. So shift your mindset, tune up your bravery, and include yourself.