You say violence, rape, murder. I say love, peace and happiness!



Love can offer you a place of safety



There is all this enraged talk about rape, violence and murders in South Africa right now - and rightly so. But we have known for a while that there are just too many people being murdered, too many being raped, and that crime and violence are highly prevalent. We have known this for a long time.

In an earlier post, a colleague stated that: 

"the leaders are either out of ideas how to turn things around, restore meaning to the lives of these young men and women, or they couldn't give a toss for the young black men and women".

I can agree with the possibility of the second bit, but tend to disagree with the first part. It may not be that the leaders have run out of ideas, and instead that the options that might work are the options that they regard as insignificant. The options that might work, like paying attention and changing the small, daily aspects of our lives, that might make the difference are not even given a look-in. Small things like the need for love and the meaning of happiness and what they mean to young men.

So after interviewing a few young black South African males about the importance of love and happiness in ideologies of masculinity, I found that most young men need love. They actually do. Really.

This got me thinking and reading even more about men, love and happiness. Then I had to remind myself that I am a psychologist too, not just a researcher. I am new in this business of being a psychologist, so I forget sometimes.

Psychology, as you might know, is a field that could make significant contributions to the current depressing state South Africa finds itself in, emotionally speaking. The discipline continues to underchieve, but it has such a great potential for this society. Through the discipline psychology we learn the undeniable role of emotions in our lives, and currently, for me, the importance of paying attention to the affective lives of young black men.

Of course, cognitions and behaviour are important, but even though we all would agree that we are "feeling beings", affect tends to be regarded with suspicion by business and political creatures, or otherwise relegated to the private sphere. However, through psychological studies prove again and again that emotions like love, hope, gratitude, shame, and happiness can actually change a person's perceptions and outlook on life. But let me stick to love. As one of the young men I interviewed stated:

"since I met her, she has shown me so much love, and I have become a responsible man, I do not only think of myself, but I have to think of her too. When I buy myself a chocolate, I know I have to buy for baby too..".

So please tell me you don't think love can make a difference in this world. I will wait for your response.

Of course this is not irrefutable proof about the importance of love in young men's lives. But it tells you this young man thinks love has changed him. 

Anyway, all I am saying is that our political leaders and government directors and corporate heads need to forget, for a moment at least, about the traditionalist way of doing things as being the only way that works. Don't buy more guns and bullets for the police to intimidate black young men. Take down the boom gates. Stop building prisons. Ignore that traditionalist leader's voice inside that says love if for "birds". Young men, like young women, need love. Black men, like white men, need to be cared for and to care for others. We need to teach these men that it is okay to love, to be loved. That it's not so bad to laugh, you know. That being happy is just what one needs sometimes, maybe ultimately. That it is okay to cry if you want to. Pat Conroy puts it very well for me when he says

"I thought that at birth men are allowed just as many tears as women, but because they are forbidden to shed them, they die long before women do, with their hearts exploding or their blood pressure rising or their livers eaten away by alcohol, because that lake of grief inside them has no outlet. Men die because their faces were not watered enough".  

So in my quest to understand how young men experience love and happiness I came across more than I had expected. The look of a young men who is in love and is not ashamed to say that he is, the look on his face when he talks about his loved one and how she has influenced the positive change in his life...just priceless.

I really do believe that love can make a difference. Maybe the rates of murder won't drop by tomorrow, maybe there won't be less cases of rape in the next week, but surely in the long run we will have a society filled with caring, loving, responsible men who are good fathers too and not men who will abuse their families. If men love, in the long run we won't have 12-year-olds who repeatedly rape their 3-year-old sisters. We will not have men who abuse other young men. We shall not have have young men who are frustrated by the fact that they cannot meet the standards of white men or older, wealthier black men. 

We all suffer from the effects of violent crimes in one way or the other. And currently the situation of continuous traumatisation is just causing further and widespread decay in our societies and hearts. We are causing all manner of injury to ourselves, by ignoring our emotions. Violence has become so normalised, so ordinary. Murder is normalised, rape is normalised, abuse is normalised, and all these and more are reported on our televisions and radios eachday and all because, YES, they are happening.

