out of the darkness they carry my heart
into the dawn, as the wrens sing,
i am lifted into the light
and i see who is my maker

i see my angel who lifts me above my suffering
into as well as above my head
i am guided by the lightness of their being
to realize i am never alone; never without their compassion
even though i often feel such a lack

and as i soar through the early morning sky,
i see a new picture of myself--
whole, beautiful, gracious in my own skin
and tears of rememberence of an innocent
child i was

was so lost
but now reclaimed as an adult
now i have the power to break the chains that
keep me from True living; True love
and i am free.

I am that petite build, with that straight, black and shiny hair that every white girl envies.
I have those slanty eyes that turn into slivers when I laugh.
I love kimchee, rice and mandu.  There is never such a thing as too much garlic.  I put red pepper flakes/paste on everything.
I use chopsticks.
People think I'm "cute" and pat me on the head.  That drives me nuts.  It still happens and I'm 32.
I regularly tell people that I don't speak Korean, except for "Where's the bathroom?" and of course "Anyonghaseyo".
My skin turns a dark tan in the summer months and I wish I was more peachy or pale like the white girls whom I think are beautiful.
I wear glasses.
I love to read and research things and I'm a good, diligent student, but I'm terrible with math and science.
I'm musical.

****

I play the clarinet, not the piano, violin, or cello; like every "Asian" should play.
I'm a tom-boy; you will never find me in a tu-tu or frilly-like dress (in public).
I do not wear make-up.
I'm loud, boistrous and obnoxious at times.  I have a serious *****-mouth and I'm not reserved or "refined".
I ask the guy out; not the other way around.
My career is more important than "settling down"-- at least during this point in my life.
I choose to never have children -- EVER.
I bite my fingernails and I've never had a manicure.  I've never even been inside a manicure shop.
I am a fantastic driver.
I am the only person of color in my immediate and extended family.
Over 99.5% of my friends are white.
I have never been in a relationship with an Asian man.
I grew up in an all-white neighboorhood and when I saw the Vietnamese, Cantonese, and Hmong students at my elementary school, I always wondered what it must like to be "them".

In 2007 I lived in South Korea for 3 months.  I encountered complex questions concerning who I am.  Who am I, really?  Am I an adopted Korean?  Am I a "real" Korean? Am I a Korean-American?  Am I none of these?  Does it even matter?  I was left with a gaping hole in my chest of deeper questions, deeper insecurities, and a poignant feeling of loss.  I thought, back in the States that who I am there is who I really am.  But, here I am, in the country of my birth, surrounded by people who share my ethnicity.  This is who I really am, right?  I felt such a deep responsibility to be more Korean.  I felt that if I identified as "white" or even a Korean-adoptee, that I was betraying my culture, my People, my home.  But, while I was in my homeland of Korea, I was so homesick for Minnesota.

When I returned back to Minnesota around Thanksgiving time, a few months later, Eastern Social Welfare (adoption agency in Korea) found my birth mother, Yoon, Young-Hee.  They were able to confirm that she was indeed my mother.  They tried to tell her that I have begun a search and that I wrote a personal letter for her, waiting at the agency.  Once they mentioned me, Young-Hee hung up the phone and would not answer Eastern's calls over a course of a year.  Children's Home Society and Family Services in St. Paul, MN contacted me and said that Eastern Social Welfare suggested that I wait a few years and try again.  I waited 6 years.  Last Decemember I re-intitated the search with the hopes that Young-Hee had gained the courage to talk to the social worker.  I had prayed for this for so many years.  I visulized light and love surrounding her.  I asked God for help.  I have heard nothing from my social worker and it's been almost 10 months.

I am learning how to let go of this search and let go of Young-Hee.  I am learning how to take my healing and my identity into my own hands.  I have a million questions that I wish I knew -- questions about my birth family's medical history.  Questions about why she gave me up. Questions about her current family.  Endless questions.  Now, I have come to terms that my questions may never be answered.  I could always have a mystery around my birth and possibly the future cause of my death (until I am diagnosed with something).  Can I live with this ambiguity?  As of right now, barely.  I am barely able to keep myself from falling apart with the frantic wonderings of my mind.  But, this is something I have to live with every day.

The Adopted Korean Community often hears wonderful and inspiring stories of adoptees being re-united with their birth-families. This is not my story.  My story is the all-too-common story that is rarely heard.  No one wants to hear how your birth mother will not cooperate with the Korean social worker and even read a letter you wrote for her.  No one wants to face the fact that millions of adoptees around the world live with this reality, too.  No one wants to acknowledge the pain, the rejection, and the loss that prevails.  Why would anyone want to hear a story like that?  Well, people who do not find their birth families or are turned away by their birth families have a story to share too.  It may not be an "upper", but it's a pretty important story to hear, too.  It lets us remember how we've all felt this way at some point in our lives, as an adoptee.  Most importantly, hearing stories like this helps other adoptees cope and feel that it is okay if their birth families wish to not meet or communicate with them.  It's not the adoptee's fault.  Adoptees who do not have success stories need to hear that this happens to many others and that a giant rejection does not mean he or she is worthless and less "special" than an adoptee who has been fortunate enough to reunite.

