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College Trauma
If worst comes to worst, some people may not know exactly what they may be doing in the near future. The present may be so sure for us, but the future may have a little twist. My father took up Economics at the University of the Philippines. He ended up as a director for films. And before most of us succumbed into this more mature world, we were dreamers. Surely, most of us, as children, dreamt to be astronauts at one point or another. Personally, i dreamt to be a vetrenarian; but now I dream of being one who contributes to our sick society through writing. The time span from how we dreamt as children to how we dream now surely went through considerable changes and choices. We know change is inevitable, but we never really know its outcome. What we will be doing is inevitable, we just don't know what exactly that will be. Its not just because people are collectively fickle, its because we simply don't know.
College scares me, and yet it excites me. My choices seem to be required to revolve around something. They always seem to have the need to be counted for. I feel potential growing in me--potential that I never thought I could achieve. I feel I'm about to undergo a drastic change, and I have to change my outlook on things. From that, I choose not to be insecure of not knowing what I'll be doing, although I know I will come across some choices that will turn out all wrong. I choose not to be overwhelmed by defeat or my past failures, because, like death, not knowing is natural. I choose not for weakness to conquer me, because I know I have some potential. I choose not to cower over the thought of college not because I may not know what I may be doing in the future, but because I know who I naturally am, and I know that I can be more than that.
Someone Else
These things I'm learning are all so new to me. Little by little, I'm getting to know myself more and more. I can describe my expectations, my standards, and whatnot. But this freedom and this knowledge and this logic, it's getting me colder and colder. Meaningful, but at a loss.
It really is losing to gain.
Grateful 2006-2007
August 15, 2006.. It was a sunny day, despite it was the scheduled raining season for the Philippines. August 15, I remember it as well as my birthday. When the date nears, I hope for what is to come, hoping that it would be like history made all over again. But, I must say, I am merely a dreamer.
It's raining today, and I wonder if he remembers. August 15, it's just an annual memory.
Ateneo Essay
“Are there any significant experiences you have had, or accomplishments you have realized, that have helped to define you as a person?”
How is it that a thousand words or so are required from this simply stated, broad, “yes-or-no” question that is supposedly the heart of this essay? Humanly speaking, that is exactly the problem with people during this newfound millennium, or maybe even since the dawn of time – they believe they are what they do. If they go about naively, they are dubbed a child. If they fail, and fail countless times, they are failures. They strongly point to a belief so limited of confidence that it limits belief in potential. They are the type to compare, the type to decline of any success or achievements. They grow up insecure, and unsure of what they will be doing in the future… I myself am part of this majority – the majority that is anxious of what is to be done in the future because the past seemed to have annexed so many wrong decisions. It’s not just because people are collectively fickle-minded, but because we simply don’t know. Like death, not knowing is natural, and yet so crucial to us all.
However, more important than knowing what one does or will do is knowing who one is as a person in a massive society. Personally, who am I? Although my significant experiences – my failures and my victories – have molded me to an average adolescent who is at the brink of bidding farewell to her high-school life and nearing the transition of a college experience, they do not define me as a person. I believe things that are defined have a living purpose in this withering world. I dare not say I am defined specifically by the things I do, otherwise I am merely a vapor in the wind, constantly changing, from student to worker, worker to wife, wife to retirement, then finally, retirement to death. Although death will do me part from this world sooner or later, I want it to count; I want my death to be filled with purpose, rather than death be my purpose, God forbid. Who am I? Ergo, if I were in a dictionary, how would I be defined?
Unequivocally, I no longer ask those questions. Moreover, I only stopped struggling with those questions recently. For the most part of my life here on earth, I’ve struggled with an inferiority complex, simply because I never thought myself as an achiever. I spent my first years up to my second year of high-school in a school called Maria Montessori Foundation. Although I could have learned so much, I hardly gave the effort to ever improve. I grew up lethargic, ignorant, unconfident, stagnant, one soul very much prone to failure at any given moment. I didn’t study, but I survived by a hair length. And though I knew the devastation at the time, I never did anything to improve my grades. Finally, I was opened to a realization that I could not survive my remaining years in high-school with such an attitude towards work. I ended up transferring to a school called Philippine Christian School of Tomorrow during the remaining quarter of my second-year high-school life, fearing that I would fail and repeat that same year. During the first day of being in my new school, I felt like a failure. Regardless that I was unconfident of myself, my personality eventually improved. I was a more sociable person, my humor grew, my grades went up, and my writing grew exceptional. People described me as “kind” or “bubbly”-- I was everything opposite from how I was in my old school, everything that I thought were the only things I had to improve… But sooner or later, indifference caught up with me. My personality improved, but my belief in any potential hardly succumbed to anything motivational, and I couldn’t care less about how much I changed for the better. I never knew what it was like to achieve so greatly, because I failed so many times in the past. I can’t say I was wearing a mask over my personality, but I improved only for myself. Purposeless. Who on earth am I?
