Life De Lux

They tell me "kudos to you for working towards being a better person." But really, the fact that I'm able to work towards being who I want to be is a luxury.

Yes, a luxury.

And I would not hesitate to say that which is the truth, or be so shameless as to take all credit for being able to do what I'm doing. I am where I am only because I need not to be in a position to fend for myself. I don't need to be struggling to make a living, to survive. Ask anyone in any of the previous generation (those of the Depression era, for instance) and any of our third world countries -- all 85% of the rest of the world -- if they are going through their hardships "to be a better person," and you will find that they are just barely surviving, let alone focusing their attention on self-improvement.

In other words, I am saying that self-improvement is an elective only for those in the situation with prerequisites of basic human needs fulfilled, at the very least.

Regardless of the fact that none of my family members actually understand what I am doing for myself and are puzzled and baffled by my "being myself," as frustrated as I am with the lack of empathy and understanding, as hurt as I am at times with the consequent remarks I received, I know that this is the price for me to pay -- a small one, at that.

So, no, my working towards being a better person does not essentially make me a "better person," so to speak. All it means is that I am privileged -- and I would not spend a second harboring any illusion that I am destined to be greater than what my family and friends generously enabled me to be.