There has been a very big news recently from my home country China that a young girl in the country’s best university committed suicide because of her abusive boyfriend, who is her schoolmate. The boy lamented the fact that she is no longer a virgin, and therefore asked her to get pregnant with his child and then abort it, as both a punishment and a demonstration of her love. It really made my heart sank, as I am sure many many girls have felt the same way and was there for her. As a girl growing up, especially raised by traditional Asian parents who are usually very strict and critical, it is easy to have doubt in yourself and not believe you deserve the best. Growing up in such an environment, girls always have a tendency to please other people and over compromise themselves to fulfill other people’s requests, and would be afraid that rejecting such requests would mean they would lose love and respect from others. It is this kind of thinking that negatively affects girls’ approach towards dating, as their willingness to over compromise prevented them from leaving their abusive boyfriends.

Being single and actively dating, I also sometimes find myself in the trap of being afraid of saying no, and would always terribly regret me not being sincere and genuine to myself and do what I actually want to do - especially after I said yes to a second date with a person I have no chemistry with, or go home with someone when I am not ready. I do tend to find myself being stronger as years go by, and would always remind myself to always reject whatever I do not like to do- something that seems easy to many people but hard for me sometimes. I did had a few moments of feeling free and independent, once after I had a very frank conversation with my ex and broke up with him, and I consequently had the best year of my life so far just by dating myself, exploring New York, visiting museums, going to shows, etc. Most recently, I also said no to a museum date in MoMa and had a great time going with my friend instead. Loving yourself - seems easy but is sometimes very hard. It means stop needing love from the outside and give love to yourself from within. It means it is ok that to not get love from everybody in the society, because at the end of the day, you will always be there for your own support. It means defending yourself in front of something you do not want for yourself, and care less about what other people think.

Anyways, a very heavy topic for an otherwise thrilling class of dancing!

Today we did many difficult dance moves, including coupé, grand battement, fondu, soussus.