Restoring National Pride

Time and again, we have stressed the various proud moments in our history.

Our early Filipinos, in their simple communities, had everything that they needed not only to survive, but to enjoy the beauty of hand-made colorful clothes, to rest in their comfortable homes, to hear the soothing sounds of their own musical instruments, to worship their gods, to respect their elders, to learn and to hand down their culture and thoughts to the next generation with the use of their own alphabet.

Our northern indigenous brothers and sisters have the rice terraces as the epitome of their voluntarism and concern not only for their own generation but for those who would come after them in the future. They shame present day efforts to remain resilient and sustainable. Recognizing what they had, bountiful nature and beautiful people, combined together, they left behind a lasting proud heritage for present and future Filipinos to look back to with much pride and gratitude. Galing ng Filipino!

Even those who lived in coastal communities had their proud cultures as well. They knew how to produce their own food and how to meet their other needs for clothes, housing, music, order and law, among others. There was NO record of POVERTY in our proud past. There were ample pieces of evidence of BAYANIHAN, of BATARISAN, of PAGTAMBAYAYONG, of VOLUNTARISM among our people in the past. Some Japanese scholars even mentioned that MASSACRE did not seem to be documented among early Filipinos.

Yes, we had our glorious, proud moments in the past, thanks to our diligent, industrious, peace-loving ancestors. We need to review our past, re-learn how they lived proud lives, and renew our people and our society.

Even in our recent past, we did have proud moments. The February Revolution, EDSA 1 comes to mind. We showed ourselves, as we showed the rest of the world that change can come about, that freedom from a dictator is possible, that liberty can come peacefully, with people’s power and unity.

There are continuing proud moments even up to the present. Remember those who gave up their lives to save others, those who returned huge amounts of money despite their persistent hunger and poverty, those who prefer truth to lies, those who remain untainted by dishonesty and corruption and the list can go on and on.

We have to continue to document these proud moments and all those Filipinos who make us so proud so that our people, at present, can realize, can understand that corruption and abuse are done only by the few selfish individuals who shamelessly call themselves Filipinos. We have to continue to awaken our young to our proud past, to our proud ancestors and our proud honest Filipinos. That is the proud national legacy that we want transmitted from one generation to the future.

We have to constantly keep and continue our proud bayanihan spirit and practice. BAYANIHAN will merge the bayani and bayan to make an even prouder Philippines for very proud Filipinos and we can make those proud moments come true soon, soonest. We need to be a bayan, we need to be united, we need to work together, to volunteer together, to generously give our best for ourselves, for our people, for our country, for God.

Let those who can clean government and politics do the best they can in the corridors of power. Let all others do their best where they are, however they can. But we need to start using our hands, joining our hands together, first and foremost, to feed our people and to produce and to provide enough to meet first the basic needs – food, clothing, shelter. Our ancestors showed us the way to go beyond survival. They combined their efforts with the bounty of nature, they survived while allowing nature to survive as well. Our ancestors and their descendants continue to remind us about how to stay resilient and sustainable through hard work, unity, and self-reliance.

Let us produce first what our own people need urgently. Let us use our hands and the rest of our talents and power to produce a self-sufficient, self-reliant, and united Philippines for Filipinos.

So much that we can do really to restore our sense of pride as a people, as Filipinos. Hard work, higher productivity of essential goods and services FOR our people, for all Filipinos will be a clear path to renewing pride in ourselves and pride among our people and pride for our country.

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