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Shine like the whole universe is yours.
- Rumi
Where am I meant to belong?
There’s a part of you that’s still hoping, searching for something that feels like home. Maybe this bit of you has been wandering for a long time. Perhaps it hides its longing under competence or independence or cleverness.
But underneath, there’s a soft, old ache. A hope that somewhere, there’s a place — or a presence — that will look you in the eye and say: “I’ve been waiting. You are welcome here.”
The Little Girl Lost inside me knows that hope. She searches for what she can’t quite name. Her secret wish? To be found — not just by anyone, but by a place, a moment, where she can belong. Where she doesn’t have to keep proving her worth. Where the welcome arrives first.
And maybe there’s a part of you that knows this too. Knows what it’s like to feel a little outside of things, even in your own life. Knows how tiring it is to be in exile from your own centre.
It's tiring to be in exile from your own centre.
Maybe you’ve already tried to build homes — careers, relationships, identities — but they didn’t quite stretch to fit all of you. Maybe some part of you was always “beyond the pale.” Maybe there wasn’t room for your softness, or your wildness, or the bit of you that speaks in metaphors and remembers the shape of trees.
What if it wasn’t you who was wrong-sized?
What if there’s a deeper home that can hold all of you?
David Wagoner's poem Lost rests here:
“The forest knows where you are. You must let it find you.”
That line lives in me like a promise. That somewhere, in the quiet breathing of the world, there’s a knowing. Not the kind you have to earn or explain. But the kind that already sees you. Already knows how to greet you.
What would happen if, instead of always searching, you paused long enough to be found?
Home is not only a place. It’s a stance. A relation. A remembering.
What if the home you’ve been searching for isn’t a location to arrive at, but a way of being in the world?
What if it’s not something you find — but something you inhabit?
What if home isn't something you find — but something you inhabit?
Coming home, in this deeper sense, isn’t about reaching a fixed destination. It’s about returning to a way of relating — to yourself, to life, to the universe — that says: I belong here. I belong to myself. I am not separate from the whole.
There’s an archetype, ancient and spacious, that speaks to this kind of homecoming. In some traditions it’s called the Sovereign. Not the tyrant or figurehead kind. Not power-over. But the one who stands in their own centre, undivided. The one who is not waiting for permission to exist. The one whose presence says: I belong, by nature. The Sovereign belongs to themselves — and in doing so, makes it easier for others to belong, too.
The Sovereign belongs to themselves — and makes it easier for others to belong too.
That’s the Sovereign’s quiet truth. Not loud, not performative. Just settled. The kind of sovereignty that lets you say, with light in your voice: I love what I’m about.
It begins in the body. In the breath. In your thoughts and emotions no longer being strangers to you. In finding, at the very centre, a still point — a sensation of being at peace with yourself.
That peace may not have a name. But it has a weight. A warmth. A hum.
From there, it ripples outward. Into your dwelling, whatever its shape. Into the place where your feet touch the ground. Into the neighbourhood, the people you greet at the post office, the trees on your daily walk.
And further still: into this planet, this solar system, this strange, extravagant universe.
Alan Watts once said:
“[We can realise] the completely illusory nature of the beings that we think we are and get back again to the beings that we really are — which includes all this: outside world no longer left outside.”
What if you were not in the universe like a visitor in a strange hotel — but of it, like a flame is of fire?
The word “numinous” has roots that mean to shine, to glow, to be divine. And what if the homecoming you long for is numinous in this way — not just cosy, but radiant?
To feel at home is not only to feel safe. It’s to feel real. Intimate with reality. Alive to the shimmer of meaning that runs through things. It’s the felt sense that “I and the universe are not separate.”
To feel at home is not only to feel safe. It’s to feel real.
Maybe coming home isn’t about being certain. Maybe it’s about letting the world and the self lean back into each other again — like two dancers in close embrace, finding their shared centre through the tilt of the heart.
What if you could feel at home, exactly as you are?
Let’s imagine for a moment.
What if it were possible to feel at home in your own skin — without waiting for the world to change first?
What if your thoughts could soften, your emotions settle, your body become a place of companionship rather than complaint?
What if you didn’t have to keep editing yourself to fit into borrowed rooms — but could stand, just as you are, in the house of your own being?
This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a practice of remembering.
