difference and belonging

Many of us come to therapy because something in our life isn’t working the way we want it to.

Often we assume that something is us.

I want to offer a gentle challenge to this assumption that the problem is you:

What if there is nothing wrong with you?  

What if there is nothing to fix or improve about yourself in order to be “normal” or “healthy”?  

(What is “normal”?  “Healthy” by whose standards?  Who decided on the criteria by which you are judging yourself or being judged?)

What if your way of responding to the world is simply brilliant, creative, adaptive, and magnificently yours?  

Pathologizing is defined as “regarding or treating (someone or something) as psychologically abnormal or unhealthy” based on non-normative behaviours they exhibit and/or characteristics they possess (Google English Dictionary, Oxford Languages).

When we view different ways of experiencing the world as “psychologically abnormal or unhealthy,” we force ourselves and others out of belonging and mattering.  

This is called “othering” and it is deeply harmful.

When we “other” ourselves and each other, we create disconnection, which for many of us can feel like an emergency.  

When we hold ourselves and others to a standard or “right” way of being, we are saying, “In order to belong, you need to fix XYZ about yourself.”  “In order to matter, you need to change who you are.”  “You/Your brain/Your body is deficient in these ways, and so you need to be this way instead.”

You belong simply because you are here.  You matter simply because you ARE.  

There are as many ways to respond to a situation or environment as there are humans in the world.

There is no right or wrong way to relate, function, think, feel, learn, communicate, be.

We are not as different from each other as we are made to believe by systems based around diagnosis that aim to uphold standards of “normal” (i.e.: the DSM).  

It’s time we completely rethink how we support ourselves and each other, in a world made richer by our unique and magnificent ways of being.  

It’s time we orient and adjust to each other, instead of othering and pushing people out of belonging.

Thank you to @livedexperienceeducator for inspiring this piece, and for their tireless work advocating for the neurodivergent community and neuronormativity.  I encourage you to click through to their profile page and click on literally any post for inspiration, affirmation, and badassery.  

You can read @livedexperienceeducator’s post here.