Feeling like I don't belong

I grew up in a church that I considered my family. I had friends, and people I could relate to. There were other kids my age, but also adults in the church who took it upon themselves to be good role models and second parents. I was truly blessed. I grew older and the world pulled me away.

I came back to the faith thirty years later, but I no longer lived close to my home town church, having moved to another town to be close to work. At first I looked at my old church through its online presence, and considered making the drive. I decided that it had changed so much from what I remembered that I should take a chance on my local church instead. And so I did. What I found was a welcoming small congregation, and it felt like home. I’m sure it being my denomination helped.

However, my local church congregation consists mostly of families with kids younger than me and people older than me. Everyone seems to be married and have kids, or elderly, and so I haven’t even tried to reach out, being a single person. The pastor is over three churches, so he isn’t at the church but maybe once a month, which makes it even more difficult.

I have online friends from my denomination on this forum, and friends of other denominations too. I speak with them in private conversations here and talk with them on the various forums. I interact with people like yourself, so I’m always making new acquaintances and friends.

Outside of Christianity, I have a few old friends who are non-Christians that I spend a few hours with every Sunday playing disc golf. I have online friends that I know from my participation in various communities, but those friendships tend to stay within the community setting. Having non-Christian friends gives me a chance to witness to others by example, and through conversation.

I guess what I’m trying to say is my Christian friends are pretty much right here on the forums. It is a great place to meet people and converse. I understand that it’s no replacement for a good church family, but it’s something.

I know if I hadn’t put myself out there, I wouldn’t be where I am, so my advice is to not be afraid to try a new church, or to start a conversation with people, and get to know them. You can make friends in the most unlikely places.

If you need someone to talk to, or bounce some ideas off of I’d be more than happy to listen and give an honest view. Know that you are not alone. We are all a family in Christ.

I’ve spent just about my whole life “feeling like I don’t belong” (anywhere). It aint a comfortable feeling; but I don’t think it’s that unusual either.

Part of my “problem” is that I’m quite the “theology nerd”. And it’s often hard to find people who (mostly) have the maturity to be teachable and willing to learn and “bounce ideas” off each other. But this is true in areas not related to faith too. Such as in this day and age; having discussions on opposing political issues is very difficult because there’s just stuff going on in society that….. I guess people’s brains are broken? Not that this sort of thing didn’t exist before the pandemic; but Covid just seemed to make the phenomena worse.

So I pray and just keep reading.

It can be very normal for people to feel like they don’t belong, and those people typically don’t broadcast this feeling to the people they don’t feel they belong to, so we don’t hear about it often.

I have an ‘exceptionally high’ IQ of 140 (I believe my parents have confirmation paperwork, I don’t) and that has made me very much an outsider in regular society.

I went to a ‘gifted and talented’ school half of the school week and then just regular school the other half of the week.

Already, that made things weird for me as a kid.

To make matters worse, I am a woman and a very logical, pragmatic, blunt woman who doesn’t share a lot of interests with other women does not make for a great social experience in childhood, adulthood or at work. I have had to really practice communication and trying to at least act like I care about mundane topics in order to not be a social pariah because my profession is very people oriented.

In addition to that, the few women I know confide in me about being neurotic, having anxiety etc and I am a problem solver so am not a good ear. If I hear that something is bothering someone, I offer solutions and kind of dismiss the person if they don’t take me up on them in preference of just talking. This is not an endearing feature.

Further to that, my parents decided that my mom would work and my dad would stay home and, as a result, I was pretty much raised by a man. My IQ and my dad have meant that I’m pretty much viewed as Spock from star trek from men and women so where else can I go!

All of that to say that my IQ has been a social hinderance and I was not taught what being ‘exceptional’ means and how to navigate around this outside of a classroom or laboratory where the real world hangs out. As a result, I have always been an outsider and pretty lonely. My husband, whilst not a genius, appreciates me for being quirky but my daughter often tells me I need communication classes and a lot of other improvement courses to talk to people appropriately!

So, I hope you get some peace in knowing that you’re not alone. We’re out here but, like you, we don’t tell everyone we feel like we don’t belong. We kind of just get along with things. Like someone else said, this forum is great because you know others are here for you and hear you.

I hope you find some peace by sharing your circumstance and through some of the responses.

God bless!

I don’t have much to say on this as I believe most Christians, if they are serious about Christ, experience this to some degree. The world has changed dramatically and it is getting late on the timeline.

But… I do want to encourage you with the encouragement God gives me, that we can look forward while we are here at the time soon coming where none of us will be lonely at all. Not only will we not be lonely, but we will have more friends than we can manage. The war is still raging, but we have good things on the way, better things than we can imagine.

Christ is our hope, and the best and only hope. Soon everything we know will change and our redemption will be complete, and life will never be the same as it is now again. I look forward to these things to keep my mind and heart aligned and to stay motivated. (Isaiah 26:3)

Praying for you.