I am insecure.
Why should I pretend to be strong and attempt to be somebody else where in fact I am and never been an admirable nor extraordinary person? Who really am I? Who can really define my identity? Can I presume and establish an identity built on my ideals just to overcome my weaknesses and hide my flaws? Or just to be who really I am without building an image different from my real personality and origin?
In Christian perspective, I am His General fighting for the freedom of those in bondage of darkness. I am a youth Champion. I am a soldier in a mission obtained mandate and direction from the Chief Executive Officer. I am an athlete determined to finish the race according to the rules set by spiritual principles.
In academic perspective, I am a student with an average standing; achiever of some, if not to be considered many, ridiculous awards; obtained some scholarships through lax screening; involve in many extra curricular activities; leaders in different minor organizations; considered, to some degree, a model student and leader measured according to their substandard scale; and admired by many who has no belief in their own potentials.
But are these enough to describe the real me? Despite those titles my society can give me, I am still just a simple mark of failure written in the history of time. I am from the least among the least even in terms of intelligence and physical appearance. I came from the poorest among the poor families, a family undignified by moral corruption and economic incapability, grown in a home with substandard form of living. How could I deny or hide even my intellectual incapacity, moral indignity and character instability? How could I reprove that I am as good as nothing?
My father, a descendant of Ybanag migrants settled in a land where they believe could give them better survival rate; from an ancestors fascinated by anitos or anting-anting and magical powers to guard and preserve their aspirations and freedom from injustice and mistreatment, has shaped his mind in a view that life is survival. He did not finish high school. He has grown in a life, since childhood, under the beam of the sun in the fields planting seeds and tending farm animals. And until now, a farmer tilling a land not his own either and caring domestic livestock in the property of others enough to feed his family but not to sustain his dreams that has been buried by poverty and darkness of uninformed mind left by a fast changing life so called development.
My mother, though originated from a patriarch of freedom seekers holding armaments of revolution camping in the mountains with the Americans and, clothed with passion for liberty and wide understanding of national existence, leaders of revolutionists, has lost in the line of heroes, grown as an ordinary citizen without concern even for her own future, thus not finishing her elementary course, that is to say until grade four only. She�s taken captive by simplicity and antiquity, grown with her father who is a common fisherman. And now she�s an ordinary housewife, a farmer and a laundress.
My ancestral history and family background have founded forces that are established to maneuver my life and have set trends that want to mold my future�the force of poverty; the ideals of poor mental judgment; the trend of my environment; the mistreatment of my abusive upbringing; the shape of my genes; the influence of my rulers and false mentors. They all meant to destroy my dreams and to deprive my life, the life that the God of Heavens redeemed by His blood (Galatians 3:13, 14)�(tears in my eyes as I write). The devil came to destroy, to steal and to kill�(John 10:10)
But by the power of His Truth (John 8:32), He transformed my mind that shapes my life, the mind that denies the lies of the devil (Romans 12:2). By the power of His Truth, I know I am somebody; I know I could reach my dreams; I know I am not the least; by His energy and strength I know I am not weak because He has defined my real identity according to His grace and not according to my origin nor background. I know He has plans to prosper me and not to harm me; plans to give me hope and future (Jeremiah). By His righteousness and mercy He has given me dignity and splendor that no man, not even my ancestral history, nor my family background, nor my friends, could ever give. Whoever I am through the eyes of the world, whether something or nothing, whether excellent or mediocre, whether good or bad, I would never allow anyone to define my identity and mock my being because I know for sure, I am a dearly child of the Highest!