From Guilt to Gratitude
By Mei Wen
What I was taught about gratitude was this: I must be thankful because I had things that others didn’t—an education, a family, a roof over my head, food—and that I didn’t have things that others had—illness, starvation, a home destroyed by war or calamity. This never sat well with me. And that’s probably why some people have called me picky, whiny, or hard to please.
To be fair to those people, I did want things to be a certain way. Years ago, in my teens, I wanted a functional family. To be seen and heard by the people I loved. To be okay with everything about myself. As time passed, the things I wanted didn’t involve just me anymore. Today, I wish for liberation and individual freedom. I wish that people who want to live closer to nature and each other could easily do so, and they could all live regeneratively and resiliently. I wish systems that alienated people and stripped them of their dignity no longer existed. How I wish we made homes of each other, that this was easy.
To help us acquire more German words in a fun and organic way, my husband and I decided a few weeks ago to watch a German dub of Puss in Boots: The Last Wish fifty times. We got the idea from the YouTube channel Days and Words, whose creator, Lamont McLeod, learned Spanish by watching a dubbed Into the Spider-Verse fifty times.
We chose Puss in Boots: The Last Wish because we loved it when we saw it in early 2023. And for something that we were going to watch fifty times, the movie also had to be mostly feel-good. Puss in Boots 2 fits the bill for having a feel-good story that handles family issues, trauma, and mortality beautifully, and an animation style that was, at pivotal moments, raw and reminiscent of comics. The German version also has a pretty clear dub, without a lot of sound effects or music overpowering the dialogue.
As of this writing, we’re on our sixth rewatch. And a character has been grabbing my attention: one of the antagonists, Jack Horner. In the film, Jack Horner wants to get to the magical Wishing Star, so that he can wish for the one thing that would allegedly make him happy: to have all the magic in the world for himself. In his quest to the Wishing Star, he’s joined by Dreamworks’s version of Jiminy Cricket, who serves as the conscience. They have a conversation that made me face-palm before but unsettles me now.
“Tell me about your childhood,” says the Cricket.
“You know, I never had much as a kid,” Jack Horner sighs. “Just loving parents, stability, and a mansion. And a thriving baked goods enterprise for me to inherit. Useless crap like that.”
I barely have what Jack Horner has. And I don’t wish to possess magic or power. But why does it feel that there’s an ungrateful Jack Horner in me—that I was—or am—just like him? How are his criteria for happiness different from mine? How do I know that I will stop wanting once I have any or all of my wishes? In this context, having conditions, regardless of what they are, certainly makes appreciating what one has quite difficult.
I spent a good portion of last year in a flurry of guilt and anxiety. I found it unfair that I, along with my cat, was able to leave a country whose politics I disagreed with, when other people who also wanted to leave couldn’t. The last straw for me was two years of militant COVID lockdowns, from which sprang armed men and checkpoints at nearly every crossroad of my neighborhood; mass layoffs and closures; seething uncertainty, grief, and fear; and claustrophobia and a slew of mental health issues from being stuck at home with a big family. As if those weren’t enough, a former-dictator’s son later won the presidency.
The migration paperwork was dizzying and tedious, not to mention infuriating, as it usually is for those in the “Third World” going to the “First World.” To exit the Philippines, I had to prove my marriage was out of love, not for a visa, and that I had a clean police record. I changed my family name and updated my IDs—a whole other long process—because this was the sort of proof of love any bureaucracy would understand and accept. And because I was taking my cat with me, he had requirements to fulfill too, like passing health tests from an EU-approved lab (the nearest one was all the way in Australia) just to make sure his rabies vaccine was working. Because, you know, rabies vaccines might not work in a “Third Country.”
And then I felt awful that I wasn’t adapting fast enough in my new home. I am still far from having a casual conversation in standard German, let alone Swiss German. I don’t know if I’ve made any friends—I don’t think the people whose gardens or farms I labored on for a few days would consider me a friend, and I don’t think some of my in-laws here like me much. The Facebook group for Filipinos in Switzerland is full of spam. The group for expats is full of people who seem to take no issue belittling non-Europeans.
