S1 EP16: The outsider’s gift

In this episode of School of Shamanism, Giada explores a deeply personal and often unspoken part of the spiritual journey: the feeling of not quite belonging anywhere.

Building on the theme of walking between worlds, she reflects on what it means to live between the visible and invisible, the practical and the mystical, and the identity tension that can come with it. From navigating corporate life while holding a spiritual path, to feeling “too much” in one space and “not enough” in another, this episode speaks to anyone who has ever felt like an outsider.

Giada unpacks why this inbetween space can feel so uncomfortable, touching on the human need for belonging and the subtle ways we shape-shift to fit into different environments. She shares her own experience of hiding parts of herself, and the exhaustion that comes from never feeling fully seen.

But what if not belonging isn’t a flaw but a role?

Through a shamanic lens, she reframes the outsider identity as a powerful position: the bridge between worlds, the one who sees what others cannot, and the one who brings new perspectives and healing back to the collective.

This episode is an invitation to stop trying to fit into predefined boxes, and instead embrace the fullness of who you are, both practical and spiritual, grounded and intuitive.

Because true belonging doesn’t come from fitting in. It comes from coming home to yourself.

Connect with Giada Gaslini:

• Website: www.schoolofshamanism.co.uk
• Instagram: @‌schoolofshamanism
• Facebook: School of Shamanism
• Youtube: School of Shamanism

About the Host

Originally hailing from the vibrant city of Milan, I’ve spent the past two decades traversing the globe in a quest for spiritual and personal growth and combined with 25 years of international corporate work experience. From navigating the vast landscapes of Australia in a campervan to finding tranquility living in a Buddhist monastery in Nepal, my journey is nothing short of extraordinary. Along the way, I’ve delved deep into Buddhist teachings, yoga, and shamanism, becoming Shamanic Teacher,  Forest Therapy Guide, Esoteric Numerologist, Shamanic and Integral Yoga Teacher and Ikigai Coach. In 2013 I settled in Edinburgh, where  I founded the Art and Spirituality Centre, a social enterprise and the School of Shamanism, where I passionately help others on their own transformative journeys.

