Brother wuqi,
My childhood experience was quite similar with you. My father is not rich and he has 8 children in total. We were always being physical abused by grandmother, uncles and aunty. All these made me more determined to get out of poverty and I studied very hard. Now, I am not rich but live comfortably with one single income. I chose to stay at home to look after my boys so that their childhood is one that fills with good memory.
On the brighter side, the hardship that we had gone through make us a better person.
Cheers. Let's always move forwards to a brighter future.
I am sad to see folks having to go through what i did, i would never wish it on my enemies. I wonder why is it that they need to do all these. Maybe to toughen us up through tough love? That is some strange love indeed. Glad to hear that and you are doing well.
Definitely grateful for their "training" but it made me a more compassionate person in some ways, every time i saw the serial Oshin when i was young, i was reminded of my mother. My relatives were much much worse then the bad folks in Oshin. Some asked her to leave my father, while some asked her why not commit suicide or take your kids with you.
With relatives like that, who needs enemies? Still, like what my mother always taught me since young, forgive them for they are blinded by their own wealth. They value their wealth so much because that is all they have. If they only teach their kids how to study and be wealthy, then they will reap the fruits that they sow. Be good to them no matter how they treated you.
These words stayed with me throughout my childhood and even when one time i was accused by a cousin, i just kept quiet and got a beating from my dad instead. My glasses were flung out to the grass patch 3 storeys down when i got a bad slap. Didn't know i had passed out until later when my mother brought me downstairs to look for my spectacles.
My mothers words had such an impact, now i am beginning to see her past wisdom as i saw how my relatives are being treated by their own kids. Absolute disrespect to their own father or forcing their father to have to continue to buy things for them even though they are all grown men with family or never taking their own mother out even though all 4 of her kids have cars each. All are rich by the way, everyone else is poor except them.
One time i was sharing some stuff in my life with a mechanic friend here, he exclaimed that i must have been reading from a book. It was then he shared the Di Zi Gui with me. It had an impact on my life, though i am certainly not virtuous but these words are still very meaningful to me and i apply them to my relatives as well.
To avoid any kind of comparison, i even asked my wife and locked down our FB accounts to all friends and relatives including my own sisters. Comparison, when will it end? If someone shows off that he pays off $40,000 SGD cash for a second hand car, why should i want to even compare. To compare between someone who is 36 and someone who is in his fifties is unfair to both parties, especially to the older one.
We are not even in the same era and i respect him enough to never point out anything but just keep quiet out of deep respect.
http://tsoidug.org/dizigui/Exp_Comm_5_DZG.pdf
親愛我，孝何難；
qin- ai` wo^ , xiao` he’ nan’
When parents love me, it’s easy to be good to parents;
親憎我，孝方賢。
qin- zeng- wo^, xiao` fang- xian’
When parents detest me, then it’s truly virtuous to be good to parents.
