Have you ever found yourself feeling alone and different in a group of people or in a new situation in your life? Maybe it was a new profession, a new club, even a new class? You start to wonder who the others are, what they are about, if you fit in, whether they will like you or if you will like them. Will there be anybody there that understands you? Will you be successful? Make friends?

If it is a new place you have moved to, you might love it a lot at first, feeling like everything is great about the new place and thinking most of the things you left behind were not so great. But as time passes and you encounter more and more change, you might start to worry, to feel confused, to wonder if you made the right decision. If things do not go the way you envisioned them, you might start to feel regret and to think a lot about how to get things back the way they were. You might romanticize the past, you might want to go back to the past. You might actually try to go back. Afterall, maybe it really was better?

At this point, you might start thinking in black-and-white terms. All-or-nothing thinking emerges to simplify things when you are overwhelmed. It is just something our brains do to conserve energy. Change is stressful and under stress we go into survival mode. We don't have the extra emotional energy to deal with complexities and vague things and unexplored opportunities and possibilities. We can get lost, demotivated, rigid and even depressed.

Cultural change can be overwhelming because it not only effects our experience of the environment, it challenges our very identity, who we are. We have evolved a lot as human beings but we still are biologically hard-wired to behave as though we need to belong to a small tribe to survive. Social scientists have found a lot of evidence of this, that we act as though we need to be part of a group of about 40 people to survive. So think of your need to belong somewhere as your biological imprint. You can't shake it. It is connected emotionally to feelings of safety and survival. We all want to fit in, to belong, to be valued. This is why a lot of unexpected behaviour, both positive and negative, can happen in groups.

There are times in life where belonging is of critical importance, when it takes a bigger focus. Big moves and changes can trigger the survival instinct to belong, and all the anxiety that emerges when that isn't going well. Adolescence and mid-life is a time where "who am I" can take on great importance and relationship troubles can trigger a lot of emotion and worry about belonging, being valued, and identity.

It is important to seek support at these times. Counselling can help by offering a safe and calming "place" to explore the complexities of the past and present, to make decisions and set goals that are beneficial and achievable, realistic and hopeful. A non-judgemental, unbiased counsellor can help a person remember their strengths, strengthen their identity, and challenge themselves to handle uncertainty with hope.