How to Feel Like You Belong in New Places

You're supposed to feel uncomfortable it's fine!!

I have bad news about feeling more comfortable in new places, amongst new groups. You have to keep doing it. In order to build community, you have to keep showing up. It’s kind of that simple, but I’m still going to elaborate. We’re in the midst of a loneliness epidemic, both male and otherwise. I’m not sure if it’s been declared by science or anything official but there have certainly been enough think pieces and TikToks about the complexities of adult friendship and the difficulties of meeting new people in new places that I don’t think anyone is alone in feeling out of place right now.

While everyone is thinking about how to make new friends, join new groups, become a part of a community, etc., the thought isn’t really becoming much of an action. Every now and then, someone shows up to a new place and feels so out of sorts that they never go back. Unfortunately, I have to tell you, the key is to push through the discomfort.

The truth is, when you enter a new place full of people who already know each other, you’re bound to feel left out. Maybe one or a few people are notably welcoming, but you know they’re just being nice, you’re not really a part of the crew yet. You go home feeling anxious, like you don’t really belong there. And you’re right. That flutter in your stomach telling you that you don’t really belong is definitely fluttering but it’s not that you’ll never belong, it’s because you’ve only been there once and new things feel weird!! You’re not a part of the group just yet and that’s completely fine!!

We’ve been conditioned to diagnose uncomfortable feelings so that we can try to avoid them at all costs. Feeling awkward in a new place isn’t awesome, but it’s extremely normal, and the only way to feel at home in a new place is to show up enough that it becomes an old place.

When I started stand-up comedy, no one cared. The comedy community is a sprawling web across almost every city in the world, and without a fixed entry point, there’s no official welcoming committee. When it comes to stand-up, most open mic comedians show up every day. Maybe three times per day. If you stick around long enough that people start to recognize your face, you’ll start to make acquaintances who become friends. If you show up once every 6 months and claim no one was that welcoming, you’re probably right! Expecting a welcome party is the oft discussed Main Character Syndrome.

Main Character Syndrome isn’t a goal or an ailment, it’s just a perspective. The only story you can be certain of is your own, so walking into a new space and assuming that you’re being actively left out is a very specific telling of your own story. It ignores that people have been there for weeks or months or years and assumes they should exist to make your environment more welcoming. Sure, you’d hope a group you want to break into is friendly, but it’s also possible that they haven’t really noticed new blood. Maybe they’re waiting to see if you plan to stick around before they invest proper effort in becoming your friend. From their perspective, surrounded by people they’ve known for a while and a revolving door of newbies, why would they spend too much time chatting with someone likely to never show up again?

The only way to become a part of something is to keep trying. The internet has created tiny little tastes of community, but they don’t accomplish what an in-real-life gathering accomplishes. They make it almost worse because online, you can create a semblance of a community and feel slightly more entitled to your place in the real-life version, but you haven’t actually been there.

I’m so, so sorry for the source of this example, but in Jay Shetty’s book, he regurgitates the details of an experiment where trees couldn’t grow above a certain height in a glass-domed, controlled ecosystem. Without the wind and the elements, the trees grew taller, but never strong and rooted, so at a certain height, they all snapped. With the internet nowadays, I feel like people are learning about communities, groups, and friendship from within a glass ecosystem. They research clothes and language, but when they try to make a landing in real life, they break at the first sign of discomfort instead of trying to grow roots in real life.

The most valuable tool in building community and connection is time, and I think that’s why people make such a to-do about having lifelong friends. Of course, that’s great to have, but the idea that those types of friendships can only be forged in childhood just isn’t true, it just seems easier because you put so much time in already. You can make deep and meaningful friendships or find a strong community later in life, you just have to put the actual time into it, and there’s no replacement for that.

If you find yourself in a new space wondering how to shake that uncomfortable feeling that you don’t quite fit, stop trying to shake it, sit in it, and keep showing up.