Balance & Beyond Podcast

Have you ever felt like a chameleon, constantly changing to fit into different environments, but never truly belonging?

Have you ever felt like a chameleon, constantly changing to fit into different environments but never truly belonging? Inspired by the thought-provoking insights of Brené Brown, we explore the exhausting and often isolating experience of trying to fit in. Through personal stories and reflections, we reveal the stark difference between fitting in and true belonging, emphasising the importance of self-acceptance as the foundation for genuine connection. Discover why the crisis of belonging is more prevalent than ever and how embracing who you are can lead to a more fulfilling and less exhausting social experience.

Sometimes, aligning happiness with your personal values means making unconventional choices. In this episode, we share the transformative journey of selling a dream home and the realisation that true happiness isn't dictated by societal benchmarks of success. We discuss the emotional challenges and courage it takes to prioritise authenticity over conformity. By sharing personal experiences and insights, we encourage listeners to seek supportive communities where they can truly belong and practice being their authentic selves. Tune in to learn how to navigate this journey of self-discovery and find ease in being genuine.

Episode Transcript

INTRO: Welcome to Balance and Beyond, the podcast for ambitious women who refuse to accept burnout as the price of success. Here, we’re committed to empowering you with the tools and strategies you need to achieve true balance, where your career, relationships and health all thrive, and where you have the power to define success on your own terms. I honour the space you’ve created for yourself today, so take a breath, and let's dive right in…

“Stop walking through the world looking for confirmation that you don't belong, because you will always find it.” This is one of my favourite quotes from Brene Brown, and it has inspired this week's episode of the podcast, where it's time to talk about belonging, fitting in, and what we are doing to abandon ourselves. 

If you're anything like me, I've always been a bit of a chameleon in life. I considered it a bit of a badge of honour, that I could fit in anywhere. I distinctly remember being on a corporate golf day, with a bunch of I'd say “blokes”, because that's what they were. 

And they were talking sport and I was, you know, harping on about football, and these things, and then I would be at the school gate, and people would be talking about, you know, someone's birthday party coming up, and I thought that that was a really good thing, that I could fit in anywhere. 

But, there's a key in that word. And that's that I felt like I was trying to fit in, and I've always had this deep sense that I've never really belonged anywhere. And belonging is a fundamental human need. We need to feel connected, we need to feel like we belong. 

But, the more I've understood these concepts and understood more about the work that we do here at The Balance Institute, and the trends with women, the more I see that we almost have a crisis of belonging, and the subsequent crisis of loneliness, even though we are really alone, and we are constantly trying to fit in. 

So, let's talk about the difference between fitting in and belonging. And, most importantly, in learning to belong you're actually going to find yourself, which is quite ironic. Brene found some interesting quotes. And, I guess, some interesting findings, you would say, in a lot of her research around shame. 

And this was when she dug into, “You know what?” “What are some of the places that shame comes most from?” And part of this was spending lives trying to fit in, and particularly in a world, at the moment, that is quite polarised, that people are almost trying to fit in with a certain archetype, or view, or worldview. And yet, because we might all have the same political views, we might all support the same team, or whatever it might be, that doesn't mean that you actually belong. 

So, let's talk about what “fitting-in” is, and I'm hoping that you're going to have some “Aha’s!” here about how your living life, and perhaps spending a lot of energy trying to fit in. So, when you're fitting in somewhere, you are assessing a situation. You are becoming who you need to be, to be accepted. Bear in mind, I use the word “belonging”, but being connected to other humans is a fundamental instinct of ours. We want to ensure that we have the protection of a tribe.

But, too often, we're relying on fitting-in, instead of actually belonging. So, we talk about fitting in with the school mums, or fitting in with work, or fitting in with friendship groups. And really, this is this focus on externally looking at the outside world and going, “Okay, how should I dress?” “What should I say?” “What do I talk about?” “What do I not talk about?” “Oh, do I like that, or do I not like that?” 

