Am I really free?

Juicy Peppah

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AT first I thought I have found freedom the day I stopped going to church. I have lived my life to full honesty, doing everything I wished with a truthful heart, gaining and using my acquired ability to reason, expressing myself as I am and all that… all in a matter of nine months already.

I reminded myself to be wholeheartedly true because God weighs it in the end, show respect to my parents, heed their advices and try to make them happy, and develop harmony among me and my siblings (and other people).

For a while, I felt like a bird freed from the burden of a golden cage, soaring high into an atmosphere so vast, gliding and dancing with the blows of the breeze. And though there were times I would hit a tree by chance or run into a speedily approaching bird of prey, I’d tell myself, “It has to happen, anyway.”

Until the time came that I was already using that freedom to the extent of blowing my own horn while stepping on the heads of other people. I ignorantly made my parents believe that I’ve had already grown from a fragile egg to a strapping rooster. There were times when I helped them do the household chores or listen to their sentiments. There were even essays that I wrote that touched the corners of their eyes, thinking I was no longer that flimsy little egg they used to handle with a great deal of care.

But then I realized that at the core of that seemingly colossal mind lived a demon that could never be cast out by just a simple “go”—a silver platter filled with lust, greed, pride, anger, gluttony, covetousness, and envy sprinkled with a handful of disrespect and impatience, and garnished with fear and pretense.

For one, I used to be irritated at one of my sisters because of a drastic change in her attitude. She was too kind I refused to believe it. I have always assumed she was doing something that would lead her into the pits of suffering in the near future, not because she wouldn’t listen to my parents’ advices but because deep in my heart I reared a grudge.  She had been very mean to me when I was young and I so wanted to use everything I have attained to get back at her. Only, I was afraid to do it eye to eye.

While I was on the process of developing a healthy attitude, I also did that to please the people who unfortunately agreed with me. I even indulged on watching some violent and unhealthily mind-provoking shows which gave me a bit of guilty pleasure. And who knows what’s been playing inside my head?

The very manifestation of that evil, however, was the disrespect I slapped at the face of my mother this Christmas season. Not wanting to take orders from anyone, I’d throw her an angry look that has pushed her to the hilt when she was asking me to get something which was only too near for her to reach.

Whatever happened that Christmas was worse than the envy I have been feeling over my other sister’s drastic weight loss and everything or the irritation I felt at some forceful advices because I have defied one of God’s commandments which is to respect my parents. I turned away from daddy’s teachings to love mama despite the differences in our attitudes. I basically refused to heed my own advice to be a better person everyday, ending up defying that Higher Self I so wanted to behold.

I would have wanted to blame myself for revisiting the church before Christmas and listening to their words and all that, but I should have known that before I have ever been catapulted back to my old self, I have always been like this from the time being: fragile and in dire need of protection and guidance. I may have been given the keys to my golden cage on a temporary basis, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel any strings tightening around my neck.