Recently I watched a group of younger colleagues. They seemed so at home with each other, so comfortable. Like pieces in a puzzle, they all fit. There was without doubt some diversity among them, but they spoke the same language, had the same Masters of Public Health (MPH) after their names, had gone to similar colleges, … Continue reading On Belonging
I was in the middle of writing a blog post when Lowell showed me this section in Brene Brown’s book Daring Greatly. The quote shot straight to a deep place in my soul. Brown had identified and articulated so clearly the struggle I was trying to capture in the post I was agonizing over. I’m abandoning … Continue reading Belonging & Fitting In
One day, on our recent working trip to Spain, we were sitting around after an intense day. Lowell and I had been teaching a small-assorted group on leadership for a week. The day was over. The week was over. Several of us were sitting outside the villa breathing in the evening air, soaking up the … Continue reading A Fit Bit (On belonging; Not on Electronic Step Tracking!)
Goodreads Book Giveaway Between Worlds Essays on culture and belonging by Marilyn Gardner Giveaway ends August 28, 2015. See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter Giveaway
In all the talk about ISIS one thing emerges – Western leaders are terrified and embarrassed that so many from their countries are joining forces with ISIS. It’s easy to point a finger when it is young men who are outside our borders raised in those countries we deem dangerous and breeding grounds for terrorism. … Continue reading Misplaced Identity and Belonging
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Between Worlds: Essays on Culture and Belonging by Marilyn R. Gardner When I found out that Marilyn was going to publish a book, I knew it would be great and I was impatient to read it. I first read Marilyn’s writing on her blog, Communicating Across Boundaries, and I was immediately captured…
Between Worlds is available NOW! Order your copy by going here! I began writing three years ago – “I want to have a voice!” I said to my oldest daughter, 26 years old at the time. And on July 1st the “voice” will be transformed into a book titled Between Worlds – Essays on Culture and … Continue reading Release of Between Worlds – Essays on Culture and Belonging
We all know what it feels like. The stomach-knotting knowledge that we weren’t invited, that we don’t belong. Our first memories of being left out usually come early in life and can be as simple as not being invited to a birthday party or as complicated as becoming a part of a blended family, where … Continue reading Inner Rings & Belonging
In three weeks time we have attended two weddings. This has not happened to us since we were engaged and seemed to be attending weddings every other weekend. The first was the Friday evening following Memorial Day. It was a lovely event. Two people, both coming from difficult past relationships who have experienced deep healing … Continue reading How Two Weddings Spell Belonging
Posted by Marilyn Our family albums tell amazing stories. Picnics in the shadow of the Great Pyramids of Egypt; bucket baths in Swat Valley – home to Malala the brave; hiking in the foothills of the Himalayan mountains; feeding pigeons outside the Spice Bazaar in Istanbul; climbing on canons in Quebec City; wandering through Topkapi … Continue reading A Life Overseas – On Family Albums and What I Didn’t Know
There was a giant chasm between worlds, a chasm separated by more than an ocean. It was a chasm of culture and food and people and faith, and I was suspended somewhere in the middle of the chasm. Worlds Apart: A Third Culture Kid’s Journey When I began writing, I never set out to write … Continue reading “What is it, to Live Between?”
A lot has happened since I posted the beautiful piece from my daughter about falling in love with your neighborhood. We moved. Those two words are loaded with weeks of uncertainty, days of planning, and hours of conversation. We took all our earthly belongings out of a seven by ten foot storage unit and began … Continue reading Lost in the Land of Plenty
I woke up this morning to bright sunshine creating shadows on the walls. It is almost spring in Kurdistan. While indoors it is still brutally cold because of concrete buildings and lack of insulation, all of nature is breathing signs of spring. From goslings to buds on trees, life is bursting forth. We have heard … Continue reading A Slice of Life – Kurdistan: Volume 3
A cat had kittens in our building about a month ago. We were alerted to this by our neighbor. The cat is fiercely protective, constantly foraging for food and growling lest one of us gets too close to her precious offspring. There are three kittens – two jet black and one with some orange stripes … Continue reading A Christmas Story about Advocacy and Failure and Kittens
I’m at A Life Overseas talking about needing to be capable of complexity when we talk about the TCK experience! I loved growing up overseas. I loved that I knew how to traverse the globe at a young age, that I grew up on curry and hot pakoras, that I could see some of the highest mountains in the … Continue reading A Life Overseas – Capable of Complexity
We are sitting in a government office in Suleimaniyah (commonly called Suli) and we are waiting. We left Rania at seven in the morning. The sun had already welcomed the day and a beautiful breeze accompanied us on our walk to the university. The road between Rania and Suli begins as a one lane, heavily … Continue reading On Waiting…
Every where I look I see graduations. Cambridge and Boston are alive with the activity and color of students who have finished their college or graduate school education. From the bright red gowns of Boston University to the maroon gowns of Harvard, you can’t escape this season. And neither can your third culture kid who … Continue reading Graduation Gifts for Your TCK
“When you’ve spent your whole life as a cultural chameleon, you end up not knowing what color you were when you started, who you might have been had you been from someplace, what it feels like to belong fully to a people, a tribe, a neighborhood, a city.” from Rachel Hicks in “To My Adult TCK … Continue reading Born to Belong
