Debt of Gratitude : Brighter Side

I used to resent my parents before because there were periods when I had to live in somebody else’s home and someone else had to take care of me, instead of them.

I was resentful because even at a young age, I’ve seen how debt of gratitude is insiduously used in our country (at least in the community and people I’ve been around with).

“I help you and so you are obliged to pay me back in the future when you are capable to.” – is the transactional concept about debt of gratitude that I grew up into.

And the following examples are some of the reasons that made me view it negatively:

• I knew neighbors, friends and cousins who were upfrontly and excessively pressured by their parents to pay back (i.e, allocate a portion of their salary every month, renovate or buy a house, car etc). The payback was enforced as some kind of return on the effort and cost of raising and sending them to school. When they fail to do so, then they’re considered ungrateful or a failure.
• I knew a kid who said he want to be an artist but he can not pursue it because his parents wants him to be a pilot. He added that there’s no or less money in art and so he can not pay them back accordingly.
• I heard some of my relatives making fun of and implying how a person (they’ve helped) is ungrateful because he/she did not pay them back in some way or paid back but they find it not enough.
• People voting for incapable politicians just because they have given them a big favor before.

So you see, with other people involved in raising me, only means I’m not only indebted to my parents.

And I honestly do not mind paying my parents back because I personally want to provide a better life for them. But feeling and being obligated to other people seemed like an added pressure and responsibility to my existence.

“If only my parents did the best they can to provide for us,by themselves, we should have not been at the mercy of other people and be indebted to them.” – so goes my resentful mind before.

But fast forward to the time I started earning, I found myself failing to sufficiently pay back the well-intentioned people who helped me along the way.

I felt so guilty, hated myself, resented my parents even more and regretted all the help I received.

Yet despite me failing the payback standards I set for myself and the standards that were directly or subtly imposed upon me – the people I feel I am indebted to, still showed me love, warmth and would still check on me from time to time.

This made me rethink how I viewed debt of gratitude.

I came to realize that how I felt about it is mainly due to my self-centeredness and my idealism.

I felt negatively about the help I was given and me having to return the favor, because being in someone else’s home gave me the feeling of being an outcast, regardless of the kind of treatment given to me. I had my fair share of feeling insecure because I know and felt I was/could never be a priority, not unlike when I was in our own home.

I was full of pride and pitied my situation, hence the resentment.

In addition, I also held highly the idea that help should be given freely and so as paying back. Feeling and being obliged to pay back felt a part of me is being imprisoned in some way.

I also realized that the “debt of gratitude” I resented was mostly self-generated. I took in what I noticed on how it is negatively used in the society and view it in that light.

Those people who helped me, what they did was really out of good intention.

They might have said or done things that sounded or felt like they’re indebting me to them but in the end, it was me who associated all those to the ugly side of “debt of gratitude”.

And so I set out to intentionally choose to look on the brighter side of it.

When I shifted my focus, gratefulness started to find its way to my heart and gradually chip away at the resentment that used to consume me.

This time around, my heart would swell up when I think about what other people did for me.

• Fondly, I remember the couple who adopted me when my mom went abroad. They became my foster parent in my high school years. They don’t have enough resources and we were not related at all, yet they took care of me like their own daughter. There were times they struggle to put food in the table, but they never made me feel they resented having me with them.
• I also remember some of my relatives and neighbors checking up on me when my father was consumed by alcoholism and depression.
• Then I also have an aunt and uncle who took me in, during my tertiary years. When the going gets tough for them – they too never made me feel like I was a burden.
• And the list goes on.

These people in my life, even when they have other people and responsibilities to take care of, took an effort and time helping me out when I needed it. And not everyone is capable of extending themselves to others like that. How could I have not focused on that earlier?

So now I choose to amplify and perpetuate the positive side of debt of gratitude. Because the negative side of it is there to stay and what I can only control is my own actions.

And it is my hope that I can continually help others in my own little way, not with indebting them in mind but as a way of simply showing kindness when I can and choosing to always pay forward.