THE FOUNDER

Who are you and what is this website about?

I am not someone who has figured it out, that’s for sure. I am not a life coach or a mentor or a psychologist nor have I been to school for philosophy or theology or physics or science or math. I don’t have anything to tell you that you need, in fact you might not resonate with any of it. But I have some ideas that I want to share and maybe they will make sense to someone.

I'm a mom, a musician, an artist and a thinker of thoughts about the universe and the world and how we are doing as a species.

What do you mean, a thinker of thoughts?

I had to deal with a lot as a kid, which got me started early when it came to thinking. Feeling was a different story since, apparently, it was against the law, so thinking had to become my North Star.

What do you know about belonging?

I know a lot about not belonging. My mother had issues. My family was problematic.

And what is a sense of belonging? What is belonging? Is it a feeling?

It’s when the need for it disappears

Because it’s freely given

Like a mother who truly appreciates each of her five very different daughters, and they become six petals of a flower of love.

Have you ever noticed that when you are uncomfortable with somebody that you start acting weird? It's because you don't feel safe and when you don't feel safe, you misperceive everything.

And you can’t make good decisions if you are misperceiving. Plus, you usually know you are misperceiving, so then there’s low-level embarrassment.

So it’s a website about positive thinking.

Not at all. You could say it’s a website about helpful thinking ideas, but positive and negative and good and bad isn’t really a part of it. It’s definitely not a website about leaps of faith, systems that will create happiness or abundance, or a guideline or general rules for life. It’s mostly about what-ifs. Imaginings. Curiosity. It's about trying on sunglasses or raiding your sister's closet or deciding to study acting. It’s about trying things on and seeing if they work.

So, how are we doing as a species? Do you have an answer about any of it?

I think we are doing disastrously. There is a saying that “Families are only as happy as their unhappiest child.” And we have a lot of unhappy children as a human family. And regarding answers, no- mostly, I just have questions.

So you’re coming from “Belonging Reclaimed?”

No, I’m coming from “Everywhere we turn we are told we are not quite there yet. It’s even inherent in our beloved slogans, “Just do it.” “Think Different.” That we are one click away, one supplement, one exercise routine, one app, one book away from being just fine.

And the problem is that sometimes it works. There are a few authors whose books I owe my life to. I have had a lifetime of book-inspired epiphanies that changed everything for me-- one was Suzie Orbach’s book, Fat is a Feminist Issue in which I was introduced to radical self-love. 

So sometimes we ARE just one click away!!! And we chase the high.

It might be the human condition. It’s quite fragile for everyone, I think. Belonging and not belonging.

Is this a trauma website about finding your way back from pain and becoming more of who you wish you were?

Nope, it’s a website about curiosity and lensing and beliefs and noticing and maybe finding a new perspective. You don’t need to be suffering.

Are you selling anything? How are you going to make money with this?

Yes, we are selling T-shirts and merchandise and this is a work in progress. The fundamental idea is that you don’t need anything (not even this website nor its products) to already be ok so it’s a little bit interesting in terms of sales - almost a non-sell, actually. But I would like to see everyone in this T-shirt. I am imagining seeing it everywhere. I would be so curious to see what that would do. I guess that would be what I would say this website is about - imagination and curiosity.

Why did you make a website about already belonging? Do you understand something new? Do you have a hack that helps people feel an innate sense of belonging if we follow your steps?

Nope.

What sparked you to come up with this?

The idea of belonging or not belonging didn't really occur to me until Ben talked about the symbols and medallions *see Ben’s story-- and I think what I'm realizing now is that belonging has got so much to do with everything. It might be a primary motivation of all human strategy. And earthling strategy as it turns out. Animals, insects, trees....

For example, I thought I had left all my feelings of not belonging from childhood behind me in the dust, but what I discovered is that I hid them underneath, “I'm in charge here.”

I performed on stages 150 nights a year for 12 years and ran a show and was the picture of relaxed entertainment-- and the shows were funny!

What I didn't understand was why I had so much trouble in group shows until I was in a group show with Patty Larkin. There were two dressing rooms and I went into one, and she was shaking her hands like they do in Qui Qong and saying, “Give it up to God!”

I said, “Hey, wait a minute, are you nervous? You're Patty fucking Larkin and you are the most famous one of all of us!” And she said, “I know, but when I have my own show, it’s my show. I know the audience. I know what they like. I've created the entire thing-- it's mine. But this is everybody's so I have to fit in. It’s got all kinds of factors.”

(And I realized, oh my God, all those nerves that I had in the beginning of open mics, and thinking I shouldn’t even TRY to do this-- and then how all that awful fear went away when I created my own shows.)

So the moral is, when you create it, you create your own belonging. But then, if you don’t create it....then what?

I know the feeling of being the headliner in a group show. And why, then, do variables wobble our security?

But guaranteed that your sense of belonging has an infinite effect on how the show actually goes, whether it’s a solo show or a group show.

And the outcome is none of your business. Who sits around going oh my God do I belong? Do I belong? Where is my spot?

What would be your biggest dream for this website?

That it flips the way we move about the cabin even a centimeter. That it connects to people in imagining a different premise. That it helps create new pathways for love that are different. That it is part of the conversation that fuels an evolutionary new perspective.