Neither Here Nor There: Finding Peace in Between
At the shoreline of solitude — finding peace in between.
This is part 7 of my 7-part essay series, Neither Here Nor There: Loneliness, Belonging & Othering, that I’m sharing here on Substack. You can find the introduction and series hub here.
This series began with loneliness—the kind that comes not from being alone, but from never quite belonging. It moved through silence, othering, fragmentation, and the fleeting nature of home. Now I want to bring it to a close, not with answers, but with the kind of peace that comes from accepting life as it is: a life lived in between.
TCK life is a paradox, and so is the creative life that can emerge from it. It gives us wide horizons and, at times, emotional distance. We learn to read a room, a culture, a cue. We develop deep wells of empathy and the technical skills to transform observation into art. But we can also feel rootless, adrift, perpetually explaining ourselves to others—and to ourselves.
Brené Brown suggests: "True belonging doesn't require you to change who you are; it requires you to be who you are."⁹ For those of us whose creative practice emerged from never quite belonging, this becomes both challenge and invitation—but also a profound puzzle. After so many decades of trying to fit in, I'm not sure who I am beneath all the adaptive layers. Sometimes I feel like there is a wild child struggling to get out, restrained by years of learning not to draw attention to myself, of discovering safety in careful observation rather than bold expression. The creative life becomes, in part, an excavation: digging through decades of protective camouflage to find what was always there, waiting.
Despite trying, I wouldn't say I've found belonging—not in the way that suggests resolution or arrival. I still struggle with it. Loneliness hasn't disappeared; it's just shifted into the background, less sharp but still present—especially as those I feel most deeply connected to live far away. Belonging, I've learned, isn't something you can simply choose or will into existence. But what I have been able to transform is my relationship with solitude, of living on the periphery—learning to see the long hours I spend alone not as isolation, but as space. As time to think, to make, to rest; constructive solitude rather than the ache of absence.
This shift in perspective has been essential to sustaining a creative life, and to life in general. Learning to turn negatives into positives, to find meaning in what once felt like only loss, has become a way of surviving and even thriving with this particular kind of rootlessness. The same qualities that made me feel displaced as a child—the watchfulness, the hesitation to fully commit to any single identity, the tendency to hover or be left on the edge—have become the foundation of my artistic practice. I photograph because I'm more comfortable observing than participating; I write because I've learned that meaning can be assembled from fragments; I create because transformation is possible, because loneliness can become connection through the act of making something that speaks to others who recognise themselves in the space between belonging.
There's a kind of peace in that—not because everything is resolved, but because I've stopped trying to force a sense of belonging that doesn't come naturally. This is how it is for me: a life between. What I've learned, perhaps, is how to live gently with that truth, and how to make that truth into something larger than personal circumstance.
And in doing so, I try to offer others what I've often searched for myself: a sense of being seen, heard, welcomed—especially those who, like me, are still learning how to belong. Sometimes that's enough; sometimes that is belonging.
This image of light breaking through above the Butt of Lewis feels like a fitting way to end. A day’s close, yes, but also a reminder that endings carry the promise of beginnings.
Writing Neither Here Nor There has been, for me, an act of laying out fragments — traces of loneliness, moments of belonging, the weight of being othered, and the shifting sense of home — and holding them up to the light to see how they might fit together. To see how I fit together.
If there is a thread that ties them, it is perhaps this: identity is never fixed. It shifts, it fragments, it fades — and yet, there is continuity in the very act of change. Belonging doesn’t always arrive in the places we expect. Sometimes it appears only briefly — in a conversation, in the gaze of another, in a fleeting landscape. And peace comes not from resolving the in-between, but from learning to live gently within it. A lesson that is still ongoing.
Thanks for travelling with me on what has been a voyage of discovery and personal understanding.
How have you learned to make peace with solitude or in-between spaces in your own life?
⁹ Brené Brown is an American research professor, author, and speaker known for her work on vulnerability, shame, and belonging. The quote is from her book Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone (2017).
There seems to be a lot of evidence that belonging makes you a poor observer. Those who come from outside see clearer and are not carrying the load of belonging. Rather, they are free to do as they please, photograph as they please, leave when they please. When done with dignity to those being observed and not with malice. With permission when required and quietly without being disruptive. When you do those things you may well be a loner, but you can perform a great service and be a mirror for our shared humanity. Leaving but a small footprint.
This does not resolve the feeling of being lonely, but rather it can fill you with a feeling of purpose, which may not be a perfect substitute, but is in my view a reasonable way to live.
I have been very moved by your essay (all parts). I hope you find the peace you seek and continue your creative writing.