Do you remember or have you ever read the saying by Maria Robinson:” Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending”. I recently had an interaction with one of my English students that brought this to the fore, she was in deep pain about her son, and I could do something about it but was it my right to take her pain away in a teacher/student relationship. This sums up what I did, this is what I wrote as my  #Winsday, which is a celebration we make in a course I am doing called Rise – Speaker training, it is one of the best things I have done for years and I do a lot of personal development. 

I’m not sure how to start this “Win” My English student said I have something to show you I don’t understand. It was an email from her son’s teacher recommending that they have a Mental health assessment done on him sooner than later as she was incredibly worried for his ongoing wellbeing. Mental health is not a biggie amongst Upper-middle-class Chinese families, especially when it is their one beloved child. After some discussion, I worked out her husband is in total denial of it and keeps saying he is fine. Coincidentally one of my best friends is head of the Child Psychology unit at the Austin Hospital, I contacted her as to what they needed to do about it. My student kept drifting between calling her son abnormal to breaking down and crying. I stood in the power of the central position and helped her keep in touch with her love for him and taking some action. In the end, we had booked a call with her GP the following day. I think without this work I would have given in to its none of my business very early on surviving in the backward position of communication.

I realise I did it because there were times in my life I had seen my own pain and my friend’s pain and done nothing about it. So what does the world say about hurt and pain and how we relate to it:

1. Yep, I was guilty as charged for years and years using this supposed protection method as my friends would not want to know the truth, luckily I have learnt this was a bald-faced lie and they loved me for all of me, warts and all.

2. For each of us, the level of hurt that is defined as bad is unique: Hurt – NIN.

3. V.J., whoever she is, points out what often happens in our relationship with others we meet on the journey of life.

4. Stop doing this in the name of Love: Stop In The Name Of Love.

5. I had many bruises from my 40 year battle with alcohol, the best thing I did when I went cold turkey 5 years ago to heal my chi energy.

6. Not the easiest thing to do, but it is what got me out of a 5-year mental health crisis that saw me be hospitalised 6 times: Believe.

7. What a great question to ask yourself to begin the healing process.

8. Do you accept the option: Bring Me To Life.

9. All pain is not bad for you.

10. Not too sure about this, to me both modalities are valid: Letting Go.

11. A guaranteed recipe to have hurt and pain in your life, hate others.

12. My friends’ daughter went to this extreme as well, it was only the love of her parents that got her through it: Till I Collapse.

13. Lewis and fellow novelist J. R. R. Tolkien were close friends. They both served on the English faculty at Oxford University and were active in the informal Oxford literary group known as the Inklings.

14. If you are born as a human, you will suffer it, enjoy the journey and what it is meant to teach you, avoiding it is not the way to go: Hurt – JC.

15. Bianca Sparacino has an interesting life motto: If you don’t fit in, you’re doing something right. It seems a great description of Living a life without any pain, don’t do that.

So how do we lessen the pain, here is my friend Marc Chernoff’s 30 suggestions to stop doing to Yourself:

1. Stop spending time with the wrong people.
2. Stop running from your problems
3. Stop lying to yourself.
4. Stop putting your own needs on the back burner.
5. Stop trying to be someone you’re not.
6. Stop trying to hold onto the past.
7. Stop being scared to make a mistake.
8. Stop berating yourself for old mistakes.
9. Stop trying to buy happiness.
10. Stop exclusively looking to others for happiness.
11. Stop being idle.
12. Stop thinking you’re not ready.
13. Stop getting involved in relationships for the wrong reasons.
14. Stop rejecting new relationships just because old ones didn’t work.
15. Stop trying to compete against everyone else.
16. Stop being jealous of others.
17. Stop complaining and feeling sorry for yourself.
18. Stop holding grudges.
19. Stop letting others bring you down to their level.
20. Stop wasting time explaining yourself to others.
21. Stop doing the same things over and over without a break.
22. Stop overlooking the beauty of small moments.
23. Stop trying to make things perfect.
24. Stop following the path . of least resistance.
25. Stop acting like everything is fine if it isn’t.
26. Stop blaming others for your troubles.
27. Stop trying to be everything to everyone.
28. Stop worrying so much.
29. Stop focusing on what you don’t want to happen.
30. Stop being ungrateful.

Have a go at a few of these and see how your hurt and pain levels shift.

Today’s playlist has another first, two versions of the same song. We begin with Nine Inch Nails, then some Motown from The Supremes. Then three bands – Mumford and Sons, Evanescence and Paul McCartney and Wings. Two of my favourites complete the set, the penultimate tune is from Eminem and we complete with Johnny Cash: Who Hurt You, My Own Expectations.

 

So if the world can turn down it’s hurt and pain levels, I reckon my Interculturalist ethos for the world of Love and Respect for All, Everybody Included has a better chance. Until we meet again, my dear friends.