But so is laughter, so are acts of peace: these are happening too. What if we made love, like a normal thing. How about getting strange and weird stories on television and radio about tenderness to each other. What about each of us making it okay for the 5-year-old to see mom kissing dad, granddad embracing uncle, friends enjoying each other. What if we teach the kid to understand that it is good to love and see if there will be a change later on.

I have a good feeling things will change for the better then. Not instantly, but they will. If, that is, we try something different. Like teach love. If we let ourselves change traditions that are not getting us anywhere. Like pay close attention to positive emotions. If we  transform ourselves and this way change our societies. Like hugging a young man today. 

The power of vulnerability in researching love in positive psychology

Brene Brown's talk on "The power of vulnerability" on Ted.com (http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html) got me thinking about not just about what it means to be a good researcher but a few other things besides. About being a  good qualitative researcher of love and happiness within positive psychology to be more specific. A research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, Brown has spent the past ten years studying vulnerability, courage, authenticity and shame. In her talk she speaks of how we tend to numb ourselves to our research situations, to cover up our own feelings, acting as though we are emotionally 'sorted'.

But, if not sorted by concealement, by covering up in the so many ways we usually do, is there a better way to deal with vulnerability?

Very often researchers get caught up in a struggle between our true selves  - if you believe in an authentic self - and the ideal researchers we ought to be. I found a big part of myself in the talk. I found myself asking: How do I separate feelings about my own vulnerability from my actual work? Do I embrace it? How does that affect my work? I mean how does it affect my authenticity?

If you study people in the way that we do it is quite important that you master this whole emotion thing. And it is a whole lot of thing, trust me. Ultimately, the question is, how do you encourage people to reveal themselves to you if you yourself are not authentic or are trying to come across as 'sorted'and 'together'? But is there anyone who would want to work with a researcher who looks like she is falling apart! 

In our work and outside work we spend most of our time trying to come across as though our lives are intact. This is especially true for young and upcoming researchers who want to make an impression.

Now there is something about the concept of reflexivity that says that researchers need to understand the influence their presence will have on the research outcomes rather than try to avoid or eliminate it. Rightfully so, but what if a big part of who you are and your presence influences or interacts with the research environment in a way that completely alters what you could've found? What if that is just part of the whole process? I mean we do aim to influence people and decisions in one way or the other. So what if being vulnerable is part of the research: should whatever the outcomes are then be accepted for what they are? I don't think so.  But, finding ourselves doing research on love and happiness, we can't run away from the fact that we have been dumped about five times by previous lovers. We are also subjects in our own right. And so perhaps that squeaky voice of the inevitabity of vulnerability is what wants to come out in my research. How about we let it be and not be horribly questioned about my biased interpretations, subjectivity and reflexivity, because none of us is invulnerable from life messiness. Whether it is love or divorce, happiness or depression, it is all through my own subjetive 'eyes' right? And that is the beauty of qualitative research: we can all see the same subject from different points of view and still find a way to validate it. After all, there are many truths and I'm sure out there someone can relate to whatever interpretation I get to.

Who said psychologitsts and researchers don't have problems? We do. Like everyone else we have been dumped before, we have failed before, we have lost the one job that matters most before! So like anyone else, we as psychologists or researchers do have issues, of course. 

Did you notice that the example of being dumped comes up a lot? If you are nodding your head and going, mmhh, I too have wondered if this is not a big part of me coming out. 

Oh well, perhaps I'll just go ahead and do some research on being dumped.

But, wait, I forgot I am supposed to be going the positive psychology route. And it might not be so bad to be less negative about love or happiness. Instead of breakups and being dumped (see, that word again!) I will study love more appreciatively. And perhaps along the way I will find a way to ensure that I never get dumped again (again) and so 'take care of my fear, my vulnerability'. Is that possible, to protect oneself from being left, if one is to live fully? On the other hand, where is the fun in that - a researcher without a story to tell. Would you want to read their work? Sounds boring. Or maybe I'm just confused, and research might give me clarity!