And, if you cast your mind back to childhood, or even the movie Mean Girls that my kids seem to be watching a bit at the moment, it is really tricky to find your people and I remember as a child never really feeling like I fit in anywhere, feeling like I was always a bit different, and always contorting myself. 

But, when you're fitting in, and you're doing this continual external, almost scanning of, “Oh okay, they're dressing this way.” “Alright, I'm going to dress this way.” “They talk about this, I'm going to talk like this.” It's exhausting, because we spend our mind, and our life, trying to be something we're not. 

And almost every time we attempt to fit in, we abandon a piece of ourselves ,because we say, “Oh no, I want to talk about this.” “Oh no, you can't talk about that.” “Oh no, we don't do that here.” If you remember, cast your mind back to Mean Girls, just because it's been on a lot lately, where they say, “You know, this day is play day”, or “This day is skirt day.” And, if you wanted to fit in, you had to follow the rules. 

And, we've been so conditioned to, you know, we go to school and in Australia we have to wear a uniform, and you have to do it this way, and you have to do it that way. We are bombarded with the constant reminders of how we fit in, and we unfortunately interplay the word “belonging” with “fit-in”, when they are two very different things. 

So, this obsessive focus on the outside world, this continual quest for external validation, it is looking for, “Do I fit in here?” “Am I accepted?” “Do they like me?” And no wonder we have an entire generation of women who are people pleasers, because we've looked outside ourselves for, “Am I safe?” “Am I accepted?” “Am I going to be kicked out from the tribe?”

But, there is this mass abandoning of who we truly are, which is really where that definition of “belonging” comes from. Because, the opposite of fitting in is actually “belonging.” So, fitting in is contorting yourself to fit in, to be accepted. And again, this is all based on the need for approval. Whereas, belonging actually requires us to be who we are. We don't need to change. 

But, the ironic thing is you actually have to belong with yourself first, before you can ever belong with another, or a community, or a group. And this is the challenge that so many women face. They've spent their entire life trying to fit in, that they've abandoned themselves again and again and again, and they've lost touch with what they really like, what they really enjoy, what their needs really are. 

Because, when you are having a sense of belonging, this is not something that you ever negotiate with the outside world. This is your internal voice, your internal faith, your internal trust that, “This is who I am”, and “I'm going to speak my truth”, never betraying yourself to fit in with other people. 

Because, every time we betray ourselves, and we reject ourselves in a bid to fit in, whether it's putting somebody else's needs ahead of our own or not, or not speaking our truth, because we're worried about what someone might think of us. Every time we do that, there is suffering. We wound ourselves, we shame ourselves, we're making ourselves wrong. 

Is it any wonder that so much of the anger and frustration that women feel, we end up projecting onto others? But, so much of our angst is because we've abandoned ourselves. We didn't speak up and say the thing, and we said the safe thing, and we weren't prepared to go against the grain or go against the bully, because that would make us vulnerable. We'd have to step out, as Brene calls it, “Into the wilderness.” 

But recognize that, when you always have your own back, and you know that you are never going to abandon yourself, that loneliness, or that fear of the wild actually doesn't really exist, because you know that you are never going to abandon yourself. That loneliness, or that fear of the wild actually doesn't really exist, because you know that you've got you. 

And, ironically, the interesting thing is, when you meet someone who does not abandon who they are, and who really fits in their own skin, they own who they are, they own their strengths, that person ends up being magnetic. And so, while they might be in the perceived wilderness, where they have, you know, risked not fitting in, in order to belong to themselves. 

Other people are drawn to them, because it is such a rarity in today's world for people to have this internal sense of belonging. And it can be terrifying to stand by yourself because you will have to abandon others, and you have to sit with the discomfort of, “I'm going to let somebody else down.” “They're going to be unhappy with me.” “They may not like me, they may even be angry with me.” 

And, until we have learned to actually sit with those emotions, the people pleaser in us says “Abandon, abandon ship, abandon ship.” “Keep them happy.” Don't rock the boat.” “Keep the peace, make sure they like you.” “Make sure that you're nice.” And yet, all of that is so much suffering. And this is an emerging theme where so many women who come into our world have completely abandoned themselves. 

