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(1) Title
(2) Message
(3) Events -> 4 Events
(4) Author
(5) Portrayal of The World
(6) Relevance to The World
(7) Personal Thoughts

(Pages were cited for reference.)

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Personally, I believe that this article is excellent since it illustrates the characteristics of lying through the persona's real-life actions and experiences. Despite having to face the unpleasant aspects of reality, through the text, I learned that lying should never be done. Additionally, I can relate to this text since I, myself, have lied countless amount of times to my parents, friends, and teachers to make my awful self feel better, and of course, it never ends well. This essay made me reminisce about my own past experiences with lying, and I’m happy that I got to understand the pros and cons of lying, realize how the world actually works, and identify how bad of an act lying is. In conclusion, never lie to yourself for you know the whole truth.

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This essay is very relevant to our world today because, as we all know, lying has been a part of everyone’s reality, and it’s really inevitable for people to not lie, especially with how the world works. It’s unfair. It is a deliberate choice of habit that people make in order to achieve their own satisfaction in this world full of problems. With that said, this essay shows a good reflection on why lying is just an escape from one’s reality (p. 3)

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The world is unfair, and when that reality hits you, seeing the ugly truth will make you want to live a different life. As a result, "LYING" was born. Nowadays, many people see lying as something that is beneficial and inconsequential when, in fact, it’s actually the other way around. You can lie to anyone but yourself. Thus, the consequences of lying will always come back to you, in different types or forms. Nevertheless, it's sad to see that most people choose to lie to cover up the sad reality behind them, which is mostly brought on by fear and shame (p. 2).

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Based on the essay, I can say that the author is realistic, reflective, and direct due to his writing style, which makes this personal essay unbiased. Their initial tone was objective and humorous until the sudden switch to a sentimental tone at the end. Lastly, the author used a first-person point of view, by using the pronoun "I", in reiterating the events to allow the readers to understand the story from the persona's own thoughts.

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When she discovered her mother's diary, she was confronted with reality. Only a few pages struck a spot in her heart. That’s when she knew how tough her mother’s life was. Reading about the struggles and difficulties her mother went through was excruciating for someone who has been escaping from their own reality. Hence, it made her think about stopping lying since reading the diary made her lose sight of the beauty in lying (p. 3).

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"The fix to a complicated problem is a simple solution." Lying was the persona's simple solution because it would simplify things for her and allow her to better understand her life. In addition to that, lying was an escape from reality to fill in the gaps with joy and happiness. Thus, she found comfort in doing it since it solved most of her existential childhood problems at that time. That’s why stopping to lie is similar to ending her childhood (p. 2-3).

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In reality, her life is not so perfect and not so great. There are nights where she solitarily waits for her mother to return home, and what’s keeping her company is watching cats play with empty beer bottles, hearing the sound of a tricycle’s engine, and seeing the flickering Meralco lamppost (p. 2). Unfortunately, those were the times when it was the loneliest and quietest for her, and she wished that it would already be daytime just so she could live her "actual" life.

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In the story, the character realized that she wouldn’t feel guilty about lying. Therefore, she grew up lying. She intentionally excluded "lying" from her list of sins during her first confession; she made up a story to make herself look good; she stole a five-peso bill from her classmate; she lied about being on national television for a swim meet; and lastly, she faked her birthday just so she could be "unique" and wear a different attire for their school mass (p. 1-2). Based on these experiences, it can be inferred that, at a very young age, the persona already deliberately lies to live out this "life" of hers built out of made-up truths to have an out from her actual life.

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First, let’s skim through the events that made me come up with this understanding!

Real-life experiences were used to portray the persona's life. The events were narrated in a fragmented manner and there were also flashbacks included.

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"Lying makes you feel better in the present, but it has no future." This is my main understanding in regards to the essay because, despite the fact that lying gives you a short-term feeling of relief and delight, sooner or later, fear and guilt will eventually overtake those feelings as time passes by. Not only that, it made me realize that nothing good will come out of lying, and it's like a disease that will continue to spread and harm others, and the only cure to stop it is by telling the truth. In short, lying is detrimental to one’s self and society in the long run (p. 4).

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by Christine Ongpin-Montes