For the first few months since my arrival, I tried to keep joy at a distance. Joy did leap at me on some days—when my husband and I hiked, stood barefoot on the grass, petted our neighbor’s cat, or when I wrote something. Nevertheless, I didn’t know what right I had to be happy.
My favorite science fiction is any work that reminds me of the magic of what we have: nature, Earth. I have come to believe that there’s nothing more complex and intricate than nature. And the other “stuff of science fiction” like flying cars, AI, and even state surveillance pale in comparison. To quote artist Jordan Bolton in his comic “Science Fiction”: “When people are living on Mars, driving flying cars and marrying robots, they will read about this ocean, and it will sound like science fiction to them.”
One of my favorite days of the last year was in October, when I was reading Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed outdoors: on a bench, before a lake, under a tree with green and yellow leaves, pigeons and gulls darting about and squawking, and people walking or cycling by. And to complete the scene, I was on a chapter about nature. There, the main character Shevek talks to his partner Takver about their planet’s moon: thriving with life—much like our Earth—but filled with “propertarians” and people who fight wars and kill each other. Again, much like our Earth.
Le Guin wrote:
“It had never occurred to Shevek that life could proliferate so wildly, so exuberantly, that indeed exuberance was perhaps the essential quality of life.”
“…everywhere you looked animals, other creatures, sharing the earth and air with you. You’d feel so much more a part.”
“If you can see a thing whole…it seems that it’s always beautiful. Planets, lives….But close up, a world’s all dirt and rocks. And day to day, life’s a hard job, you get tired, you lose the pattern. You need distance, interval. The way to see how beautiful the earth is, is to see it as the moon. The way to see how beautiful life is, is from the vantage point of death.”
“All you have to do to see life whole is to see it as mortal.”
I highlighted those sections on that October day. I sat still, my spirits lifted, in awe of Le Guin’s words and wisdom as the world thrummed on, proclaiming “Life! Life!” through the birds, the rustling leaves, the fresh air, the undulating waters, the laughter of kids, the chatter of adults.
In July, when my husband and I returned to Switzerland from my brother’s wedding in the Philippines, I had trouble sleeping. At the time and on my lowest days, I lay in bed and wondered, “What if that plane had just crashed?” The flight to Saudi had been turbulent, and I couldn’t fall asleep—all I could do was pray and pray and pray. I don’t remember if I tried to make any deals with God. I remember my body was shaken, that I watched helplessly as the water and tea on my tiny table wobbled and splashed and spilled, while people shrieked and the overhead compartments rattled.
That was the second time I thought I’d die in a plane crash. And living through that flight and emerging from it safely, my general outlook dimmed, as if I was sick of everything. As if everything that came after it was a bonus, or a joke, that I was ambivalent about.
Thinking of the End was how I fell asleep sometimes. It all changed when I began volunteering to do permaculture work in people’s gardens and farms.
I’m not a fan of weeding, especially through poison. But I’m grateful for that almost-autumn day in October when I weeded (by uprooting plants) for the first time. It was the day I saw what was in the soil—that so much life slithered beneath my feet. Earthworms, centipedes, and other crawly creatures. I was touched by their lowliness, their humility as they quietly mixed and aerated the soil, which enabled more life to grow and thrive above them. They blended in, without vibrant colors to draw one’s attention or compel praise.
I don’t know how that experience silenced all my thoughts about dying in a plane crash. But it did. The scholar Tyson Yunkaporta believes that nature can heal us in specific ways. He says in a podcast, “When you’re part of the land and these natural systems, then the land as a sentient system—it gives you what you need from moment to moment.” I don’t know how true that is, though it’s worth noting that I don’t let myself near that death spiral anymore. I’ve since fallen asleep imagining myself lying down on healthy soil with earthworms next to me. That has brought peace.
In 2022, when I began to identify as an anarchist, I experienced high highs and low lows. Accounts of war atrocities and war-adjacent issues, past or present, fictional or real, began to make me cry. I despaired whenever the state had new impositions, when I felt there was no way out of the state, when I thought of how states have been around for centuries, suppressing their citizens or oppressing people they deemed barbaric.
As for the highs, my goodness did I relish stories and even simple scenes about communities, love, hope, or breaking boundaries. Which often also made me cry.
