3 reasons why Adoptive parents aren’t special

Sitting with my beautiful wife last night (any excuse to boast) she was sharing about how she feels when people speak about those who adopt as a separate group of people. The words “special” “different” and “called” came up and while these are glowing reflections on what we and many people do, and don’t get me wrong, praise is always accepted and appreciated, there is a subtle danger in people accepting and giving these specific praises too easily.

Imagine a couple, feeling called by God to open up their hearts to the lost, to the ones forgotten, opening up their home and their family to accept those who have nobody to offer them a hope and a love that will be forever. This couple, when described like this, can be made to look a little more special than they really are. Truth be told, this couple doesn’t glow in the dark, doesn’t walk on water, they don’t control the winds by the mere wave of their hands and no they don’t poo gold bars or sweat diamonds. They are you and I!

Rockheart!

So it appears to have happened! I have achieved the ubiquitous experience of many modern-day human worker ants, Burnout! I say worker ants, as it seems ants appear to live a life on “repeat”. Wake up, get up, get out, get back and go down, only to repeat the cycle. Different day, same…well you get the idea.

Burnout seems to me a bit of a “cop-out”, after all, isn’t it a label for those who just can’t keep up with the pace, the ones who play a good game but choke on the finish line, those who were meant to do good, but should leave the great for those who don’t use the “B” word. I honestly struggle to hold this diagnosis with any form of seriousness, or at least I did before I found myself head in hand banging my fists against the wall, crouched on my knees screaming into nothingness while my kids ran to the next room unsure of what was happening. I struggle to think, to decide, to become motivated. I would rather be alone, separated from the crowd so I can let the tears gather in private. I’m irritable, I feel out of control. But isn’t this normal in todays working world?

The irony is, I’m a counsellor, a “fixer”, surely this is something I should have seen coming a mile away and taken action against? The truth is that I didn’t see this coming, sure I wasn’t passionate and full of joy, but the busyness consumes us and lies to us. It says that as long as I am filling my time with tasks, I am productive, as long as I am ticking boxes, I am fulfilling my purpose. The sad truth is that if we aren’t conscious of our own mental, emotional, physical and spiritual state, the good starts to overwhelm us and can become a poison that begins to feed on the great, our passions, our source of joy, and before you know it, the things that gave you a purpose, those things we know we have been called to, those very things become a drudgery, another task on life’s all-consuming “to do” list. So with hesitation in my heart, I declare I am burnt out!

Now what?

Men behaving Daddly!

I’ve had the privilege recently of sitting with some amazing young people and hearing their hearts, hearing where they are at, where they’d like to be at and just generally being allowed to listen to them sharing.

So much of what I hear seems to connect with their confusion of who God is, what He wants and how we should connect the two. I must say that for most of my life I struggled with this, to be honest, I still have days now, where I struggle with understanding Him and what He wants for my life. But for certain, one thing that God has solidified in my heart, chiselled into my very soul, is that He wants me to be a father, a husband and a man, and those are things He holds close to His heart. After all, He is a Father, he lives as a husband to his bride and he was a man!