Many years ago, I read a book by Diane Tracy called The First Book of Common-Sense Management (William Morrow and Company, 1989). In this book, she asked the question, “Why do people join teams?”. To this day, her question and her answer continues to intrigue me.
Tracy list the following five reasons for why people join teams. First, people join teams for security, because it is a place where members feel safe, and cared for. Second, people join teams for belonging because it provides identification. Next, people join teams for individuality, because the team recognizes and supports the valuable differences of its members. Fourth, people join teams for pride, because team members share in group achievements. Finally, people join teams for recognition, because the outside world respects the group as a more powerful entity than it would an individual.
When I reflect on all of the reasons people join teams, the one that seems particularly important to me is belonging. This is in part because I remembered something Mother Teresa wrote years ago: “The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather the feeling of not belonging.”
Right now, I believe many people are feeling like they do not belong. In a world filled with extreme polarities, people are choosing to disengage in order to stay safe. Yet, in their heart, they truly want to belong. They want to put down roots, and they want to be in a place where they can feel welcomed, safe, and able to make healthy connections with other people. In short, they want community.
But, in order to achieve this desired experienced of belonging, we need to better understand what it means to belong. For this, I turn to the work of Brene’ Brown in her book, Braving The Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone (Random House, 2017). As she writes, “True belonging is the spiritual practice of believing in and belonging to yourself so deeply that you can share your most authentic self with the world and find sacredness in both being a part of something and standing alone in the wilderness. True belonging doesn’t require you to change who you are; it requires you to be who you are.”
This notion that belonging requires us to be who we are requires us to recognize an important truth. “Our connection with others,” writes Brown, “can only be as deep as our connection with ourselves.” For me, this is the missing piece of the puzzle. Executive coach Lindsay Leahy grasped this when she wrote, “We lead with who we are, so to be a good leader, whether in our families, workplaces, or communities, we have to do the deep exploration and healing work to become our best selves.”
And becoming our best selves is a commitment to a profound level of inner work over time. It is not completed during one weekend workshop or a singular inservice on self-care. Instead, it is a commitment and a discipline that takes time, energy, and support in order to sustain the focus and the effort.
One element of the journey to belonging is bridge building. We need to do this on two different levels. We need to build a bridge back to our true self and we need to build bridges that connects us with others. As to the former process, American journalist and author Elizabeth Gilbert wrote: “Never forget that once upon a time, in an unguarded moment, you recognized yourself as your friend.” I think many people have forgotten how to be their own best friend. They have lost this vital connection and are struggling to find it again. They do not know where to begin and how to do this work.
At the same time, as many people are seeking safety and isolation over engagement and connection, the act of building a bridge that connects us with others is a huge and risky endeavor. It also requires great courage and patience.
Upon reflection and personal experience, the beginning work that engages bridge building at both levels starts with finding safe and trust worthy relationship centered space. In the beginning, it may be only one person with whom you feel safe, with whom you can be friendly and a friend. But in time and with the support from experienced coaches, mentors, and counselors, we can rediscover a community of support, and a place where we belong.
Still, in the beginning, we need to focus less on problem solving, the normal default solution that every leader turns to during times of challenge and difficulty, and instead focus on relationship building. For what we are seeking is to create a daily life experience that has a rich and vibrant social landscape. Then, when we find our people, we can create a fabric of social memory that we can turn to during tough times.
What I have learned in my journey in life and during my work as an executive coach is that finding safe spaces takes time. We need to not assume that any space is going to be amazingly safe from the get-go. Instead, we we need to grow the space and take care of the space.
Furthermore, as this space becomes safe, if not sacred, we also need to find our voice within it so we can share our story. The late Stephen Covey in his book, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness (Free Press, 2004), writes that our voice” is the nexus of talent, passion, need and conscience (that still small voice within that assures you of what is right and that prompts you to actually do it).” I think this a great definition, because when we find our voice, we also inspire others to find their voice. This results in a feeling of belonging and kinship with fellow travelers in life’s great mysterious journey.
For it is the combination of creating and maintaining safe spaces with a diversity of people, including ourself, plus the discovery of our voice, that yields one of the most amazing things, the sharing of our story and the gift of listening to the stories of others. Given all the travel, consulting, training and coaching I did around this country for 36 years, the most precious and amazingly impactful transformations took place, when we gathering around a table or in a circle of chairs and shared our stories, our questions, our frustrations, and our amazing moments of new insights, revelations and epiphanies. Through laughter, tears, and deep listening, we came to understand that we are all travelers and we are all trying our best to make a positive difference in the world. And in our finest moments, we realized that we were not alone. Instead, we are all in this together. We all belong. As Father Gregory Boyle wrote, “We don’t just walk each other home to wholeness; we are home to each other.” And this is the miracle of belonging. We truly are home to each other.
© Geery Howe 2025
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