1. Morrie is optimistic towards his death. Although he is also distressed about his life-threatening disease, he is happy that he is given enough time to create more happy memories with his loved ones before he departs this material world. He perceives having the opportunity to bid farewell to the people around him as something good and wanted to make the best out of the remaining days of his life. For instance, Morrie even had a “living funeral” in which he himself who is about to die, participates in his own funeral. The close people who attended in Morrie’s “living funeral” all laughed and cried as they reminisce their experiences with Morrie, stressing how Morrie has touched each of their individual lives. What is very heart-warming and essential in the movie “Tuesdays with Morrie” that reflects Morrie’s outlook on death, and most importantly on life, is his interview sessions with his former close and favorite college student named Mitch. This is because Mitch wanted to preserve his memories with Morrie, he asked Morrie to tape record their interview sessions every Tuesdays revolving on fundamental questions about life. In response, Morrie happily agreed with the favor Mitch was asking him. Morrie wanted to share his life and experiences to Mitch in the light of teaching Mitch about life lessons on how one should appreciate the beauty of life and how to live it to the fullest. On one of the Tuesday interview sessions, the topic centered on death. Morrie pointed out one of man’s weakest points in life which is their reluctance to believe and think about that they are going to die someday. Morrie tells Mitch that “once one learns how to die, they learn how to live.” Morrie discusses that if people believe that their lives could be possibly taken away from them at any time or at a spur of the moment, each person would have lived their lives differently. Each person would have make the best out of his everyday existence as if it were the last. This is why Morrie says that we must be prepared and learn how to die before we can learn how to live. When Morrie further elaborates on how one can prepare for his death, he says: “Every day, one must ask the bird on his shoulder if that day is the day he will die.” This substantial advice of Morrie indicates his acceptance that his life will almost come to an end. Morrie wants every person on earth to always have this bird on their shoulder, whether they are young or old. By accepting one’s possibility of dying, this would enflame a person to appreciate the value of everyday life for a limited period of time. One must make the most of every moment in his life on doing things that would truly make him happy and things he would not regret until the day comes that the bird would eventually sing its last song. Another life lesson Morrie shares is: “Death ends a life, not a relationship.” I believe Morrie is trying to say that although one already passed away, the relationship between people would still last through time. This is because the person would still be in our hearts and every moment we shared with them continues to live. This could be supported by what Morrie said: “remember the feeling of love we had, we can die without ever going away. All the love you created is still there.” Truly, death should be seen as something good because our acceptance of death enables us to make the best out of every minute in our lives. At the same time, death enables us to be capable of doing transcendent things such as memories, relationships, and feelings such as love towards others, which would never cease to exist even though we would someday leave this material world.

2. Proof that Morrie has a spirit based from his experience was when he shared to Mitch on his views on spirituality. When Morrie explains spirituality, he says: “You think it’s touchy feely stuff. Even I don’t know what ‘spiritual development’ really means. But I do know we are deficient in some way. We are too involved in materialistic things, and they don’t satisfy us. The loving relationships we have, the universe around us, we take these for granted.” According to Morrie, although he could not clearly define spiritual development, he knows that it is the contrary of materialism. Morrie explains that he has observed man is “deficient” in some way when it comes to spirituality. This is because man has a tendency to prioritize material things in his life that don’t “satisfy” us. These material things would not truly provide lasting satisfaction and happiness to us because these material things act as sources of temporary happiness here on earth. As what Morrie said, we should not take for granted the loving relationships and the universe we have around us because these are the things that would satisfy us and truly make us happy. We should learn to value our relationships with other people and appreciate the beauty of how the universe was created that provides the things we needed to survive and serve as means for us to acquire perfection in life. Through these things, we actually do things that could transcend through time and signify the presence of “spirit” within us as human persons. By activating the capability of our spirit to for us to do spiritual things, we become more human.

3. Although we all have the same beginning and the same end, we are different because each one of us has the free will to act in various ways towards perfection given the temporality of life on earth. What is significant is the individual decisions and choices we make in our everyday lives that would cultivate us as a person. We are different in the sense that we have different ways or means to make our lives meaningful. As we live, we undergo the process of self-realization that enables us to become more individualized. In the beginning or when we are born, we are not automatically capable of acquiring talents and skills. But as we grow, we continually learn how to embrace more and strengthen our capabilities. Another factor that differentiates each one of us is free action. Free action causes a person to either work towards or stray away from his goal in life: self-perfection. In working towards self-perfection, a person should have self-realization on his potentialities as a person and concretize it in order to attain excellence in life.