Since finishing The Dispossessed and having worked with the earth in the latter part of last year, I’ve become hopeful. The feeling of hope doesn’t come and go as it did before; it feels rooted in me now. I’ve observed and learned how easily life can spring from anywhere, how every creature has something to offer, how death brings life, and that nature grows and adapts with us—slowly, but it always does.
I doubt that nature will nurse all the anxieties and disappointments of a person. Suffering will continue for everybody. But nature has helped me think in terms of the long game. Nature has always, always rebuilt itself—often with the help of people and other animals that nourish the soil (we are part of the ecosystem, after all). I may not get to live in my dream society, but that doesn’t mean it can’t emerge one day, or that it did not already exist many times over. Variations of these nonstate or autonomous communities did exist: in the fringes, upon mountains and highlands, and across small islands and island groups.
That nature is an important aspect of The Dispossessed makes me giddy. As if Le Guin, a fellow anarchist, is validating my suspicion that dreams and efforts toward one’s ideals are incomplete without nature; that nature is hope, straight up. I realize how one-sided and lacking my anarchism has been—that it was partial toward despair, and wrongfully so.
In the last few chapters of The Dispossessed, an ambassador talks to Shevek about his groundbreaking work: a theory on simultaneous communication across space, which would make not only instant communication possible but also cooperation, freedom, and solidarity among individuals and between worlds. She can’t believe that Shevek would offer his theory for free to the whole galaxy, so she says, “I thought I knew what ‘realism’ was.”
And to that, Shevek replies, “How can you, if you don’t know what hope is?”
Sometime in August, I was missing my brother and his wife, who had spent their honeymoon in Switzerland. I wished what they wished for when vast forests and farms on green rolling hills enthralled them: that we could be farmers here and grow food together and live together. I shared with them what my husband had shared with me before, about permaculture and agroforestry. These practices, unlike mono-crop agriculture, valued all life forms and sought to nurture care and harmony across living things. We let ourselves fantasize about another way for us to belong in this world. But our wish wasn’t possible because of borders and property laws.
I began to reflect on gratitude. My wishes were piling, and I wondered if gratitude would somehow silence all my endless desires for things I barely controlled. How could I give thanks in a way that wasn’t about possession or privilege, in a way that acknowledged that life is suffering, and in many cases, unfair?
I was not a fan of the Catholic perspective, which goes along the lines of, “God gave us His only son, therefore we must give thanks!” It’s so conditional, and in my view, it’s been used to demand something from others, as if they have a debt to pay. So I googled “why be grateful Buddhism” because I’ve resonated more with Buddhist philosophy.
The search engine suggested a video titled “The Power of Gratitude: a Buddhist Story” on the YouTube channel Pure Land Buddhism. The clip told the story of an old man who complained to the Buddha about his sons not taking care of him. The Buddha’s first response was to ask the old man if he was grateful for his walking stick. As I listened to the story, I wasn’t pleased. So far, it still worked around this idea of having, and I really wanted to go beyond possession as a reason for gratitude. Possessions, while tangible, don’t last; they come and go, and focusing on them can lead a person to measure or calculate—to view things superficially or competitively.
I pressed on. I was desperate for answers.
“Constantly say ‘thank you.’ When the time comes, your destiny will change,” says the narrator, quoting the Buddha.
That stood out to me—this possibility of change, this openness. In the story, the old man followed the Buddha’s advice and thanked the things and people that helped him, like his walking stick and his neighbors. He even went as far as thanking his sons who had neglected him and refused to care for him. And that’s when it clicked for me.
I could be thankful for opportunities in which people—or all life forms—could experience and show kindness.
I don’t know if that is the Buddha’s intention or meaning. I just know that when I feel low now, when I consider the hardships people must endure, I can still be grateful. Isn’t kindness the greatest and brightest gift when life seems most bleak? Doesn’t it produce grippy, expansive roots for hope to emerge, grow, and spread?
Perhaps that is how one’s destiny changes.
“Enjoy it.” That’s the advice of one of my good friends before I migrated. I had told her my worries about discrimination, language barriers, and starting a home all over again. It was difficult advice for me to follow because I could barely see any reason for it. Should I be happy because I was living the life that another person could only wish for? Did I owe it to people back home, because wasn’t it ridiculous for me to be unappreciative of my path when I was comfortable?
