Los Baños, Laguna — It’s almost 3:00 in the morning here as I write. Yes, I’m still up because of my bouts with insomnia, and I have to work on my paper presentation. I’m currently participating in the Philippine Historical Association’s annual conference held here at UPLB. I’ll be presenting a paper on Negros Oriental politics in the 1960s, and the rise of Mariano “Tsila” Perdices.
I’ve written about Perdices for years now, and new things (from new sources) have come up from time to time so I have to update what I’ve written about him thus far.
History, as they say, can always be re-examined depending on readily-available, let alone verified, sources the historian is able to get his hands on.
But I don’t intend to talk about Tsila Perdices’ political career in this column now as I’ve written about him a number of times in my previous columns. What I want to talk about is something connected to what I wrote about last week – on life, in general, and the struggles of some people when they face the vicissitudes of life.
I’ve been quite in a disconnect lately; it may be the gloomy weather, I don’t know, or the time of the year; it’s been almost a year since my best friend, Leo, passed all of a sudden from a heart attack. His passing led me to a rocky path of denial, grief, mourning, and despair to the point where I questioned really what it means to live. He had his life all planned, but it all ended abruptly on the evening of Oct. 15 – three days before my birthday.
They say death is part of life, that it should not be seen as a bad thing. We came from nothing, and we become nothing in the end.
In a similar vein, American-British philosopher Jerry Valberg supposed that birth and death are alike, “given the qualitative identity of [his] past and future nothingness”.
Valberg said some people find “no more reason to have a negative attitude toward his future nothingness than toward his past, pre-birth, nothingness.”
This makes sense, in a way, if you look at it from this lens: that we come from nothing, and we end up as nothing; that there is perceptible difference between the two.
From a different lens, however, as Valberg again inferred, one can also see the difference between birth and death in a way that death – or ceasing to exist – is something awful since it is irreversible; there is no ‘undo’ button, or a form of respawn whenever it happens.
The reality – which is really very obvious, but seldom being thought of – is that we are just transient beings living in this world; living, as cliché as this may sound, on borrowed time, and it may be difficult for others to accept this.
People have to deal with death in one way or another, unlike our past nothingness (pre-birth) – that which we really don’t actually deal with.
There is that certain emptiness that one feels when you lose someone close to you. Sometimes, or oft-times, you start to give more value to life when you experience this form of loss.
It could take years – even your entire lifetime – to fill that void left by the loss of a loved one. But is there a way to overcome grief? Well, some friends tell me we should look into the good memories, and focus on the good times, not the bad. Easier said than done? Yes, but still doable.
I’ve read, though I do not fully agree, that the more you dwell on the pain, on grief, the more it brings pain, and the more you can’t stop grieving. I don’t fully agree because talking about your grief, and the process of mourning helps, to varying extents, alleviate the pain of suffering alone. But I get it; there may be a time that you really have to find ways to distract yourself, and do something that will make you dwell less on the problem (i.e., grief, anxiety, depression, etc.).
How? Try to accomplish some things in your daily life: do your household chores [admittedly, I’m not the best in doing this]; do errands; exercise [also not the best in doing this]; spend more time with your loved ones, and always tell them how much you love them; write about your day, as this is one way of processing your thoughts and emotions; focus on your work, and be the best at it; or do what is meaningful to you – in my case, I find meaning in teaching and writing History.
This is why I’m here in Los Baños now – to meet new people [fellow historians and history faculty], to present my paper, and hopefully help advance the study of history at the local level, and of course, to listen to other paper presenters, and learn from them.
Then again, I know this is just temporary; I know there will be times when the problems – the feelings of anxiety, dread, loneliness, and so on – in my mind will return, and dealing with it will take a lot of mental fortitude.
Suffice it to say, the best thing we can do is to continue to find meaning in what we do. We will invariably be beset with fears and anxiety in life; many problems will definitely come our way, and the only way out is when we try to do something about it, act on the problems at hand.
As Marcus Aurelius said in his Meditations: “The happiness and unhappiness of the rational, social animal depends not on what he feels but on what he does; just as his virtue and vice consist not in feeling but in doing.”
For now, at this ungodly hour, I’m just ruminating about life, and the problems I have faced so far, and hoping that my actions will speak louder than my words.
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Author’s email: [email protected]