And I've heard people say to me, “What does that mean Jo, when you've abandoned yourself?” And it means that you no longer know what your own needs are. You have no idea what your desires are, your dreams, you've shut everything down, and you're living this life of “shoulds.” “Well, I should do this” or “I should want this.” And this is when you realise that you're spending a lot of your life fitting in. 

I went through a process when I sold my house. I had the house, because I thought it was what made me happy. I would have sworn hand-on-heart, it's what I wanted. But it was only when I got that dream, that I realised “I'm kind of keeping up with the Joneses here.” “If I'm honest, I feel like I've got to fit in, because that's the benchmark of success, and that's really what fitting in is. “Everybody else” quote unquote “society”, quote unquote the “corporate world.” I don't care who you put in those quotes, it is just us what has been said, that this is what makes you successful. 

And on that pathway, I ended up abandoning actually what it meant to me. What did success mean to me? What was important to me? What mattered to me? And any of those voices were completely drowned out by “achieve”, “strive”, “bigger house”, “more money in the bank”, “more security.” And, of course, I had logical arguments around,  “Well, of course money in the bank, and pay down the mortgage, and get some investments”, and all of that. But, that's the conventional path of fitting in. 

And, if you're listening to this podcast, if you're in my world, there's a pretty good chance that you're not a conventional person. Whether you have admitted that to yourself yet, or not, is only between you and the universe. But, you are probably not conventional. You are probably a trailblazer, of some description, whether or not you've abandoned that side of you. I know I did for a long time. I wanted to fit in. I wanted to have the same goals as everybody else, because that's what everybody else was celebrating. 

And it takes so much internal strength. and it takes a lot of internal work for you to be able to put that down and say I'm not going to fit in anymore. And as I've done so much work on myself, I realised that that moment, that night that I had before my house went to auction, when everyone else had gone to bed, and I sat in my living room sort of looking over. It was a perfect evening. All the beautiful lights were on, the house looked impeccable, because the auction was tomorrow. And I remember sitting there, tears streaming down my face. 

It still makes me emotional now, going back to that point. And part of my biggest fear was if I sell this house, and I was in the process of blowing up my life, what are they going to think of me? I'm doing something that everybody else told me was nuts. “You're mad!” “What's wrong with you?” “How could you be doing this?” But it was so threatening to them that I was in alignment with my truth, because some of them ended up confessing later on that they wished they could do the same, but they didn't have the guts to do it. 

They didn't have the courage, or maybe they didn't have the spouse that supported them, or they just didn’t. They weren't in a position, they weren't strong enough emotionally and they weren't grounded enough in the truth of who they were yet to be able to move forward with those decisions. 

So, I ask you today, where have you abandoned yourself? Where are you putting everybody else's needs ahead of your own? Do you even know who you are? Do you know what it is that you want? What makes you happy? We're seeing an absolute epidemic of loneliness, particularly amongst women who, interestingly enough, are never alone. And that's the thing. You don't have to be alone, to be lonely. 

But the loneliness is, we think that it's from, you know that, “I don't really have my people”, or we think that no one gets us, that no one understands us. But the reality is no one gets you, no one understands you, no one sees you, because you don't see yourself. Until you have decided that you are going to do the work to belong to yourself, and own who you are, and to speak your truth, and to step up into who you know you were born to be, no one else can ever see that. Because, you're blind to it. 

So, this is where you have to have a toolkit that ensures that the wilderness is a little less scary. As I was going through this journey of blowing up my life, I was flying blind to be honest. I was doing a lot of reading, a lot of podcasts, and trying to get a lot of support. But, I had no idea what I was doing. My goodness, if I'd have had the program that I've now built, then it would have been a whole lot less tears, a whole lot less suffering, a whole lot less of everything. 

