How Therapy Can Give You a Sense of Home and Belonging Again After Feeling Adrift
Places of Belonging
There are places where the air is heavy, where silence insinuates fear. Single steps feel like walking on glass, every word carefully weighed and measured. You learn to shrink yourself, to listen for danger in each shifting breath or tone. Even in a hotel room, where you are safe from the tolls of your travel, the emptiness can linger — you have a roof over your head, yet no place to lay down your spirit. You have found shelter, but no sanctuary amongst others to share the joys of your journey.
And then there are places we can breathe. Homes, or even people, that feel like a deep exhale. Where every voice can speak freely and liberally. Everyone’s contribution is considered enough and a gift to the whole. The air in these spaces carries ease, is woven with laughter, tenderness, and leaves you with the quiet knowing that you belong. Here, no one has to perform to be loved. Presence itself is enough. Around such a table, the soul finds rest, the body unclenches, the heart remembers it is safe to open.
This is the difference between a “house” casa and a “home” hogar. Between surviving the day and being restored by it. Between tip toeing on eggshells and moving with freedom in the circle of belonging. Home is the place that ushers you in when everything else falls apart — where warmth meets you at the door and love keeps you coming back for company.
In Spanish, both casa and hogar refer to a place of living. The difference in these words, though subtle, is deeply meaningful. Like the imagery above, Casa, meaning “house” in the Spanish language — is a physical dwelling. Hogar, however, carries something more: not just a structure, but a “home” shaped by belonging, warmth, and community.
Rooted in fuego — “fire” — the word hogar can also signify a “hearth”. In earlier times, families once gathered around hogueras for light, comfort, and warmth. Just as the fire can captivate and nourish its’ admirers, a hogar is a place where people are held, restored, and invited into the ongoing work of who they are becoming – the people their community so desperately needs them to be.
Casa Hogar
Casa Hogar is that kind of place. Not a physical house, but a therapy and social work practice — offering counseling, advocacy, and support — a circle of people where you don’t have to perform, explain, or hide your rough edges. Casa Hogar is un refugio — a refuge – where wounds are acknowledged, limitations embraced, and differences celebrated. A space where one is wholly welcomed, cherished, and loved. Only on this foundation of authenticity and acceptance can we begin to live as our fullest, most alive selves in our healthiest and strongest communities.
The lessons I learned while launching Casa Hogar are etched in my heart today: you invite into your life those with hands willing to hold you; those who can see your becoming — your unfinished, unfolding self — and are willing to invest in it. Casa Hogar is a place to land when we are beaten down, when the world has chipped away at our worth, and we need to be reminded that we are seen, valued, and safe. Life already delivers hard lessons — home should be a place of sanctuary. The work at Casa Hogar is to cultivate this sense of home within ourselves, in our relationships, and in our community.
Casa Hogar’s vision as an agency largely reflects the social work value of human relationships: the belief that connection, care, and trust are the soil in which healing and growth can take root. With the walls of a supportive home and community, life’s challenges may continue, but beauty can still bloom, even in the most unforgiving places. At Casa Hogar, the heart learns to unclench, the soul remembers its resilience, and the spirit finds room to breathe, grow, and thrive.
Historically, casas hogares were sanctuaries for children, women, elders, and others pushed to the margins — places they could find shelter, rest, and dignity. Today, although Casa Hogar is not currently a physical home for living, the agency’s practice carries forward this same spirit. It reflects the community I live and work within: vibrant, diverse, woven with unique stories and strengths. It is a shared home where we uncover and cultivate our gifts together. My role in Casa Hogar will be one of an encouraging guide and sojourner – walking alongside you as you uncover your purpose and while continuing on my own journey of healing, self-discovery, and transformation.
When a House Becomes a Home
In this shared work, we gently rewrite the narratives that once held us back, replacing them with stories rooted in compassion, curiosity, and an unwavering belief in possibility. We believe change begins at home — and home begins within. Home is something you must choose to cultivate and carry within.
If you can’t imagine yet what that home feels like, begin with what you know it is not. Notice the places you visit where fear, judgment, or scarcity have taken root, and tenderly set them aside. Maybe walk away from them. Listen to your self-talk. May your words become a healing salve to the scars left by those who’ve harmed you. Speak to yourself with the same patience, care, and warmth you would offer someone you love. This is when the heart begins to unclench, where the soul finds room to breathe, and where your spirit can find the will to journey its own path.
The first step in creating this inner home is small, gentle, and profoundly transformative. Each word of kindness to yourself, each act of allowance or forgiveness, begins to build a foundation. As you nurture this inner sanctuary, you will notice that the sense of home begins to spill outward — into your relationships, your community, and the world.
When home and community are places of safety, belonging, and respect, people are free to bring their best selves forward — not because they are controlled or silenced, but because their experiences are honored and reflected back to them with dignity. Strong people and strong communities do not let the success of others threaten their own. They say, “Welcome! Come on in and come join in!’. In these spaces, voices are heard, stories are witnessed, and individuality is celebrated. Only then can growth, connection, and transformation ripple outward. And when that happens, the ripple of change does not stop in one’s heart or at one’s doorstep — it travels outward and reaches the world.