4. In Morrie’s statement “We all walk around as if we’re sleepwalking, We really don’t experience the world fully, because we’re half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do.”, he means that as persons, we are capable of doing a wide array of possibilities yet we become unconscious of tapping these capabilities and would rather focus on doing the cyclical practical things we have to do. This means that we do not experience the world because we become blind in appreciating the beauty of the world we live in and on what more we can do to make life meaningful. This is because we are more conscious on paying more attention and are trapped with our routinely activities that provides us with temporary satisfaction. For example, if we spend most of our time in work rather than sparing some time for us to bond with our families, hang out with friends, learn a new sports, or join a charity or environmental organization, we actually act like as if we are “sleepwalking”. We could clearly depict the huge trade off a person gets if he only focuses on the “automatic” routines he has to do rather than what he “can do”. We should learn how to open our eyes and see the realm of possibilities we could towards achieving self-perfection in life.

5. If I have 24 hours left to live, I would spend my time with the most important persons in my life and doing things I love. I would want to spend my last 24 hours in my beloved hometown, Iloilo. First, I’ll start my day watching the sunrise while I am sitting down at the terrace of our house. Afterwards, I’ll go to the 6 AM morning mass at St. Clement’s Church, the church I always attend mass, together with my family. Upon returning home, I would play with my two dogs, Smiley and Snow White, and cuddle them in bed then take them for a walk in front of our house. I would then have breakfast together with my mom, my dad, my sister, and my two grandmothers at home, eating my favorite breakfast: Spanish sardines in corn oil, Brazilian-styled corned beef, and hardboiled egg together with fried rice and pineapple juice. Next, I would visit Montessori International School, Colegio de las Hijas de Jesus, Iloilo National High School-Special Science Class which are my pre-school, elementary school, and high school in Iloilo respectively. I would want to spare at least two hours in visiting my previous schools, I would walk through the corridors of my school and have a quick glimpse of my classrooms as I could happily reminisce my memorable growing up years at school, how I met new friends, honed my talents and skills, and excelled academically. I would then visit the house of my vocal coach, where I usually had my series of voice lessons ever since elementary until high school. I would want to spare a few minutes, vocalizing again accompanied by my vocal coach playing the piano then sing the first song I’ve ever mastered since I was in grade 1, “The Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston. Singing is really my passion ever since I was young and it is through singing that I am able to express myself to other people and built my confidence to sing in front of a huge crowd of people at an early age. After having quick voice lessons, I would then have a lunch date with my special someone at my favorite beachfront restaurant called Breakthrough. There, we would eat variety of delicious seafood such as oysters, shrimps, scallops, catfish and the Iloilo native chicken as well. After eating lunch, me and my special someone would walk along the beach in barefoot while holding each other’s hands as we talk about the rollercoaster relationship we had, how it started from friendship up to the funny times, romantic moments, fights and misunderstandings and on how we remained strong despite the ups and downs in our relationship. The next thing I would do in the early afternoon is to watch a romantic comedy movie with my special someone. Afterwards, I would go to Plazuela and spend time with my best friend, Andrea. We would both stroll around Plazuela, jumping from one boutique to another. I would then meet my mom and sister at SM City Iloilo and have a shopping spree of clothes, especially dresses, in my favorite shops. After shopping, I, my sister, and my mom would then have an hour and a half Thai fully body massage at Nuat Thai spa. We would then have an early dinner at Sarabia Manor Hotel dinner buffet together with my dad, my grandmothers, and special someone. After dinner, I would want us all to watch the Audio Visual Presentation (AVP) I had during my debut which shows pictures of me since I was born until now that I am in college. Afterwards, I, my family, and my special someone would together walk at Esplanade, a long street specifically designed only for people to walk with no vehicles allowed to enter, which faces the Iloilo River. After the long walk, I would give a big hug to my special someone and give him my diary of our everyday experiences together starting in college with the selfies and pictures we had together as we bid farewell. Upon arriving home, I would watch my favorite Disney movie “Frozen” together with my family. I would also give my favorite big pink teddy bear named “Celestine” to my only sister, Stephanie, which my dad gave to me on one of my birthdays and is very sentimental to me. I would tell my sister that if ever she misses me or feels sad and upset, she could just hug the teddy bear as if I was personally the one hugging and comforting her. After which, I would ask my family to accompany me in the terrace and sit down together as we all observe and look at the stars above the sky and share all of our fun and memorable family travels and experiences together until I could have my last breath. Although I already parted this world, I would make sure to leave a heartwarming letter each to my mom, my dad, my sister, my grandmothers, and to my special someone that I secretly wrote during the early morning as I wait for the sunrise before I start my day. These letters would each contain my personal farewell that expresses my unfathomable and infinite love for each of them. I would also express how grateful and thankful I am because they have made my life very meaningful and how I wanted only the best for them as they continue living their lives while I would be up there, watching over them every day.