I didn’t realize how important a sense of belonging was to me until it manifested as a theme in my memoir.

Holding the author’s proof of my memoir Facing Up to It- written with no clear theme in mind. Thankfully it still turned out well.

I wrote my memoir Facing Up to It backwards. This doesn’t mean I started at the end and wrote until I got to the beginning. What it means is that I started by writing it. I had no ideal reader, no outline, and no theme. I just wrote. After years of writing, long periods of not writing, more writing, hiring an editor, another long period of rewriting, and finding an indy publisher to help me with the design details, I ended up with a published book. While thankfully I am a good writer and it turned out well, it could have been better if I’d had had a theme and an ideal reader in mind when I wrote it.

One theme that emerges over and over in the text is the importance of belonging. I didn’t realize how important that was to me until after I’d read my own book.

As social creatures, it is natural for human beings to want to feel they are an accepted part of a group or community. Usually these are based on commonalities.

Growing up, I never had any connection with other people who have facial differences. Now, thanks to social media, I am connected with others worldwide. I have joined that community, and I feel like I belong. We share common experiences, such as being stared at and having to have surgery, as well as similar emotions such as doubt- temporary or long term- about our ability to find a romantic partner.

In college, I found a sense of belonging when I joined the Science Fiction/Fantasy Club, and again when I started hanging out with the Theater crowd. When I spent six weeks in Iceland on a horse farm, I was afraid I’d be the outsider because I was considerably older than the other working students and I was American rather than European. But our common experience and goals as well as all of our open and accepting personalities made me one of them. When you’re that far from home, it was important for me to belong.

You need only look at the success of discussion groups on Facebook to see how important a sense of community is to humankind. We gravitate toward people with similar interests, backgrounds, beliefs, experiences, physical appearance, vocation- we formulate our identity in a variety of ways. For example, my communities include authors, Icelandic horse owners/enthusiasts, music lovers, professional speakers, and other people with facial differences. When I can do projects that merge two or more of these passions, so much the better.

Friends I’ve made in the facial difference community.

I think communities are great, and I’ve made a lot of new friends and acquaintances. However, I do have one caution. People sometimes identify with a certain community so strongly that it becomes an “us vs them” mentality. While it’s great when someone finds people who share experiences and are like-minded, identity with a community should not be at the exclusion of all else. I certainly do not agree with everything that is expressed by other members of the facial difference community, especially when it comes to terminology. But our disagreement comes from a place of understanding and respect rather than being adversarial. As for the Icelandic horse community, there are as many differing opinions as there are people who own horses.

As much as I emphasize with that desire to belong, I encourage people to keep an open mind and maintain their autonomy. Identity need not equal conformity. After all, it is our combination of experiences that truly make us individual, and that is how we complement each other. So find your people. Enjoy that sense of community; of belonging. Just maintain your individuality.

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