More for Po
In Kung-Fu Panda 3, Po meets his long-lost father, who he didn’t even know existed. Po had been abandoned as a baby. He had been brought up by Mr. Ping, the goose. Mr. Ping found Po in a basket and fell in love with him. (Who wouldn’t?) He brought Po up single-handedly and lavished him with his own brand of love and affection. Po’s lovely friends (the Furious Five) were obviously aware that Po was adopted (a panda whose father is a goose, duh) but never brought it up in conversation.
After the initial shock, Po is thrilled to meet his father and, later, to meet a whole village of pandas. As Po gets lost in all the excitement, Mr. Ping is, understandably, a little jealous. Jealous of a father who was never there when Po was growing up and needed him. And who has now returned to reap all of Po’s affections. So, there are some jibes and some angry faces.
However, later in the movie, Mr. Ping realizes that Po needed this. He needed to know his birth father. He needed to know why he was abandoned. And he needed the joy of belonging to a community of pandas.
After coming to terms with this new reality, Mr. Ping says something truly remarkable. He says that he now understands that he needs to share Po with all his new friends and with his birth father. And he is okay with it because:
“It doesn’t mean less for me… it means more for Po.”
That quote has stood me in good stead when I see my loved ones leaning on people other than me to solve some of their problems. I cannot be everything for everyone. Even when I love them very much. It is fortunate that the people I love have several sources of care and support. It doesn’t mean less for me; it means more for them.
