My Story — Pt. 1 (Patreon)

The album has been uploaded and set for release. Now we’re looking for venues to launch it on September 3, 2022.

Before this drops, I want everyone here to know the true heart behind my music. I don’t keep this a secret.

The story of the prodigal son is one that speaks to me personally. To help you understand why, let me share my story.

I grew up in a religious family. Ever since I was 2 years old, my parents brought me to church. I knew no other life outside of the church. What’s more, I was homeschooled using a religious curriculum until high school. This is information I rarely volunteer, but I’m slowly owning it as part of my story. Even in the first half of college, my life revolved around church. I knew no other life outside of church.

This religious upbringing had its pros and cons. I’ll mention the pros first. One pro is that being isolated from the rest of the world, I got to develop a way of thinking and mentality that was entirely my own, uninfluenced by any peers. In other words, may sarili akong mundo. HAHA. But seriously, I’m thankful to have developed an outsider perspective from an early age, because this helps me write the way I do.

Another huge pro to my being homeschooled is the time I had to develop my writing and music. I also had the freedom to learn whatever I wanted to learn. A con that turned out to be a pro is that I never had teachers until college. This means I had to learn everything by myself from Grade 1 to 4th year high school by reading books. This handicap helped me develop a love for books, for they were my only teachers. This love for books proved to be valuable in a place like UP Diliman, where I eventually went to college.

The biggest pro to my religious background is the connections I got to form. It’s in church that I met my best friend, Bryant Ayes, when were in grade 4. I also remember seeing Joric around growing up, though we never interacted until he first sessioned for us and we became The Ridleys. In college, I met Jan when he auditioned for the music ministry, and I was the music head in charge of organizing bands for Friday church services. Funnily enough, I never sang for church in those early college days. I was convinced that I had no voice, and made way for other singers by playing acoustic guitar in the background. But I digress.

Church was where I met the best people — the good batch — but it’s also where I met the ones who hurt me the most — the bad batch. Without giving too many details, it was in church that I met the worst hypocrites, the most insensitive adults, and the most judgmental youth.

To illustrate this a bit more, let me share an example. I previously mentioned that I was the music head for my college youth ministry. That responsibility was heavy for a homeschooler adjusting to “real world” college life. One of the main cons of my upbringing. Though I survived (and even excelled) in college, it wasn’t without difficulty. I worked double time to catch up with my classmates, whom I had a difficult time relating with. While I got high marks for my writing, I always fumbled at recitation and presentation. It was in college that I realized I had massive stage fright. What’s more, I realized early on that Psychology was not the right course for me, though I finished all four years and even passed the board exams to at the request of my parents. Because of these stressful adjustments, I lost sleep, skipped meals, and felt a mix of isolation and depression that I couldn’t explain.

When I tried explaining this to my leaders in church, I did so thinking they would understand me. I was the church music head, and they were my teammates, my buddies, my comrades. What’s more, growing up in church, I was taught that these people were my “family,” my “home.” So I cried in front of them and expressed my frustrations. I poured out my whole heart to them.

Their response? “Kaya mo yan, Benny. You’re doing a good job. Oo nga pala, sino tutugtog sa susunod na series? Ikaw a bahala dun a.” A pat on the back, and they moved on with their ministry. I was stunned by the lack of care from people whom I thought were my brothers, confused by the lack of love and concern from a place I called home. They didn’t care about me; they only needed me. They didn’t see me as a “soul to care for,” but as a useful student volunteer.

Because of this hurt, I left the youth ministry for a time. I didn’t hate them. I didn’t plan on leaving forever. I just needed a break. Anyway, I needed that extra time to study and work on myself, especially in the area of relating with people and presenting myself in public. For the first time in my college life, in the first half of my third year, I spent a lot of time away from church. I asked my leaders to appoint someone else to head the music ministry while I focused on my studies. I didn’t open up to them about how they hurt me, because I thought it wasn’t necessary.

A few months pass. After that time of rest, I decided returned to church again, just to say, “Hi guys. I’m still alive. I missed you.” I wanted to come back not as a member of the team, not as a church leader, but as a “lost soul” who needed some care. Wasn’t that the purpose of the church youth ministry? To care for people like me? So I went back, hoping to be greeted with smiles and hugs from the people I called brothers. Instead, a number of them looked at me with a subtle hostility I could never forget. The first person who greeted me said, “Uy Benny, you’re back. Balita ko hindi ka na raw Kristyano a.”

How does one express “???” in real life? Because that was my reaction to that “brother” of mine. I didn’t know how to respond. I was ready to brush it off as a friendly joke, but throughout that day, people continued to ignore me. Why would they talk to me? I had no use to them anymore. There was a new music head and better instrumentalists.

After the church youth service, everyone went their own way. No one bothered to invite me or ask me how I was. Bryant belonged to another satellite of the youth ministry, and Jan was nowhere to be seen. I was in the midst of these rich, powerful, and eloquent church kids from private schools who had no concern for nobodies like me. The message was loud and clear.

At that moment, I decided to leave church for good. I felt so much hate for everyone in that group. I felt so much hurt.I lost all love for this “family” and vowed never to return to this false “home.” I wrote a lot of songs along the way to express my frustration. Prodigal’s Anthem was the first of them.

In all this, my high school best friend, Bryant, was there for me every step of the way. Surprisingly, in those days, Jan became evem more close. He became my college best friend who never left my side and always jammed with me in those dark moments.

I’ll end the story here. I’m at Gino’s Pizza right now, buying pizza for my younger cousins who are at home. Order is almost here.

But the story doesn’t end here. Stick around for part 2. It has a lot to do with finding answers, making sense of this past experience, forgiving and reconciling with the people who hurt me, and how all that molded me into the person I am today. Oh, I’ll also talk about how The Ridleys started.

Bye for now!