Pinaghugutan: Root

Unconscious Reason Behind Conscious Behavior

            I could consider my family a unique one. It consists of five members- father, mother, sister, brother and me. Uniquely as it goes, my parents managed to build a three-year gap in between their siblings. Even with that gap, I found it hard to manage a close bond with my brother. Reason!? Find out as I tell the story of my family.

            Way back my babyhood years, my father was an employee of “jueteng” now known as “Small Town Lottery” while my mother was an assistant manager at Divina’s Lechon. During those times, I was with my parents whose working far away while my siblings were with my grandparents. With this, the chance for having bonding moments with my brother and sister was very small causing the gap between me and my siblings most especially with my brother. The only time we could be together was when my parents go home once a week. Sometimes, let’s say these once- a- week-visits strike on weekdays so my brother and sister were on school and I was alone playing by myself. When they came home, they made their assignments until around 8pm, that time I was already asleep. In the morning, they’re getting ready for school while my parents and I are getting ready to go back to Quezon (place where they work).  This situation lasted for three years.

            After that, my parents decided to have their own business back here where we originally resides, but the three years without my siblings made it really hard for me to catch up the lost times where we could have a close relationship with each other. I thought it was a good start but it turn out to be the greatest factor of why I became aloof with my brother. Unlike other child I don’t have toys of my own so I reached for my brother’s stuff. This results to lot of fights between me and him.

            Are you now wondering why I’m not having gap with my sister!? Simple. She is a girl like me, she knows what I like and what I needed. Every day, after her school she gave me presents like candies and chocolates which made me really happy and let me love her more even more. She only manages to bring me presents because she saves her allowance. My mother was so cheap and she grew us up with the concept of “If you want something, you need to work for it” meaning to say you need to save money from the money she is giving you. This is also one of the things I adopted from her, being thrifty and determined to achieve the things you want.

            Years pass and now it is time for me to go to school. I turned out to be very talkative and cry baby. This maybe because I wanted affection, I wanted my existence to be recognized and I thought making out a scene could be of great help.

            School gave me lots of playmates. I became close to boys and even have a boy bestfriend. I really felt a brotherly love and treatment from my boy bestfriend.

Aware of mostly the style of boys, I became really attached to their way of life. I started to be like one of them. I became boyish. I saw this attitude as a great benefit. Women in the movies I’d seen before are underestimated, maltreated and were considered as a second-class citizen. Being boyish brought me to different level.

Schooling for me didn’t turned out to be so easy. I was being compared with other children who achieve lots of awards. I hate comparisons, I envy those children, and I turned insecure so I strive hard to be someone my parents would be proud of. I was determined to achieve success so I spent sleepless nights studying. Later, I achieved success. My parents are proud of me and I am now a valued child. They brag about me over their friends. It gave me a feeling of having a big responsibility of not disappointing them. I don’t want them telling sad stories of me someday. I always want them happy and proud.

My parents have this habit of monitoring my grades so I have to be focus; I have to be grade conscious. What’s bad with this!? I cried easily after a failure, it became so hard for me to accept the fact that life does not go smoothly. Due to being compared before, even though I hate comparisons; I often compare myself to others. Asking myself, why am I indifferent? Why others got grades higher than me? Why others live normally? How could they take schooling so easy?

These are the questions playing around my mind and now I’m still working out for the answers by building positive thoughts with the bitter things life has to offer.

A Fight between my Id, Ego and Superego

            I often encounter difficulty in deciding about things. My id, ego and superego are always arguing about what option is best to choose.

One particular decision I am always making was “whether to ask my parents for an extra money or not”. Like what I’ve said above, I had adopted my mother’s attitude of being thrifty so that I could buy the things I want and that I could have something to spend when emergency calls.

As a student who had little amount of allowance and lots of balances to pay, budgeting money is a must. Imagine the things a student involve herself with. A student naturally had lots of expenses. These involve seminar fee, transportation fee, school supplies’ fee, food fee, miscellaneous fee and project’s fee. My allowance obviously is not enough for those.

What I did is to prepare for those expenses ahead of time. I saved money even of little allowance but still the money I kept can’t provide me with all the things I need. That’s when the conflict among my id, ego and super ego arises.

My id tells me “go and ask your parents for an extra money. Come to think of it!? There might be some money left, you could use it and spend it to satisfy your material pleasure.” I could tell that my id had some good points, but I’m a woman whose life doesn’t lie on material pleasure.

My ego says “Ask when you needed. Ask for just an enough amount of money you needed. Nothing more, nothing less. Be exact. Make sure you’ll spend your money wisely and always think of the first things first. Learn to prioritize.” This is the usual thinking that I use to adopt and apply in my daily life. Being practical could lead you to the right path.

On the other side, my superego whisper to me this way: “If you need something, save for it super ahead of time. Save until you can save. Deprive yourself from eating too much. This will train you in being more independent, knowing that you had plans for yourself and that you don’t depend too much on your parents.” Yes, my superego had a point. But isn’t it too unfair if I deprive myself from eating too much? I mean with my physical condition (asthmatic and weak), what I need is to eat lots of food to survive.

This is just one of the instances in my life. There are lots of situations when the provinces of the mind had some debate and disagreements.

--Take home exam namin ito sa THEORIES :))