I don't like that advice at all. Sure, not everything's easy, but the hard way is almost certainly not the right way. When I was learning to program (still am, as should all of us who are programmers), pointers came easy, arrays came easy, hash maps came easy. Almost every concept makes sense. I'm not some intellectual godsend either, so I know there are probably a countless amount of others who feel the same way.

I think that the most likely option is that the "teacher," or at least method of teaching, is bad.