Skip to main content

Only Good News, Never Bad News

Only Good News, Never Bad News

What Dear You and Qiaopi Teach Us About Love Intelligence

One of the most touching lessons in Dear You comes from the Qiaopi (侨批)—the letters sent by overseas Chinese migrants back to their families in China.

These letters followed an unspoken rule:

Report the good news. Hide the bad news.

Why?

Not because they wanted to deceive.

But because they wanted to protect the people they loved.

  1. They did not write about hunger.
  2. They did not write about loneliness.
  3. They did not write about hardship or danger.
  4. They did not report on death, illness, or imprisonment

Instead, they wrote,

"I'm doing well."

"Don't worry about me."

Many letters were even rewritten by professional scribes, transforming simple or crude messages into beautiful poems and elegant prose.

The words became more beautiful, because the writers wanted to send hope instead of fear.

This was not dishonesty.

It was Love Intelligence.

They understood something many of us have forgotten:

Not every truth needs to be told immediately.

Sometimes, love means carrying the burden yourself so that others may live in peace.

Sometimes, wisdom is knowing when to speak the truth.

And sometimes, time itself becomes the messenger.

Years later, the full truth may emerge.

Or it may never be revealed.

But the intention was always the same: To protect. To encourage. To love.

This is one of the deepest expressions of Love Intelligence (LQ).

  • Care chooses another person's peace over personal relief.
  • Courage quietly carries the burden without seeking recognition.
  • Connection values a loved one's hope more than one's own comfort.

Dear You reminds us that love is not always loud.

Sometimes, love is found in the truths we choose to delay, 

the burdens we choose to carry,

and the hope we choose to send.

That is the quiet wisdom of the Qiaopi.

And perhaps,

that is one of the greatest lessons of Love Intelligence.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What an Executive Coach and Business Coach Does

The Secret Under the Mattress: Why would a 79-year Man Bet So Big on 4D?

It was 2007 when we discovered his secret. While moving my father’s mattress, we found them: heaps and heaps of Singapore Pools 4D tickets. They were stacked in layers, a paper trail of lost hopes. What shocked us most wasn’t just the volume, but the stakes. He wasn’t betting a few dollars for fun. He was punting hundreds of dollars per draw—nearly ten times a month. At the time, my siblings and I were furious. Our father was a 79-year-old retiree. We wondered, with a mix of anger and confusion, why a man at his stage of life would need to win such "big money." What was he going to do with the money? We saw it as a reckless habit, a sign of poor judgment in his final years.  Some of us would say, "If I were to give him money to buy 4D, why don't I use the money and buy 4D myself?  At least I have better discipline".  It has taken me two decades, and the experience of raising my own three grown-up children, to finally see the truth that was hidden under that matt...

Head Bleeding when the Chair Falls

The Weight of Silence: What Were We Really Arguing About? My earliest memories are punctuated by the sound of shouting. In 1970, when I was barely 6 years old, I stood as a small witness to the fierce quarrels between my father and my late eldest brother Kah Yang (he passed away in 1971 at the age of 17). As I grew up, these contradictions became the soundtrack of our lives, usually centered around our family's shoe shop and clothing stalls in Chinatown. In the court of family opinion, the verdict was almost always the same: my father was "wrong." He was judged as a man who didn't fulfill his role, who wasn't "burdening" enough for the family’s success. But as I look back from the vantage point of 2026, I have to ask: Was that actually true? Let me finally put to rest what my father did right: the truths that were buried under decades of criticism: Unseen Labor: He worked grueling, long hours. I remember him hauling boxes of goods and equipment to set u...