And I mean, it all worked out for a reason, and there are now hundreds of women that have managed to benefit from my suffering. But, my goodness, what I would have done to have had me around. The ‘me’ of today, to help the ‘me’ of then. So, this is my challenge to you. This is why it is so important for you to do the work on who you are, to not negotiate yourself with everybody else. To show up as yourself. To find your truth. 

As well as having a toolkit, which is so important, it's also really vital and crucial, almost for the sanctity of your soul, and for how you feel as a human to find other people, where you can practise belonging. We've all had those friends over time. I know I've had that person, where you meet them for the first time. “Oh my God, I feel like I know you, and you can be more of yourself around them.” You don't have to contort to be around them. That's a sign. 

Who are those people in your life? Who are those beacons, where you can be yourself? Where you don't have to hide? Where you can actually speak your truth, and you can tell them a secret, and they're not going to judge you. Sometimes, it feels like we're going back to primary school days, where you know you had that one friend sometimes that you could giggle with, and they didn't judge you, and they didn't call you silly.

You've got to go and find those people. You have to find that tribe, whether it's a community tribe, a work tribe, a school tribe, random people that you have accumulated across your life. Whether you find groups. I know people that have found their tribe in hobbies. Obviously, a lot of the women that come into our ecosystem don't leave, because they've never been in a room with people where they all feel like they belong, that they're accepted for who they are.

And they're actually encouraged to put down the bits of themselves that they've abandoned, and in seeing everybody else pick up those parts, it gives them permission to do the same. So, yes, it's vulnerable, and it can be very difficult, because everybody around you is trying to fit in. Everyone around you is contorting themselves and following a path that they think they should take. 

But, there is something shifting. There is a collective movement, of women particularly, who have decided, “Enough, I don't want to live this life.” “I don't want to abandon myself.” Because, when you feel resentment, that's a clue that you've abandoned yourself and your needs. If you feel somewhat empty, if you feel like there's a clue that you've abandoned yourself, and your needs. If you feel somewhat empty, if you feel like there's a nagging voice that says, “Something's missing.” That's a clue that perhaps you're fitting in, and you haven't yet found a place where you belong. 

So, be brave. Do the tough thing. And, yes, we're human. We have to interact with other humans, so you can bring yourself to places. And, often I say to people, “I belong everywhere” and I can also “change my clothing.” So, I can be at the soccer club, and talking to a bunch of other men around, and I can joke around. But, the thing that shifts when you do this work is, I no longer abandon myself. 

I liken it to, “I stay true to who I am.” “I am myself, and then I change my clothing.” So, if I'm in a boardroom, I might not say a particular thing, but it's not because I'm scared of speaking my truth. I might just know that that's not the right circumstance to, or the right social environment to say that thing, or to say that thing that way. 

So, there's a very distinct difference. When I was being a chameleon, I was contorting myself. I was trying to pretend that I was interested in things that I wasn't. I was trying to act more funny, I was trying to act more serious, I was trying to be more polished, and there's a whole lot of “trying” which is exhausting. 

Instead, when you own who you are, and you simply slip on a different outfit, it's actually really easy and it's effortless. Because, I don't have to change who I am. I might just change the language I use, or I might change how I present myself. I might put on different clothing, but that's okay. It's so much less exhausting to be yourself. It is so much easier to step into who you are. 

But, I encourage you to do the work. Ditch the fear of fitting in, and learn to become who you are. But, I encourage you to do the work. Ditch the fear of fitting in, and learn to become who you really are. Find your belonging in yourself, and then you get to walk through the world and find evidence that you do belong, and you are enough. 

OUTRO: Thanks for joining us today on the Balance and Beyond Podcast. We're so glad you carved out this time for yourself. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend who might need to hear this today. And if you're feeling extra generous, leaving us a review on your podcast platform of choice would mean the world. If you’re keen to dive deeper into our world, visit us at www.balanceinstitute.com to discover more about the toolkit that has helped thousands of women avoid burnout and create a life of balance, and beyond. Thanks again for tuning in, and we'll see you next time on the Balance & Beyond Podcast.