Remembering that the still point inside you is not lost, only quiet.
That the world — like the forest in David Wagoner’s poem — is not against you. It’s waiting for you to stand still long enough to be found.
Coming home doesn’t mean everything is perfect — it means you are no longer in exile from yourself.
Coming home doesn’t mean everything is perfect — it means you are no longer in exile from yourself.
Can you picture it? A life in which your inner compass is steady. Where you feel met, not managed. Where your belonging doesn’t depend on being pleasing, or palatable, or productive.
Where the very air around you seems to whisper: You are meant to be here. You belong.
And from that place of self-rootedness… a new kind of movement becomes possible.
You are not the only one
So often we imagine we’re the only ones who haven’t found the doorway. It's easy to imagine that everyone else is at ease, sure of their belonging. And yet, behind closed doors and polite conversations, many of us carry that same ache. That secret wondering: Is there a place for all of me?
I remember a client’s face lighting up as she said, almost in surprise, “I love what I’m about.” That glow, that uplift in her voice — it wasn’t about ego. It was relief. She had come home to herself. And it changed how she moved through the world.
Coming home to yourself changes how you move through the world.
Sometimes the home that finds you is a place. Sometimes, it’s a practice. Sometimes, it’s a people.
At the turn of the 20th century, young men poured into Buenos Aires from Europe — hoping to earn, to support their families back home, and then to return. Instead, many found themselves stranded, caught in lives far removed from the hopes that had carried them across oceans. Most lived frugally, alone, unable to build homes or families. But in the dance halls, something else took root.
Tango waits for you, the locals would say.
Whenever you come back, you are welcome.
I know this to be true.
There’s a memory I carry — not from life exactly, and not quite from fiction either. A woman, arms open, standing on a hill. She is waiting. Not impatiently. Not longingly. Just… already there.
I used to think it came from a story I read, but when I went back to find it, it wasn’t there. The image, it turned out, was mine. Or maybe it was something older in me, finally recognised.
I once came back to tango after a long absence, unsure if anyone would remember me. But when I walked into the room, someone turned and said, “Ah, there you are.”
No fanfare. No explanation needed.
The embrace that followed didn’t ask where I’d been — only where I was now. In that moment, I realised: sovereignty doesn’t mean being alone. It means being able to return on your own terms, and still be received.
Tango has felt like that. I leave. I return. It meets me without question, as if to say: I never stopped expecting you.
You, too, are already held. You were never lost.
And if you need someone to tell you so — let this be that message:
You are expected — now, a year from now, a decade from now, a millennium from now. Whenever it is Now, you are expected, greeted warmly, welcomed.
Let yourself be found
There’s no single map for this homecoming.
But if something in you has stirred, been recognised, felt accompanied… then the next step is not to strive, but to listen.
What if you gave yourself permission to pause long enough… to be found?
To stand still, as Wagoner’s forest invites.
To turn inward, and greet the Sovereign part of you.
To let the world become not a test — but a companion.
Let the world become not a test — but a companion.
You don’t need to figure it all out now. But you can begin.
You might begin by sitting with a single question:
Where in my life have I already been welcomed?
Where in my life do I love what I'm about?
Let the answers come slowly. Let them surprise you.
Choose one practice — movement, writing, stillness, touch — that helps you remember: I belong here.
Or you might choose to walk with someone who knows how to listen for what’s trying to return. That’s what I offer, here at ByHeart.
However you begin — begin as if you’re expected.
Walk As If the Forest Knows You
Coming home is not a single moment. It’s a movement. A rhythm. A returning.
Sometimes bold, sometimes barely perceptible — like a brook bubbling up through the soil. But it’s happening, even now.
With each breath that softens your chest,
With each place that meets you gently,
With each part of you no longer in exile —
You are already on the way.
Coming home is not a single moment. It’s a movement.
So go as you are. Let your footsteps be imperfect, tender, true.
The home you long for is not only ahead of you.
It’s also behind you, beside you, within you.
And it’s been waiting to greet you.
As the ache you've been carrying begins to melt, something in you sighs —
relief, recognition, return.
Welcome home.
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Meet Margarita
Learn more about who I am, how I hold space, and what soul-work looks like in practice.
Keep reading
You might find more resonance in the Coming Home series — reflections on connection, heartbreak, healing, and finding your way home.
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