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Transcript

Giada 0:00

We need to belong somewhere as part of the humankind. So for most of our evolutionary history, being cast out of the tribe meant death. So that feeling of not fitting in, it's not just uncomfortable. It can feel like a survival threat. We've been on quite a journey together. We've talked about what it means to hold two lives at once, the practical stuff, energy boundaries, rituals, what happens to your relationships, fear, resistance, imposter syndrome, the guilt of choosing yourself, the invisible world, and last time learning to trust your intuition. Today I want to talk about something that doesn't get named often enough. Something that many of you feel but maybe haven't put words to. The feeling of not quite belonging anywhere. Identity and what I'm calling the outsider's gift. Not quite fitting in, basically. If you're walking between walls, chances are you know this feeling from an intimate point of view. So you are at work in the normal world doing the job, having the conversation, but part of you is somewhere else. You smile and not, but inside you are thinking about the ceremony you did last weekend, or the dream that's still lingering, or the energy you felt when you walked past that tree this morning. And you can't say any of that. So you just stay quiet. You fit in on the surface, but underneath you feel like an imposter. And then you go to a spiritual gathering, a circle, a retreat, and finally you think my people. But even there, something doesn't quite land. So maybe you are too practical for the love and light crowd, like it would be for myself. Maybe your corporate background makes you feel like a fraud. Maybe you don't have the right language, the right credentials, the right story. So even in the spiritual world, there's a gap. You are too woo woo for the mainstream or too mainstream for the woo-woo. And you start to wonder where do I actually belong? So this is in between place that can be quite painful. Um we need to belong somewhere, it's part of the humankind. So for most of our evolutionary history, being cast out of the tribe meant death. So that feeling of not fitting in, it's not just uncomfortable. It can feel like a survival threat. The nervous system doesn't know the difference between actual danger and social rejection. So when you don't fit neatly into any group, when you are always slightly on the outside, there is a grief inside that and loneliness. And you might find yourself shape shifting constantly, being one version of yourself here and another version there. And hiding parts of you who are depending on the room you are in. So it's exhausting and it can make you feel like you don't even know who the real you is anymore. I lived this for years. And in the corporate world, I hid my spiritual side almost completely. And with spiritual friends, I downplayed my business brain, my love of strategy and structure. And I was always editing myself. So always afraid that if people saw all of me, they wouldn't know what to do with it. Um, and you kind of feel that no one truly knows about you because you won't let them know that full part of yourself. So the belonging we are searching for, that feeling of fitting perfectly into a group, a tribe, a community, it's partly of a myth. Or at least it's not the whole picture. Because yes, we need connection, we need community. But the idea that you should find your people and then feel completely at home, completely understood, completely comfortable, that's not always how it works, especially not for people like us. Because when you walk between worlds, you are by definition not fully in any of any of one word. You are a bridge, you are a translator. You carry pieces of different realities and weave them together. And bridges don't belong to either shore, they span the gap. And that's part of your function. So, um, what if not belonging is actually a gift? Just think about it. When you're fully embedded in a group, you can't see it clearly, you absorb its assumptions, its blind spots, its limitations, you become so much a part of it that you lose perspective. But when you are on the outside, you see things that others don't. You notice what's being left out, you question what everyone else takes for granted, you bring perspectives from another world that can shift everything. And in shamanic traditions, this is understood. The shaman is often someone who lives on the edge of the village, not at the center. They are part of the community, but also apart from it. And that position is what allows them to travel between worlds, to see what others can't, to bring back medicine that the tribe needs. And the outsider isn't excluded. The outsider has a role, a vital one. Both and, or not either or. So it's one of the biggest shifts in my own journey was realizing that I didn't have to choose. For so long I thought that I had to pick a lane. Either I was a businesswoman or I was a shamanic practitioner. Either I was a practical or I was a mystical. Either I belonged in the mainstream or I belonged in the spiritual world. But this wasn't the right things to do. I didn't have to make a choice. That's the old paradigm of either or thinking. I am both, and so you are. You can love spreadsheets and soul retrieval. You can be strategic and intuitive. You can navigate a boardroom and a sacred circle. You can hold the visible and invisible worlds simultaneously. And that's not confusion, that's capacity. Walking between walls isn't about being half in each place. It's about being full in both. Bringing all of yourself wherever you go, even if others don't quite know how to categorize you. You don't need to fit into someone else's box, you are building your own one. And now I'm not saying you have to walk this path completely alone. Connections matter, community matters, but maybe the way you find your people looks different. Instead of looking for a tribe where you fit perfectly, you might find individuals, fellow travelers, people who are also walking between worlds in their own way, maybe different worlds than yours, but they understand the experience of being a bridge. Your people might be scattered, they might not all know each other, they might not form a neat community with a name and a membership list. But when you find them, those soul friends, those fellow outsiders, there is a recognition, adept. You don't have to explain yourself, you don't have to hide any part of who you are. They see you, all of you. And that's the belonging we are actually looking for. Not fitting into a group, but being truly seen by another soul, which is similar to you. And so, how do you actually uh make peace with this? How do you stop feeling fragmented and start feeling whole? It starts with integration, with stopping the constant shape shifting and starting to show up as all of all of who you are, wherever you are. And this doesn't mean oversharing. You don't have to announce your shamanic practice in your Monday morning meeting. Discernment is still important, but it means not hiding, not feeling ashamed of any part of you, holding all of it with dignity, even if you are not taking talking about it out loud. It means finding ways to bring the worlds together in your own life, maybe your spiritual insights while you are leading, maybe your business skills help you build something that serves your soul work. And maybe the invisible world and the visible world start talking to each other throughout and through you. And it means letting go of the need to be understood by everyone. Some people will get it, many won't. And that's okay. Your job isn't to be universally understood, your job is to be authentic. And many of the greatest healers, I have to say, healers, teachers, and change makers throughout history were outsiders. They didn't fit the mold. They questioned what others accepted. They brought perspectives from the margins that transformed the center. And think about it in your own life. Who are the people who helped you most? Often it's someone who saw things differently, who didn't just echo back what everyone else was saying, who offered a perspective you couldn't have found inside your own bubble, and that's you. That's what you can offer. Your outsider statues isn't a problem to be solved. It's medicine you carry. The world needs people who can see from multiple angles, who can translate between realities, who can hold complexity without collapsing it into simple answers. The world needs bridges. The world needs you. So the deepest belonging isn't out there somewhere to be found. It's not in a group or a tribe or a community as beautiful as those can be. The deepest belonging is inside you. It's coming home to yourself, all of yourself, the parts that fit and the parts that don't, the mainstream you and the mystical you, the practical and the weird and the wild. And when you stop abandoning yourself to fit in, when you stop leaving pieces of yourself at the door, that's when you find any feeling hole. That's when the loneliness eases. Not because everyone finally understands you, but because you understand yourself, you accept yourself, you belong to yourself. And from that place of inner belonging, you can connect with others in a completely different way. Not from neediness, not from trying to fit in, but from wholeness, from offering who you actually are, not who you think they want you to be. And so if you've spent your life feeling like an outsider, like you don't quite fit anywhere, I just want you to hear this. There's nothing wrong with you. You're not broken, you're not too much, you are not too weird, too sensitive, too different. You are a bridge, you are a translator, you are someone who carries medicine that the world needs precisely because you see from the edges. So stop trying to fit into boxes that were never designed for you. Stop apologizing for the parts of yourself that don't make sense to others and start embracing the fullness of who you are. Start showing up as all of it, not just as the acceptable parts. The outsider isn't cast out. The outsider has a sacred role, and it's time you claim yours.