The Practice of Belonging
Taped on the pale, blue wall of my bedroom is a colorful collage of postcards I’ve accumulated from my travels over the years. Each postcard symbolizes a period of time, from a few days to a few weeks, where I could explore the limits of my identity away from the burdens of my day-to-day responsibilities. Whether I was meeting interesting people at hostels, cliff diving in El Yunque, or partying my way through Nashville, I always hoped to return home with a more intricate understanding of myself as a multi-faceted being. However, for years, the challenge was discerning which identity I was returning home to.
To be Asian American is to live in constant flux of others’ perception of you. For as long as I can remember, I have been hyper-aware that I look different than those around me. In elementary school, I was the only East Asian person in my grade, to the confusion of others. I was teased for my “unique” facial features because my classmates had never met anyone else who looked like me. In first grade, we had an arts and crafts activity where we created miniature versions of ourselves from construction paper, yarn, and buttons in various colors and textures. As we were gluing parts together, my classmates and I talked about our racial identities. One girl didn’t understand when I said I was Asian.
“You’re white,” she stated. “You have light skin.”
“No,” I responded. “I’m pretty sure I’m Asian.”
“I’ve never heard of that.”
After school, I asked my mom if we were white. “Of course not,” she said. “Your classmate is confused.” But I still didn’t understand my identity as an Asian person in America. At home, my parents teased me that I was a “banana” or a “twinkie” – yellow on the outside but white on the inside. I was too “American,” and they understood American as being synonymous with white. Yet I didn’t know how I could be less American; I grew up in a cookie-cutter suburbia where I spent weekends with my friends at the mall, indulged in Dairy Queen blizzards and bomb pops in the dog days of summer, and pledged allegiance to the flag at the beginning of each school day. To behave in a way that was more Asian was not intuitive nor authentic to the way I was being raised.
As I entered my 20s, being Asian American continued to be framed as a paradox. I had a limited ability to explain who I was, as I was not entirely sure myself. My identity was an amalgam of others’ projections. I was told by my friends born and raised in Asia that even though I could speak Mandarin and celebrated all the Chinese holidays, I behaved too American and therefore didn’t count as being Asian. But at work, it was clear that I was a diversity hire and my appeal as an employee was simply fulfilling a DEI requirement. I never felt that my contributions or efforts in that particular workplace were valued. At the time, I did not understand or even recognize the need to affirm myself.
In 2017, I found myself alone in a new city. I had an unexpected opportunity to pursue my dream career in media so I packed up all my belongings on short notice and moved 1,100 miles to Atlanta, a city I had never visited and didn’t know anyone. Based on a quick Google search, I read that Atlanta was a very diverse city that had earned the nickname “too busy to hate.” I was excited about this new chapter, hoping I would find a community that would finally understand me, and signed a lease for an apartment in Midtown, which had branded itself as an inclusive neighborhood for young professionals.
Over the next few years, I immersed myself in Southern culture. I stopped along the roadside for boiled peanuts in North Georgia, spent many late nights ordering the All-Star Special at Waffle House, volunteered with community organizations, and tried all the activities that locals like to do. I deeply craved to form connections and belong to this city that had seemingly pulled me there involuntarily.
Despite my intentions, I was faced with hurdles. Contrary to what I had initially read about Atlanta, strangers would frequently approach me and make racist comments while I was walking around my Midtown neighborhood. Each incident became harder and harder to shake off. It became a constant reminder that my neighbors not only did not want me in the community, but that they were willing to go out of their way to make it known. All they saw was an Asian woman and that meant an unwelcome foreigner to them. The signs on the streets boasting that “all are welcome” mocked me. I developed a sense of constant paranoia and anxiety each time I left my apartment.
I considered leaving Atlanta many times, but unable to realistically do so, I chose to compulsively travel as a form of escapism. In my Midtown apartment, I had no sense of belonging and a suppressed ability to self-explore because I spent so much time and energy processing the way others, mostly bigoted strangers, were perceiving me. How could I discover what it meant to be my authentic self when my simple existence could elicit hateful reactions from others? When I wasn’t traveling, I moved through periods of sadness and self-pity, often fixating on the overwhelming feelings of helplessness and loneliness. This impacted how I showed up at work, around my friends, and in relationships. I was afraid to take up space because I had been conditioned to understand that my existence could be offensive to others and that being invited into any room was a privilege, not an indicator of interest in me as a person.
During an emotional breakdown after three consecutive days of being harassed by strangers, I made the decision to move to a much quieter neighborhood, one that could at least provide the connection to nature that I had started desiring. I was conflicted about making this move – after all, Midtown was touted as being very open-minded and inclusive, and I didn’t want to risk moving to a somehow less inclusive community. But I recognized that I had spent years trying so hard to be accepted by my Midtown neighbors with no success, and I didn’t feel that it would change anytime soon.
In my new home, I found a stillness I hadn’t experienced before. At first, I thought it was the lack of traffic noise or the absence of drunks fighting outside my window at 2 AM. Then I noticed that the racist encounters had lessened, my body became physically calmer, and I was able to take the first steps in learning how to ground myself. It was initially just an exercise to cope with the feeling of transience, but paved the way to allow myself to figure out who I was. The answer came from a surprising place – after a lifetime of placing value on others’ perceptions of me, I found that anchoring within myself allowed me to recognize my own complexities, values, and desires. From this understanding, I became capable of intentionally seeking new friends and communities that aligned with how I choose to perceive and navigate the world. They also recognized my worth as an individual, inclusive of but not limited to being an Asian American woman. Within those relationships, I was able to build confidence that I could contribute meaningfully to my newfound community and finally began cultivating a sense of belonging.
It seems so simple yet it isn’t something we’re taught growing up. Finding the feeling of belonging first requires us to root inwardly and develop an understanding of ourselves as individuals; it isn’t simply existing in any environment and expecting it to nurture us in a way we haven’t yet identified. It takes intentionality to belong and isn’t limited to heritage or ethnicity; it’s a shared goal to create and foster mutually supportive relationships with each other. The perception of Asian Americans as perpetual foreigners will always exist in our world, but we all have a choice in which communities we pour into. You may find that the community that provides the strongest support for you is not necessarily one you were raised to identify with. Belonging begins when we finally understand how to empower and honor ourselves so we may truly connect with others for engaged communion.