She walked into the office, a terrified little mite of a child barely 7 years of age. Her shoulders were bent and her chest caved in – already this child had the look of an old person beaten by life and wishing for an end, any end. She heard me introduced to her as "Doctor" and she immediately hid behind the principal, so scared I was going to give her a shot and inflict even more pain on what was already a painful life.
My responsibility was to figure out why this little one was having so much trouble learning. Only in 2nd grade, she was already far behind her peers. She seemed unable, perhaps unwilling to learn, to keep pace with everyone else – all those 7-year-olds that found learning so easy. We forget what children live with daily. We tend to think their lives begin and end with school.
I remember when I was in school, we thought the teacher crawled into the blackboard at the end of the day and walked back through the next morning. Their lives outside of the classroom were nonexistent to us. This is what we now do to children. We adults in the education arena forget they have a life outside of the classroom and that life affects their ability to function within the entirety of their lives.
When this child saw me, she hid. She rolled into herself and hid behind the principal. The principal had to accompany her to my room and frequently reassure her that I was not there to hurt her. I played some games with her, reinforced her when she smiled by giving her small gifts, and soon the principal could leave. But I had to be cautious. I could not look at her with anything but a loving glance. I could not show any emotion when she looked as if she would cry. If that happened, I would lose her, unable to bring her back.
What happens in life to a child so young to bring her to this point? Her life was extreme, to be sure BUT, unfortunately, not that unusual. She was born as the result of rape. Her biological mother, unable to care for herself, had moved in with a friend and her husband. The husband of her best friend raped her and this child was the result. Mom tried to kill the baby when the baby was an infant and, as a result, the biological father (the rapist), along with his wife, were given custody and have raised the child since.
Mom disappeared from the child’s life. To say the bio dad was a hostile, angry individual is, at best, an understatement. When he first met me, his look was designed to intimidate. He sat across the table from me with narrow, slanted eyes, arms crossed, looking down his nose at me, daring me with his eyes to say anything. His wife, the child’s stepmom, proceeded to tell me how she loves this child like her own and how she has raised 4 happy children. She went on to tell me about how miserable this child is and how she screams and kicks without cause. This was followed by her story that she liked to go outside and rap loudly on the window where the child was doing her homework. She did it in the dark and then complained about how miserably the child reacted by kicking out the window.
There are many other stories like this that I have encountered through my 50 years of experience, but this one will do. It illustrates how and why the Alchemical Child becomes the apocryphal child and can, if allowed to continue, predict the demise of civilization.
The Alchemical Child is born in love, regardless of whether it is conceived in love or not. It is born from the Divine spark as is all life. It is born in innocence – coming directly from Infinity to experience what it means to be human.
A child is born with infinite love. It knows itself to be Divine, without any doubt. Infinity resides in its eyes, and when we look at a child, we see ourselves reflected there. We see our own true selves and who and what we are. There is no hiding from a child’s eyes. The Love it holds for us is complete. It is eternal and it is unconditional. Regardless of what we do, this child continues to love us, and it continues to seek love from us. In many cases, long after the parent is gone, the child continues to seek love and approval from the parent, hoping and seeking.
Eventually it realizes -- we realize -- that the most important love is the one we have for ourselves, the eternal Divine Love that is our birthright, without condition and without judgment, that is ours regardless of who or what we have done with our lives and who or what we have become.