For most times, I've always considered myself a disgrace. When you're suffering from anxiety and depression at the same time, such conclusion is never difficult to arrive at. I mean, it happens. I feel so lacking, so much like a burden to everyone I work with. Constant validations are a necessity and the paradox of my personality always demand to be felt.

It sounds like I'm so fucked up, but yes, I am.

But during times when life decides to shed some light on my darkest days, I just find myself feeling so accomplished. And then I just tell myself: "Hey, you're actually doing well."

For many, it seems so out of my character; but it has turned into a lifestyle - a major part of who I really am - from being a mere deviation from who I used to be. Fourteen years ago, I have started as an awkward, soul-searching teenager in a youth group in our parish until I became a photographer, a layout artist, an advocate of church cultural heritage, and then eventually appointed (unbelievably) as the head of a commission with sixteen organizations under its umbrella. That equates to almost 800 persons - of all ages - under my authority, my responsibility.

Whoever would think and say that it is easy deserves a good punch in the gut. The current parish administration had been spearheading a complete upgrade in the community since three years ago. And as we're dealing with traditional parishioners who have been so used to the olden ways, instigating necessary changes that would allow us all to keep up with the times, is totally daunting.

With this said, it isn't a question why I have expressed a million times before that I want to quit. Up until now, I am so convinced that the only way to get to live the life I've always wanted - free and self-serving - is to lose something I've always lived with: the church.