Quotes About Belonging

I wasn't into making classmates laugh - or any of the comedy cliches. I wanted to disappear. I was a nonentity. I wasn't too clever but I wasn't in the bottom group. I wasn't loud but I wasn't quiet. I wasn't a bully and I wasn't bullied.

Having my animals or my children with me exorcises that feeling of not being wanted.

My biggest problem in middle school was catty girls, cliques, and trying to figure out if I wanted to be a part of one of those, just figuring out who I was and all that.

I never wanted to change countries; it's something that is part of me.

Unworthiness is the inmost frightening thought that you do not belong, no matter how much you want to belong, that you are an outsider and will always be an outsider. It is the idea that you are flawed and cannot be fixed. It is wanting to be loved and feeling unlovable, or wanting to love and feeling that you are not capable of loving.

And so much of my life has been about returning home and longing for home, wanting my children to know about my roots. And I thought I can't be the only one to feel this way so I thought it would be an interesting topic to explore.

I knew I had to write a good screenplay to be taken seriously, and I knew I needed to present Mississippi on visuals instead of just saying, 'Hey I wanted to film it in Mississippi.' It would seem like it was a hometown boy just wanting to be home.

I went through my whole life wanting to feel I belonged. I was very, very lonely, so I would marry people that I wasn't really in love with, and who weren't right for me, because I hoped they would be.

I think that it's hard enough being an adolescent and wanting so much to fit in with your peers, your schoolmates, and to erase any sign of difference, to be part of the group. And being biracial but also being black in a predominately white school marked me as different.

I wasn't born Austrian; I wasn't born German. My roots are from Africa, and I do not have any reason for not wanting to celebrate that. Every time that I can, I like to kind of mention it, you know, just to keep people sort of knowing exactly what's going on. My French is pretty good, but I'm still African, thank you very much.

I did musicals in high school, certainly. And then I just kept wanting to do them. I felt at home in the theater, in that way that, you know, you're supposed to if that's the kind of person you are.

I was seventeen when I moved to New York. I was nineteen when I joined the main company. I was going through a lot. Just becoming an adult and just wanting to fit in, be accepted, and be in common with the other dancers.

I'm torn between wanting to connect with what I grew up with and what's available, living in Brooklyn. I don't have a grimy supermarket that decapitates frogs' heads nearby.

I'm a Jersey girl, but I went to college in L.A. I can connect with the feeling of wanting to come home.

We are Americans when we go to war, and when we return, we are Mexicans.

The analogy I use is that 'World of Warcraft' is like going to the mall: you see a ton of people there, but you don't really want to interact with them; you just want to know you're part of the human race. And if you get in trouble, you'll know someone else is there.

I was a ward of the state, initially, and then in the foster care system for quite some time, even though I did live part-time with my aunt in Brooklyn.

The psychiatric ward was a really creepy place and, hindsight being 20/20, the creepiest thing about it was that I truly belonged there.

I am proud of being a Somali-American Muslim, and my wardrobe has been an important part of my religious and cultural upbringing.

A lot of people don't know that before 'American Idol,' before I got this Jonas Brothers wardrobe going on, I grew up with skinheads and punks who fought for a cause and didn't care about skin color. I was the only little gay.

A house that does not have one warm, comfy chair in it is soulless.

If you fall in love with a country and its people, that makes any country warm to you.

Hollywood has given me a great, warm hug.

I feel so fortunate I was able to grow up in such a warm, loving, safe, beautiful community that I still call home.