Author: jayjay1111

Many happy memories. My first time working with children. Ramana’s Garden is an orphanage and school in Rishikesh, Northern India. It sits on a bank overlooking the Ganges river. I volunteered there to see if I really wanted to be a teacher before changing careers and retraining.

I organized art and craft activities for the children, for example beading and making kites.

The children taught me many things. I always resented authority. It has never been kind, fair, or attuned to my being or needs. Working with the older teen children was very challenging as they didn’t respect my boundaries or authority. The founder of the orphanage was very harsh and direct with the children from my perspective, but I soon learnt it was done out of love.

Children need boundaries, and they absolutely need to respect you or they become simply unable to hear you. I arrived there with the best intention to pour my heart out to the children, and try to be their best friend. However, it slowly dawned on me that international volunteers come and go, and their emotional connections with the children can cause as much of a sense of instability and loss as the benefits of being a source of love for them.

I learned to respect the love underneath the harshness of the orphanage’s founder. Children do need structure. They need routine. They need stability. A bright source of love in expression is one thing. However, I see my own urge to be their best friend was mostly about satisfying my own need for connection. They need to be shown respect, and by demanding respect and establishing healthy boundaries you yourself become a role model on how to do that.