An average person spends one-third of his life sleeping. This is in accordance with the required eight hours of sleep in a span of twenty four hours. Given this medically statistical fact, I was boggled. One-third of my life is too long but then, I would just use it up for merely sleeping. While sleeping, I am definitely neither being useful nor being useless…at least considering my own self alone, but how about taking the others into account? In this case, nothing of that proposition will actually change. My being neither useful nor useless will absolutely be undeniable, and that so applies in an appreciably conspicuous level.
I have got a lot of obligations to carry out. There will always be those responsibilities that are inherent to every being like those on the familial, moral and societal aspects. As for me, aside from those, I am endowed with academic tasks to faithfully and sincerely adhere to. This adds to another burden, having me to try to cope up with the world’s everyday necessities. This triggered me to challenge myself. Of the remaining two-thirds of my life awake, I want to be as useful as I can get.
There is that familiar saying that goes “life is short”. This is ostensibly taken for granted by a lot of people, especially most of the young ones-those who do not feel, whether intentionally or not, the cycle of what life is all about. Some do not want to accept, while others just do not consider, that inevitably, we will all die. Having stated this, at the very start of a person’s stage of inquiry in life, a lot of questions are being posed by him regarding his existence. I, personally, have asked the questions “Where did I come from? How did I come to life? What is my mission here on earth? Is there really a God? How’s about the concept of heaven and hell? Where do I go when I die?” In short, I was basically asking for one question and that is, “What is the truth?”
Putting the natural law into consideration, it basically contains four features. These are self-preservation, propagation of species, order in the society and search for truth. All of these things enumerated are collectively applicable to persons alone, thus their interconnectivity is being accentuated. No other living creature will have to let all of these characteristics be evident in them. Given this, I would want to stress that when speaking of human beings, we do not only speak of another complicated concoction of hollow walls of physics and chemistry held together and bump each other as if they were just a bunch of moving atoms in a certain space, called earth. No, no, no! Really, we are not just that!...
We are rational beings. Taking the view written in the sacred Christian scripture, the bible, we are sanctioned by the Divine to have dominion over everything in our environment. This enforces a higher level of our existence. In fact, we are in its very height, but really not quite. You might probably ask why. The answer is that we need to go deeper. We need to develop our social awareness. We need to enhance our values. We need to be better persons involved in our community. In being so, we must always follow the principle of primacy of conscience. We must have to always do what our conscience tells us to. Coupled with this, we should have the natural response of updating our conscience. It is our moral obligation to have some informing to do for our enlightenment.
Learning must have to never cease. It will be of our advantage anyway. Do not get me wrong here. The word “learning” is not to be limited in terms of the scope of academics alone. It is to be seen in a far larger scale. There is a better scenery waiting for us outside the boundary being restricted by the four corners of the classroom. If we deprive ourselves of it, whether intentionally or not, we are actually blocking our path to our journey of finding for the truth that we ought to witness. Simple things might seem complicated if there are no actual practical applications of concepts and theories being cultured. We must be vigilant of everything around.
Experience leads to expediency. This convenience directs a person to have a mind that is conducive, always capable and willing of depositing in information. Further, it strengthens the person’s foundations on truth, giving him clearer views on certain human acts to be classified as either good or evil by promoting his sense of critical thinking in situations wherein he needs to decide upon given possibilities leading towards different ends. Our judgments are being enhanced in a way that issues are being confronted with open-mindedness, having theoretical applications on the different disciplines and considering the personal situations of those that are involved.
Experience makes persons versatile. A person can easily manage to do things that he usually does not do. It must still have to be noted here that not all that a person experiences is a hundred percent good. There are those good ones and, conversely, bad ones. Either way we will have to look at these, we cannot get away from the fact that they form part of how we came to be who we currently are-the real us.
Sometimes we commit mistakes especially when we are subjected to doing things that we really do not want to do-things that pressure us since our dignity is being put at stake. These instances really happen in conformity to Murphy’s Law. According to this, if anything can go wrong, it will.We are sometimes confronted by situations where there is seemingly no way out if we will not have to follow what is not being dictated by our hearts. When such happens to me, I easily feel nervous and get rattled, highlighting that my social height is being put to test. But then, I realized that in life, it is not important if you stumble a couple of times; what is important is how many times you genuinely tried to stand up from where you fell. I have gone through a lot of challenges in my life already. I find it not normal to get to do something that would put me down and still not learn to cope up with those that must be done. It is true, indeed, that there is glory in failures for it is in committing mistakes where we discover to learn and unlearn things, and be flexible whatever our situations.
All of the existing concepts and things that are already known and established by men are matters that are, in the philosophical terms, objective. Just as truths are considered as objective ideas, falsities are also objective. These might have been concluded from tradition, observations and experimentations.It is only in the interpretations of these truths and falsities that a person becomes subjective. Let us take the word “simple” for example. A simple lifestyle for me might not be how another person perceives what simplicity is all about.
Relativism is the result of this personalism when it is already in its extreme sense. This condition is already lamentable since if so, we will have to be trapped inside a world where we always oppose the flow of what is really being offered out there. Legalism, on the other hand, is the case where there is already extreme physicalism or objectivity at its highest degree. This is still something that is dangerous for a person since he will have to be stuck within the mentality of the others that surround him. In most of his undertakings, his independency will be sealed in an isolated corner that he cannot reach. He will be easily swayed by sweet talks and deceiving looks. It is in cases like this where a person comes to be debilitated. Due to his being unexposed for discovery, his foundation for truth is being shaken and thus, eventually weakens.
In the ongoing life process of an individual, there are a lot of unavoidable progressions in terms of his social aspects. Life and love are two thoughts that can never be taken apart from one another. These concepts are complimentary.
One notion of the good that I know with regards to this is that on the universal issue on marriage. As for how I see it, the simple decision making of someone on to whom and when to marry will either make or break him. There are a lot of driving forces that motivate a person to marry. Some of these are love, economic and emotional security, escape from loneliness, money, power, prestige, protection, parents’ wishes, common interests, or even the simulation of sexual urges, longing for a sexual partner. The last detail is actually the most problematic of all. It is something that can really be considered as shallow.
In most, if not all, instances of pre-marital sex, sexual immaturity is being pointed as the main crook. Although being innocent and curious mitigates the evil done, the persons involved are still considered to be culpable of their action. This often leads to the utter misery of both the parties involved. Some choose to have the baby be aborted for them to smoothly continue their studies. Others choose to stop their schooling for the sake of the child-the seed of what they have done and then decide to marry one other. If the couple is not yet ready for such, their conjugal life would be as shattering as how they came to enter the family life.
From all of these realizations, I have seen the sacredness of marriage. As for now, I will have to concentrate on my priorities in school and at home for I know that God has someone in store for me. As He is preparing me, He is also molding the woman that I will be engaged with in the future. When we are already mature enough, God will permit us to meet by then. In God’s right timing, I am assured that my family life will not be considered as challenge that is cumbersome but it will be something that is euphoric and transcendent, as glorious and as victorious as paradise.
After marriage, life does not stop there. There will still be many confrontations to triumph over. In our quest, it feels nice to be assured that we have touched various lives. This has been a challenge for me; I hope that everyone will make it theirs too.
Given the things above-mentioned, it is actually the prerogative of someone to practice his freedom of choice. In the end, it will not really matter how much a person accomplishes. What will be important is his happiness in his transformed whole-his success in his search for the true meaning of life.