“What I regret for sure was not to enjoy more my time,” reveals two-time Formula 1 world champion Fernando Alonso in a podcast. Alonso, at 42, is currently the oldest F1 driver on the grid, and he’s still snatching podiums from drivers in their 20s. But his time in the sport is running out. One could easily expect an athlete of Alonso’s stature and age to become reflective now. But I wasn’t expecting his insight.
Alonso further shares, “When I look back to my career, I will see a lot of good things—good friendships and incredible experiences. But I should have enjoyed more. And if I had the opportunity to live my exact life once more, I wouldn’t change anything on my teams or my choices...I will just change to live a little bit more all those moments and try to have more memories from those moments.”
His words allowed me to consider that maybe it was important for me to enjoy my life. Maybe one’s moral obligation to oneself is to enjoy one’s life. To be exuberant in this way.
I’m aware this sounds like #YOLO. But I would argue that enjoying one’s life is deeper than #YOLO. In my experience, people have used #YOLO for trying or gaining new experiences—or even doing crazy things—which could suit a person just fine; no judgments here. I do think enjoying one’s life is more profound, in the sense that one doesn’t need to tick things off a bucket list or collect experiences to make the most of life—that one could be happy or find joy in one’s humble lot.
I’ve seen people criticize Filipinos for being too happy. Always smiling and waving at a camera when a typhoon or landslide has just bulldozed one’s barangay. Granted, there’s a time and place for rage and grief. But who’s to say that these happy, generous people did not or do not rage or grieve? What if these emotions could be companions of joy? Being away from people so warm has made me realize that this joy and the act of smiling are free. Free to do. Free to give. And with lasting impact.
In a society that extracts and extracts from us, isn’t there kindness in sharing one’s joy, in allowing oneself to be happy, in showing that a hard life isn’t the end of the world if no one makes it so? And don’t we all at least try to ease the suffering around us when the opportunity arises? Perhaps that is enough, though it may not seem like it when we are forced to prioritize material goods or possessions. I remember Shevek’s words to the ambassador in The Dispossessed, when he says his theory on simultaneity is “nothing”: “Weigh [the theory] in the balance with the freedom of one single human spirit, and which will weigh heavier? Can you tell? I cannot.”
Despair is a myth that blinds us from kindness and opportunities for kindness.
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish incorporates the proverb that cats have nine lives, and the titular character Puss is down to his last one. He therefore begins to fear death. In the film’s German dub, this fear is translated to “Angst.” And Puss must figure out how to live his last life alongside that Angst. Should he hide and keep safe—retire from his adventures? Or should he wish for more lives upon the magical Wishing Star?
Rewatching the film offers a constant reality check for me: I realize I only have this life. It’s not perfect, but isn’t it good? Not because of what I’ve been “blessed” with or not been “cursed” with, though I suppose one could still bring that up. But for me, it’s good because I’ve been able to experience the kindness of nature and people, and partake in that kindness. And of course, there’s all the endless possibilities and opportunities to be kind to one another.
“From Guilt to Gratitude” by Mei Wen is the 2nd Prize Winner
of love & liberation daily’s Writing Contest #2
Mei Wen is a Chinese Filipino essayist who explores her relationship with herself, her home, nature, and art in her work. She often writes in vignettes to stay true to her tangential way of thinking and highlight our entanglements. Since her recent pieces began containing more of her anarchist politics, and to stop being paranoid about authority figures (or her mom) finding her personal essays online, she picked up a pseudonym. In the same vein, she wishes she wrote fiction instead. Today, her writing has appeared in The Tiger Moth Review, diaCRITICS, Spellbinder, The Lumiere Review, Anak Sastra, The Ekphrastic Review, After the Art, and 11 x 9: Collaborative Poetry from the Philippines and Singapore, among others. She edits Pandan Weekly, a bi-annual zine and email newsletter that delivers hearty writing from Asia and the diaspora. Outside of literature, she enjoys embroidery, film photography, and watching cat reels. She lives in Switzerland with her husband and their cat. Instagram: @houseblessing_
Mei Wen’s picture was taken on the day she gardened and practiced permaculture for the first time — an experience she writes about in her second-prize-winning essay “From Guilt to Gratitude.”
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