Love Till It Hurts
I recently saw a film named "Human" on a website called Films For Action. There are three parts to the series. It is part one of the three. The first interview, also the trailer, was what captured my attention.
It was a monologue by an African man about love -- what love is and what it is not. He recounted his childhood experience of being beaten by his stepfather with extension cords or whatever comes handy. It makes me cringe because it sounds like my childhood home although we never had to face an extension cords. After hitting him, his stepfather would say, "It hurts me more than it hurts you. I only did it because I love you." It really shook me because I remember hearing those same line before.
As the man went on to say, this wrong message gave him the idea that love is supposed to hurt. So, as he grows up, he hurts pretty much everybody he loved. He gauges how much people love him by how much pain they would take from him. It was not until he went to prison did he get an insight of what love is actually about.
The man is an inmate who is serving a life sentence for a double murder. He killed a woman and her child. I strongly suspect that he must have been in a relationship with the woman before he killed her. The person who showed him love is the mother of the woman and the grandmother of the child that he murdered. "By all rights, she should hate me, but she didn't. She saw through the condition I was in . . . and she gave me love." the man said.
The man finally was overcome by emotions and could not talk anymore. Anguish and chagrin of all sorts run over his face. He closed his eyes as tears were streaming down. Suddenly it feels so quiet. So quiet to the point that I can hear my own heart crack.
I did not grow up to become a murderer like him. Maybe because the beating we got as children was not severe enough? One way or the other, I am glad. However, I know the kind of love he talked about -- the love that hurts. This kind of love does only one thing. It hurts.
It is really unfortunate that this model of love has been perpetuated for generations. It is still very much alive among some families and in other communities, including martial art groups. In the "good, old days", if a sensei likes you, he beats you up. If he hates you, he beats you up. If you do something wrong, he beats you up. If he wants to show you something, he beats you up. I don't even know how a student differentiates between the different beatings to find out what a particular beating signifies.
Even in Aikido, there are schools that are known for the rough treatment of students by the teachers. One may wonder why the students would take it. And, not only do they take it, they actually almost crave it and consider the abuse a privilege. "Because Sensei likes me," the victims like to tell themselves. Getting more abuse is a badge of honor within the circle. The whole dynamic is very codependent and unhealthy.
I am lucky that my teachers never used that method on me. I have encountered some people who may have tried to teach me something that way, but I find it neither pleasant nor effective. As a teacher, as an Aikido instructor, I do not find such method all that educational at all. People do not focus well when they are over-stressed. Most of all, they do not come to a dojo to be abused.
We expect a teacher to be technically competent. Otherwise, why should people come to learn from you? There should not be a need to prove that using the students. A teacher's job is not to show what he can do but to show students what they are capable of doing and help them get there. Beating students is a selfish, cowardly way to fulfill one's fragile ego.
A while ago, my mother told me she called in to a radio show. The topic was corporal punishment. After so many decades, my mother confessed on air, "I used to hit my children a lot. After they left home for school, I cried. I regretted what I did. Then, they came home in the evening. I hit them again. I just could not control myself. What I did was wrong. I was stressed out, and I took it out on my children." I can testify: My siblings were very good kids. We pretty much stayed the top of the class all the time, but we still lived in fear every day because you get beaten even if you get 99 out of 100.
Now, even my 80-year-old mother who never had formal education can recognize how wrong she was and urge younger parents to not hit their children. So, people, can we please stop?
Teach your children/ students when you teach. Love the entire time. And skip the pain.
It was a monologue by an African man about love -- what love is and what it is not. He recounted his childhood experience of being beaten by his stepfather with extension cords or whatever comes handy. It makes me cringe because it sounds like my childhood home although we never had to face an extension cords. After hitting him, his stepfather would say, "It hurts me more than it hurts you. I only did it because I love you." It really shook me because I remember hearing those same line before.
As the man went on to say, this wrong message gave him the idea that love is supposed to hurt. So, as he grows up, he hurts pretty much everybody he loved. He gauges how much people love him by how much pain they would take from him. It was not until he went to prison did he get an insight of what love is actually about.
The man is an inmate who is serving a life sentence for a double murder. He killed a woman and her child. I strongly suspect that he must have been in a relationship with the woman before he killed her. The person who showed him love is the mother of the woman and the grandmother of the child that he murdered. "By all rights, she should hate me, but she didn't. She saw through the condition I was in . . . and she gave me love." the man said.
The man finally was overcome by emotions and could not talk anymore. Anguish and chagrin of all sorts run over his face. He closed his eyes as tears were streaming down. Suddenly it feels so quiet. So quiet to the point that I can hear my own heart crack.
I did not grow up to become a murderer like him. Maybe because the beating we got as children was not severe enough? One way or the other, I am glad. However, I know the kind of love he talked about -- the love that hurts. This kind of love does only one thing. It hurts.
It is really unfortunate that this model of love has been perpetuated for generations. It is still very much alive among some families and in other communities, including martial art groups. In the "good, old days", if a sensei likes you, he beats you up. If he hates you, he beats you up. If you do something wrong, he beats you up. If he wants to show you something, he beats you up. I don't even know how a student differentiates between the different beatings to find out what a particular beating signifies.
Even in Aikido, there are schools that are known for the rough treatment of students by the teachers. One may wonder why the students would take it. And, not only do they take it, they actually almost crave it and consider the abuse a privilege. "Because Sensei likes me," the victims like to tell themselves. Getting more abuse is a badge of honor within the circle. The whole dynamic is very codependent and unhealthy.
I am lucky that my teachers never used that method on me. I have encountered some people who may have tried to teach me something that way, but I find it neither pleasant nor effective. As a teacher, as an Aikido instructor, I do not find such method all that educational at all. People do not focus well when they are over-stressed. Most of all, they do not come to a dojo to be abused.
We expect a teacher to be technically competent. Otherwise, why should people come to learn from you? There should not be a need to prove that using the students. A teacher's job is not to show what he can do but to show students what they are capable of doing and help them get there. Beating students is a selfish, cowardly way to fulfill one's fragile ego.
A while ago, my mother told me she called in to a radio show. The topic was corporal punishment. After so many decades, my mother confessed on air, "I used to hit my children a lot. After they left home for school, I cried. I regretted what I did. Then, they came home in the evening. I hit them again. I just could not control myself. What I did was wrong. I was stressed out, and I took it out on my children." I can testify: My siblings were very good kids. We pretty much stayed the top of the class all the time, but we still lived in fear every day because you get beaten even if you get 99 out of 100.
Now, even my 80-year-old mother who never had formal education can recognize how wrong she was and urge younger parents to not hit their children. So, people, can we please stop?
Teach your children/ students when you teach. Love the entire time. And skip the pain.
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