Maxene Magalona remembered her late father, Francis Magalona, also known as Francis M, on his birthday today, October 4. She took to social media to share the most important life lessons she learned from him.
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In a lengthy post, she talked about how her father taught them to always be kind and respectful to everyone. Maxene emphasized that Francis M reminded her not to let anything or anyone stop her from making her dreams come true.
Here are the eight life lessons she shared from the rap icon:
1. Treat everyone equally with respect. He didn’t discriminate against others and spoke to the people around him respectfully no matter what background they come from. He even said, “It doesn’t matter if you are the CEO or the janitor of a company—we all shit the same.” 😅
2. Don’t judge other people’s life choices. He always used to say, “walang basagan ng trip” (loosely translated: bitch, don’t kill my vibe) 🤣
3. Being a celebrity doesn’t make you more important than others. He said to me, “Our work is just our means of living. It doesn’t mean that just because we appear on television, it makes us better or higher than others.”
4. Work on becoming an instrument of peace. He was named after St. Francis of Assisi who was one of the most well-known peacemakers in history with a prayer that goes, “Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.” My Pop used his platform to advocate for peace and even wrote a song called “Peace on Earth” 🥹
5. Love your family to the best of your ability. Admittedly, he was not perfect as he would unconsciously project his own traumas on to us when he was much younger which was understandable given that he had us at the age of 21 😳 Despite his shortcomings as a father, I could always feel that his love for us was very deep and genuine. He was my role model for love.
6. Never let anything or anyone stop you from making your dreams come true. Papa was a true artist. He wasn’t just a musician—he was also an actor, a breakdancer, TV host, photographer, music video director, painter and pizza baker! He even shot photos for the Camera Club of The Philippines while battling cancer. His life truly was one big Happy Battle.
7. Never trade your authenticity for approval. He was always his genuine and authentic self—simple, real, down to earth and kind despite his iconic status. He expressed his soul fearlessly and did not give a rat’s ass about what people thought of him 😎
8. Let go and let God. This was one of the things he said to me when I was asking him for advice 🙏🏼”
In a separate Instagram post, Maxene penned a loving letter to her father along with an old video clip of her interview with him in 1996 for the TV show 5&UP.
“To celebrate what would have been Papa’s 59th birthday, here is a short snippet from my interview with him back in 1996 for 5&Up, an educational TV show for young adults. In this episode, we featured Papa’s work as a musician and followed him around while he was working on his album “Happy Battle,'” she captioned.
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The 36-year-old also posted a video of her vibing to Francis M’s hit 3 Stars & A Sun.
Dubbed as “Master Rapper,” Francis M contributed a lot to the local music scene with his meaningful songs, such as Mga Kababayan, Kaleidoscope World, Tayo’y Mga Pinoy, and Ito Ang Gusto Ko!.
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In March 2009, he passed away due to leukemia.
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