Why is it that I so closely tie my identity and then my self-worth to my birth family?  Why can I not be sovereign unto myself?  I am Korean.  Yes, I am.  It doesn't mean I must do, be, act, believe, see, or think in a certain way.  I am human, too.  I choose to have little identities that I see myself as while in different situations, with different people.  Indentity is complex-  it often signifies one thing-- oh that, (points) THAT is a chair. But simultaneoulsy, identity can also be so fluid and flexible -- (points) THAT chair is a folding chair, but this one isn't. But they're both chairs.  Maybe in some situations I can be a folding chair.  I'd like to play around with identity and let the concept roll around in my mind.  The thinking error comes when we think we must be one, same thing at all times. That is when we become stagnant.  How refreshing it is that we get to have such fluid identities!

Like every person on Earth, I have many shades.  I have many identities, and I surrender the long, hard fight to conform to one identity or another. This is my life and this is who I am, so I reserve the right to identitfy with whatever and whomever I see fit to be ME! :-)

My world is falling down beside my feet
What I felt so deeply was Truth and was real
Is not.
And I see a reflection of the cruelty of others
In myself. I reflect that lack of mercy
For myself.
I am running as fast as I can
And yet I cannot let go of what I run from
The very foundations of my People; my friends
Are gone.
Forever.
Now the door is closed.
Will a window open in it's place?

Humans are natural go-getters.  We are instinctually driven to fix it, solve it, control it.  But, oftentimes, even our most sincere efforts return fruitless.  We relentlessly pursue anyway.  What lies beneath the desire to make things better; make our lives better is a deep-seated insecurity that if we don't DO something, our lives will dissipate, and fall into a heap of failure and depression.  We cannot bear to let go of the need to control our lives and "make things happen".  What would happen if we let the Universe guide us?  I'm not talking about passively living our lives.  No. I'm talking about going about our lives like how we normally do, with the exception of needing to make certain all of which brings us discomfort.  And instead, to live in this insecurity, this uncertainty and trust that the Universe and ultimately, our soul knows the True way.  Our soul is caring for us and whether or not we like it, our soul is ultimately the one in charge of our lives.  We have free will, and we may exercise that whenever we want, but we do not have free will of how outcomes turn out.  We wish we could manipulate the destinies of ourselves and others, but in the end, the Universe and our soul causes the outcome to occur.  The power of action is a shared privilege, done by both ourselves and our soul.  Since we ARE our soul, but separated from the love and wisom by our ego-mind, what is shall and always will be what our soul wants for us and we need to open up to that and trust it.

We are like an inverted bike tire.  Our focus is exernal, yet the meat of us, the essence of us, and our true persona lies on the inside.  When we finally stop running from ourselves in the myriad ways in which we do (alcohol, drugs, ***, shopping, TV, lying, for example), we come to see ourselves as frightened and lonely children that only wish to be loved.  We feel this lack tremendously and we do everything we can to escape the helplessness and rejection.  As children, it is difficult to source our love and security from ourselves.  We don't know HOW to love.  Learning how to love is precisely so; a skill-set and behavior that we emulate and grow to understand. Therefore, it is very hard to self-soothe as children because we lack the experience and the skill.  However, as adults, if we've learned from our broken hearts and dissapointments, most of us have learned how to comfort ourselves, even if that is with eleven shots of tequilla. What we hide from is finding the love we seek from within ourselves.  How do you DO that?  Well, there's the mirror exercise: look at yourself in the mirror naked and say repetitively, "I love myself", with the hopes that one grand day, you will.  Sorry folks, that's too simplistic for many.  I'm not suggesting a solution to the struggle of learning to love yourself, you just have to organically create it from trial and error. And eventually you will discover your unique way of truly being there for yourself.  What helps me is I imagine myself as a child comforting myself with a hug or a pat on the back while I am sad as an adult.  It's nothing major, but it really DOES help me!  We all can find our own ways.  If you find that you run from your pain and seek consummation within the love of your own heart, stop seeking outside of yourself for that wholeness, that completion.  Instead, give yourself the warmest, most caring hug you can imagine and see how you feel.

Does continual conflict serve it's point?  If the point has not gotten across by now, it probably never will.  Does breaking all ties and retreating back to the cave in a stubborn self-rightousness harbor resolution?  When is it right to surrender to your adversaries, to throw in the white flag, so to speak?
You can forgive and forget.  And when you finally do forget, you can finally understand peace.  But, how do we come to that place of willing to surrender, and after we are so willing, how do we actually surrender?  I believe a good warrior is best friends with her enemy because she knows him well.  She knows him so well that she can **** him.  And he knows her so well that he can duck before she attempts to chop his head off.  If they weren't enemies, they would be husband and wife.  What's the difference? ;-) We must see beyond the illusion that we are each others' enemies.  We must see the dignity of our humanness, we must recognize the fragility of our bodies, our hearts, our souls.  And when we do see one another as just another guy doing the best he can, we can have empathy.  With sincere compassion, we can lay the conflict to rest.  We can remember that we all make mistakes, even terrible ones, but that we all were innocent children once.  If we can see each other in the light of innocence, it may help us surrender to our adversaries and come to a passionate peace, most importantly, a peace within ourselves.

Toiling in our herbs and magic
Boiling in our pain and manic
When will we see what's real?
We must first open up to feel
Because all of what's outside of us
Reflects what's inside of us
And we all must
let our feelings permeate our shock shells
because we can drown in our own crafted hell
if we run away from the people and things
that reminds us of where love begins.