SCAR 

 

Adopted people all have a physical reminder of motherloss, and it is the belly button. Whether you have an inny or an outy, it is a scar that is left from the cut that separated your body from the body in which you grew. When you touch your belly button, are you also touching your mother? 

NAVEL

 

The small round part in the middle of the stomach that is left after the umbilical cord (= the long tube of flesh joining the baby to its mother) has been cut at birth. (Cambridge English Dictionary) 

NAVEL GAZING

 

The activity of spending too much time considering your own thoughts, feelings, or problems. (Cambridge English Dictionary)

 

Some adopted people avoid writing about themselves because they don’t want to be accused of navel gazing. They don’t want to seem narcissistic and self-involved.

 

A long, long time ago, the Hesychasts, a group of monks, believed that a deep contemplation of the navel induced communion with God. 

 

So, who’s to say navel gazing isn’t a holy practice? What if focusing on your own navel brings you face to face with yourself, with the universal, with love? 

 

What if what makes navel gazing holy is that it’s not a solo act? What if it’s about us in relation with another: with the body, with the mother, with source? 

PLUGGED IN TO SELF

 

The navel is often depicted as the center of balance for the body. How many adopted people do you know who walk around with a finger firmly planted in their navel because they know, this is power, this is home? How many adopted people could draw their belly button without looking? How well do we know what our mother’s left behind?

 

DON’T LOOK AT MY STOMACH

 

I’m guessing if you asked a thousand people which part of their body they hated the most, a majority would say their stomach. Often people hate their stomach if they look pregnant when they’re not. Often people hate their stomach if it is soft like bread dough, if it spills over their pants, if it is not flat like a board. 

 

Can you imagine giving birth to a beautiful baby who by some miracle can already speak, and the first thing this gorgeous new human did after being born was to point to their belly and say, “I hate that”?

 

Perfection would be marred by perfection’s own confusion.

 

Perhaps that is you. 

 

What if your belly is your story? What if you can’t tell your story because you’re so busy looking down at yourself cataloguing your faults? What if you are too busy being boring to be fun?