As I said, I only stopped asking that question recently. The answer came among all the stress that applying and choosing a college has brought to me. The thought of college scares me, and yet it excites me. My choices seem to be required to revolve around something. They always seem to have the need to be counted for. I feel potential growing in me--potential that I never thought I could achieve. I feel I'm about to undergo a drastic change, and I have to change my outlook on things. From that, I choose not to be insecure of not knowing what I'll be doing, although I know I will come across some choices that will turn out all wrong. I choose not to be overwhelmed by defeat or my past failures, because, like death, not knowing is natural. I choose not for weakness to conquer me, because I know I have some potential. I choose not to cower over the thought of college not because I may not know what I may be doing in the future, but because I know who I naturally am, and I know that I can be more than that. These are the thoughts that motivate me, telling me that I am not my own body, but a human being of potential. I don’t just want a good college, but I want the best. I don’t just want a good career, I want the most exemplary that satisfies what I earn. I don’t just want to make friends… I want to touch lives. My dear friend who is now in one of the prestigious schools in the Philippines once told me, “It's not a battle between good and bad. The good has already won. It is a battle between good and best.” If I can avoid a devastating future, then I will, and by God’s grace, I will do better than that. And upon saying all that, finally, I will answer the question, who am I?
Purpose starts from giving something beyond myself. My future is a blur to me, but as my years went by, I’ve learned to give my life and trust my God to bring me wherever He wills me to be. I have nothing but my choices so limited, sometimes I can’t even elaborate. I have my failures reflected from my achievements like any other person. I am temporary -- a body that will be joining the sands of the beach one day. But, above all, I am a work in progress – one with a purpose to empty myself for reasons beyond myself. I may not be an achiever, nor may I say that I am a failure. Who am I? I am a work in progress. I am a conqueror.
Shut Off
The only importance of the past is the study of feasibility. From observations of the past, from mistakes already made and done, we are somehow able to calculate for corrections, and spare the chance of a better future.
It never occured to me that even things you've forgotten about yourself can affect you greatly. They say forgetting is a psychological manifestation; a way to shut off that which inflicted darkness in your life. In short, your body makes you forget the bad things in life. How selfish.
This fact is making me quite tense. I can't remember much of my childhood, I can't recall much bad memories -- only happy ones. My life can't be that perfect and meaningless, there must be something I've shut off. And this scares me because even the darkest things that go unseen have a great diming effect on the future. It just worries me.
she can't tell me that all of the love songs have been written,
'cause she's never been in love with you before.
your skin smells lovely like sandalwood.
your hair falls soft like animals.
i'm tryin' to keep cool, but everyone likes you.
i want to kiss the back of your neck,
the top of your spine where your hair hits,
and gnaw on your fingertips and fall asleep,
i'll talk you to sleep.
but i'll be the one, i will have chosen.
i'm tryin' to keep cool, but everyone here likes you
i'm not the only one.
your skin smells lovely like sandalwood.
your hair falls soft like animals,
and nothing else matters to me.
she can't tell me that all of the love songs have been written,
'cause she's never been in love with you before.
your hand,
so hot,
burns a hole in
my hand.
i wanted to show you.
Sacrifice is Purpose
When people hope, usually, its by circumstance. A lover hopes for the best in a relationship, and quarrels open oppertunities of hopes and dreams in desperation of consoling a soul back to sanity. But, really, it's this kind of hope that gets things quite crazy. Yeah, it's crazy.
Hope isn't circumstantial, nor is it a narcotic to get you on a high. Its no drug -- it can't be abused, neither can it be prescribed. It's an act that goes deeper than a concatenation of events. In fact, hope -- real hope -- often stands alone in the darkness. And when you have nothing else, human nature will tell you that you can't go anywhere without your will, and that nobody can deprive you of your acts of hoping for your principles (and coping 
).
Hope is knowing there is always a risk, and, if you can avoid the unfortunate side of it, then do so with faith. I'm hanging on to my ideals, especially those involving some sacrifices, that way I have nothing to lose, but learnings to gain. My needs are at stake; my sanity is, too. My wants will always be there anyway, and they're going to change eventually. Enough with the moping, the jealousy, and the negativity. My loss is a loss, but my ideals are still there.
"God does not require that each individual shall have capacity for everything." - Richard Rothe
"Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the Lord." Psalm 31:24
God has given me ideals, and I want them to challenge me.
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