SITTIE HAFSAH C.

TOMAS

GEC 101 A3-2

(answers)

1. C. The quote that struck me the most from the Chapter.

"I can never catch myself at any time without a perception, and I can never observe anything but
my perception." David Hume

This quote struck me the most, because it contends that even when we actively look for
ourselves, we simply can’t find them. How I see myself right now will not be the same as how I
will see myself tomorrow. My definition of life is different from what you think life is. Almost
all of us have settled for the idea that we are somebody and that we are here for something, but
are we really? If everybody is “somebody”-has a role to play then does the word "somebody"
even have an essence? When we think of ourselves, we can never come up with a definite answer
that will fully satisfy us, that will fully capture every inch of our being. Though some thoughts
may resonate with you at the moment, but do you think that they will be the same tomorrow or
for the next 10 years? No they won’t, they’ll change and that’s for sure. Because none of our
perceptions resemble a unified and permanent self-identity that exists over time, What I think I
am today is not the same as who I thought I was yesterday, and it certainly will be different to
who I will be the next day. However, with all this being said, I think that we can find ourselves
in everything that we do, from the moment we open our eyes to the cold morning delight, to the
blazing glare of the sun in the afternoon, up to the chills and weariness brought by the glorious
night.

2. ESSAY
 At this very moment, I don’t have the slightest idea of how I can put into words how I see
myself.  Because I don’t think that whatever words come out of me will fully satisfy my
perception of myself. Perhaps later or sometime around here, I will be able to assemble and
resonate with the thoughts I have in mind and come up with a thoughtful conclusion. Like many
people, I overthink a lot. Indecisiveness is my strong suit. At night, I also find myself wishing for
the infinite number of celestial bodies in the sky along with the billions of other selves.  I notice
myself in everything that I see, from the tip of the mountains to the curvy edge of the sea when
the sun sets, to the falling weary leaves of Autumn, and the drowsing smell of earth when it
rains. I consider myself the same as everyone else. I have qualities that you don’t have and you
have qualities that I don’t have, but that doesn’t mean that we are any kind of different. I can’t
come up with an absolute certainty that I have something in me that sets me apart from everyone
else. Looking back, I used to think that I had some kind of special quality that separated me from
the rest. I fed my ego and pride unknowingly, which later caused me to fall into a pit of misery,
hatred, and regrets. I didn’t know how to climb out of that, I only knew how to stop all of that
through ending it all at once. I’m immature and dumb. Out of desperation, I leaned to my last
resort. I tried and tried till I could feel myself no more, and I thought it was the end until my
dying breath. I saw that thin strike of light coming from up above, and I immediately held on to
that. At that very moment, I felt so much pity, tenderness, and mercy towards myself. Self-
compassion suddenly existed in my vocabulary.  In that course of life, that is where I found
myself, not fully, but where the journey to get to the peak started. I know that every day and
along the way, I will pass through some pieces of myself that will make up the whole being of
me. Every day it changes. I am gaining and so is everybody else. I consider my body as an
instrument of myself. Through my physical attributes, I am able to express myself, who I am,
and what I am. I follow Rene Descartes' notion that self is the soul and the thinking entity, while
the physical body is the non-thinking entity. Simply because that’s how I see myself too. When
my time comes and everything will cease to exist in me, I think that my soul will separate from
my body, like clothes that my soul will take off of me. My body will then be embraced by the
earth’s soil and dispersed eternally. As for my soul, it will wander to someplace unknown until
the end of time.