TUMANGAN, Ma. Estela Leonor Angela, P.

Q1 – June 10, 2021

2019152008
GED107/B6
The Emancipation of a High School Student
During the time of our lives, which most would say it is high school, we would
begin to bloom. It was like coming out of your shell of childhood and entering the
cocoon of puberty before blossoming into a vibrant butterfly as you approach college.
Many would say they had a very amazing experience; they met a lot of friends and a lot
of classmates, most of the friends and classmates get along with them quite well and a
handful of it clashes with them but it is still alright if they recall it now. Others would say
that it was in high school when they finally realized who they are, gender-wise, including
myself. Some would say they had a horrible experience because they were bullied or
had their heart broken by their first love. Almost all of us would say that they had an
emotionally painful experience in high school which varies with causes and effects.
As for my emotionally charged experience, I can definitely say that it is the most
painful experience I’ve ever had in my entire life, and it happened during high school so
I can vouch for the saying “High school isn’t necessarily the best time of your life” by
Jenna Ushkowitz. My high school life may not be the best, but it was the most
memorable. I experienced a lot of emotional things in high school, including the
heartbreak caused by my first love. One would think that this heartbreak by the first love
is the most painful experience in my life but no, you got it all wrong. It is what happened
before that was the most painful one of all. I lost a friend, the best friend that I have ever
had. It was around the 4th year of high school; we were approaching our senior year
when suddenly my best friend and I got into a fight, it was worse than it could get. I
mean it could have been better only if I had not gotten into a relationship with my then-
lover and only if I had not kept everything all bottled up until it all exploded right in front
of me. Suffice to say that my best friend and I did not had a proper closure because
words were said but not meant and I became best friend-less, left with an unsure lover
who left me for someone else later in our 1st senior year and I was ultimately devasted,
left to regret the choices that I made. What I learned that day was to learn how to look
beyond the surface of every individual that I meet. To see who intends to stay for good
and to always keep in mind of who really stayed for the sole reason of being with you. It
does not have to be romantic; it can be platonic. When the day that I cut myself off from
my best friend and from everyone else apart from my family, I could not control my
emotions at all. It was a disaster, I kept crying because of the pain and I was almost
sent to a psychologist because my family believed that I was in depression. Who
wouldn’t though? You lost your best friend, you isolated yourself from other people
when you ended a toxic relationship. That all happened within a year, it was as if it’s a
series of misfortunate events because my family isn’t exactly the best listener and
comfort that anyone could ask for. They tend to be a little judgmental and generally toxic
especially to the third genders so bottom line is that I felt alone.
 To make things a bit clearer for you, I am the kind of person that puts duties and
responsibilities and basically everything first before myself. My whole being and health
is the last place on my priority list. So, if we consider that, I believe that the ethical
theory that I applied in this particular experience is not one but two and those are
utilitarianism and the deontological theory of Immanuel Kant. As for what
freedom model I applied, I believe that it is the hierarchal model. The reason for
this is because when I made the decision to emancipate myself from everyone else’s
opinions and persuasions, I wanted to be free from all the judgments and work on my
crushed self-esteem. I wanted to live free from all the societal burdens that has been
pressed onto my back, hence the hierarchal model of freedom. As for when I decided to
break off my relationship with my then-lover now-ex and my relationship with my best
friend, I thought of their own happiness and my own as well. I thought and considered
what is best for everyone. I mainly thought if they would be happy without me and after
much consideration, I figured that they are much better off without me in their life thus
the utilitarianism. As for why I included the deontological theory, I believe that it was my
duty to do what is best for them. Of course, we are all responsible for our decisions but
not everyone have the sense of duty to commit and act upon it. During those times, I
was the only one brave enough to decide and so it has become my duty to serve what
is best for them and for myself. I completely cut myself off from everyone else because I
saw it to be my duty to fix myself first before meeting other people and letting them
enter my life. I built up my self-esteem, my self-confidence, and my self-worth before
letting others see me for who I am today now, and I can say that I did a good job of
finding the essence of my self and finding my source of happiness. After a few years, I
entered college and a new chapter of my life began, it is extraordinary to think that I was
once a severely broken person a few years ago but is now whole than I have ever been
in my entire life. It feels like I finally found the sense of peace that everyone has been
looking for. You may be wondering why there are two ethical theories that I believe I
have applied in that experience but according to the book “Ethics: Theory and
Contemporary Issues”, there is not a single theory that fully describes or explain the
morality of an individual’s decision or act. Based on this book, it is highly probable that
there will be two theories that explains the decision or act of an individual.
In terms of freedom, I would say that it is both negative and positive liberty.
According to the discussion about Freedom, negative liberty is the freedom from
external restraint or barrier. It simply means that you are breaking free from the
expectations and desires of other people. This is applicable to me in that experience
because they expected me to stay and endure all of the struggles and burden that they
keep putting on me. My best friend had anger management issues and she can be
vulgar in her vocabulary, and she can be very distant so in my worry, I lose sleep
because of it. As for my ex, manipulation is a daily routine. So, they expected me to stay
and endure with all of their toxic traits beating down on me. I refuse to live like that, so I
freed myself from their restraints. For positive liberty, it means that the individual is
taking control of his or her own life and unlocking his or her full potential. Now I believe
that I also gave myself positive liberty because I emancipated from everything else for
the sole purpose of taking care of myself and to prioritize myself from then on because I
have never prioritized myself before that. I was the kind of person to let others dictate
me, to let others tell me what to be and not to be. After experiencing this emotionally
charged incident in my high school life, I started to wonder if I want to be controlled by
society as an individual. I realized that I am someone that is capable of being a
somebody in this world, that I have the potential to be someone that can provide help
for anyone that needs help. I began looking at myself more frequently than before, I
began prioritizing myself while still considering the people around me and not
completely be a narcissist as I went through the emancipation. It has been 4 years since
it happened, and I can say that I am doing well, good, and righteous right now. I have
already come to terms with my best friend, and we are now friends again after 3 years
of not speaking with each other. I still have not spoken with my ex because my trust has
been fully broken ever since my ex replaced me with someone else. All in all, I think we
are all doing well and good despite the incident 4 years ago.
To summarize everything, I learned to be independent and confident with myself,
the emancipation of my high school self has led me to believe that I have the power to
be good and right not for myself but for the others around me as well. I have also
learned that once incident or experience in your life can change your whole being.
When it happened, my personality changed twice. First was that I became distant,
secluded to myself only. The second personality change was that I became more
attentive to myself and to my feelings, I focused on healing myself as well as getting to
know myself while maintaining the line of ethically and morally good and right. With the
lesson of ethical theories and freedom models, I have come to realize that I was utilizing
the theories and models even before I heard of such things. The only thing that I can
hope for now is that people should be more adept with change and to be of strong heart
and mind when it comes to society and its ethics.