Adoption and Self-Knowledge

I have been rather distressed the last two months. And frustrated. October began with Anita Tedaldi’s piece on the N. Y. Times about the why’s and how’s and most impotantly the justifications of terminating the adoption of her ‘Adopted Son’ and the responses that bombarded the Internet.

Then in November with the U.S. marking the National Adoption Month, the issue of adoption became the focus of some, often prickly, discussions. Each day I grew more and more amazed by the sheer intensity and energy of emotions demonstrated by those involved in the adoption process.

In effect I also got caught up in the heat of it all and drafted ideas from all kinds of perspectives. There are now three potential articles saved on my desktop, but each of them reflected the same unpleasantness that while revising I found distasteful.

Like many, I was also disturbed with the story of little ‘D’ - a story of compounding injudicious actions that added further trauma to the life of this unfortunate boy. Although now that he has a good home and understanding parents, he has a chance to heal.

The fact however remains that with some self-knowledge on Tedaldi’s part, together with more sensitivity and responsibility exercised by the social services, the child would have been saved the mindless trauma.

I do hope that her article does not start a copycat trend in disrupted adoptions.

Adoption is a very personal matter.

Adoptee, birth parent and adoptive parent—each has their own perspective. Then the involvement of the coordinating agency adds a whole different angle to an already complicated story.

It is not easy to be objective about relationships that are so essential to our existence, that are so instinctive and natural that we enter them without thinking, and that are burdened by a mythology of superlative ideals and tremendous expectations.

Perhaps as a result of everybody wanting to achieve that ideal, ‘adoption’ now seems to have become a microcosm, a self-contained world with a vocabulary that only communicates at cross-purposes.

I like to smile. I find it easy to smile and I think others find it easy to smile with me too.

But I haven’t been smiling much the last few weeks, because I am an adoptive mother and for the last fifteen years I have also been a post-adoption counselor.

Chanting

When I stopped working full-time, I joined a comparative philosophy class (very convenient, same lecture and discussion three times a week and three units every week. Could be done on the same day all together or spread over a week. Pretty good arrangement, don’t you think for a person with chronic health problems?). I also spent time reading the scriptures of various religions with guidance from the men and women who are qualified to teach their subject and do so as part of their duties at the monasteries and missions. They were wonderful experiences that I will share in another post.

I don’t know what attracted me to the subject because I had spent the first twenty-five years of my life happily indulging in thoughts and activities that even a very indulgent monastic would stop to consider saying, ‘ Ho ... hum!’ to. :)

Anyhow, after about a decade or so of pottering and digging, seeing all kinds of people and visiting all kinds of places, I sort of began to arrive at an idea of the approach to life that suited me personally. Life encompasses times and circumstances that are completely unpredictable and not always pleasant, and to be able to give of oneself with grace through it all one needs the constancy of personal integrity.

The word Personal is very important to me.

No two people can approach life similarly. Emotional and spiritual advancement may be the final goal that we wish to reach, but each of our journeys is different.

So after trying to find my way to a better understanding and expression of myself, I put together a stream of thoughts into a verse that now inspires and carries me from moment to moment.

As this blog is also the reflection of my thoughts I’ll write it down.

I will respect how I am perceived.

I will respect what I perceive.

I will respect what I imbibe.

I will respect my physical being.

I will respect my intellect.

I will respect my spirit and my further advancement into the spiritual world.

I honour the universe.

I honour Energy within myself and within the life around me.

Together the two of you are the Universal Life Force.

Together You are my life.

Together You lead me to You.

You lead me to Integrity.

You lead me to the Truth.

Bless me so I can experience You.

Bless all who teach me of You.

Bless All who speak of You.

Let me find peace within and around.

I chant these verses to myself often - last thing at night and first thing in the morning as a routine and then at all times of special joy, crisis or sadness. Sometimes I chant them just for the contentment they create in me, when I feel the world is just right.

Chanting calms me. I find it soothing and centering.

Like many others, I am not ritualistic. But I can appreciate the appeal and often the beauty of rituals, and I can understand their purpose.

I find that the rhythmic singing of words limited to a set of repetitive notes in one pitch help at once to lift my concentration from the immediate. The familiar words set to a tone in a single pattern frees my mind from the effort of remembering so I can visualize what I speak.

I have found the notes, rhythm and the pitch I am comfortable with. It is based on a particular classical style that I have grown up with and ‘though I never had ever learned or participated in organized chanting before, I found it easy to teach myself and become familiar with in little time.

This method has worked for me the last five or six years. I am alert to other possibilities that may be more fulfilling, but for now this works.