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Hug: My Experiments

Spreading enlightenment. Teaching and similarly learning is a two-way interaction; a healthy debate between the teacher and the students leads to the "true" enlightenment.

Hug Experiment in a College
Some time back I was invited to teach a group of post-graduate students in the art of Ballroom Dancing; so that they are able to carry themselves properly as managers at social gatherings as well, which they are required to attend quite frequently.

Ballroom and Latin American dances require the dancers to be in close proximity and yet to be comfortable. Also the duration required to learn such dances is quite a bit, especially when one wishes to dance just as one pleases. Also, it is not always possible to get a partner who knows to dance; yet in such situation one should be able to carry on.

Thus I started with the formality of greeting one another before and after the class with a good hug. This was to break the ice between the two sexes as fast as possible. Thus for every class each student would be hugging the person of the opposite sex, at least 40 times.

Only on the first day there was a bit of hesitation. The gentlemen hesitated for longer time. Any way once the process started there was a total transformation in their attitudes. This is very difficult to document, as it could only be felt. And the feeling was very strong one, a kind of firm respect born for ones own self. It is easy to give respect to others, yet it is really difficult to respect ones own self and be able to carry ones self this way through all walks of life. This didn't happen in the first class it self. This was over a period of about 8 to 10 classes.

The result was that the students were more tolerant of each other, the sexist remarks and jokes gave way to more sophisticated forms, and above all each of the students were able to move around with an air of confidence.

Prior to starting the greeting formality I had informed the director of the institute who had invited me to teach dancing. He agreed with me, as a hug is also a pattern of greeting. My condition was that he and I; both should be present if the greeting is to take place. Fine so he would be present and found nothing special in it. He treated it simply as a handshake that one does every now and then. So once I involved him also with the students and made him go through the drill. The first time he was definitely a bit conscious however later it was just as similar to a handshake.

He confided in me later on that initially he was really cold in the feet. Later he realized the change, that was really difficult to explain, that he felt really good, and it gave him as sense of being.

Later he told me of the changes he had noticed in the students during the lectures.

a) Earlier if a person need to borrow a pencil the approach would be to another person of the same sex, even if the person were located else where in the class. Now if such a need arises the first approach is to the nearest person irrespective of the person's sex.

b) Earlier during the short recess brakes distinct separate groups of men and ladies would be formed. Now the groups are formed as earlier, with two major differences. The first difference is that more mixed groups are formed. And the second difference is that a person could join into a group of predominantly the opposite sex, and the entry was acceptable.

c) The class would be more evenly distributed, as against the earlier times when all the men would be seated on side and the ladies on the other side, with a strong boundary line between the two sexes.

d) More teams of mixed groups, i.e. of men and ladies together, were formed for various educational projects that fared much better than the teams consisting of unisex members.

e) A month and a half later my classes there at the institute was terminated. It is this time that the director told me that initially he had feared unchecked sexual activity amongst the students, however nothing such happened. Moreover the hugging formality seems to have deterred such an activity.

Another Institute
At another institute that's even more prestigious, and well know the world over, a similar experiment was conducted. The need for this hugging formality was to be able to put up a good dance show in a matter of ten days. And the dancers barely knew the basics. Any way the trick worked, and the show turned out to be one of the very few of my best dances that I had choreographed.

What happened next?
In both the above cases I had to suffer slight inconveniences. The people who just watch get different ideas, and they cannot be expected to understand the depths and essence of such an activity. And such group invariably forms the majority. As a result I cannot mention the names of the institutes, nor the names of persons as it can be traced back to the institute. However the students were not effected at all in any way, and instead they have gained.

The right path I am following has a few thorns, which are nothing but a few challenges for a better future.