Reflective Essay On Personal Identity

It was the fall of 2003, a cool and cloudless California morning. My parents, who dressed me up with a polo shirt and khakis, waited patiently for the school bus as I looked fearfully at what was going to happen. I didn't want to leave my house, nor did I want to go to school. I was a shy boy, who didn't like doing anything but staying at home and minding my own business. When the school bus finally came, I climbed on to the yellow bus and looked outside fearfully as my parents waved goodbye. I was too scared for the first day of school, which helped me shape the person I am today. Throughout my life, I've been to different places, from Oklahoma to a whole different country in a different continent miles away. During that time, I was able to shape myself with the cultural experiences I got through being in a multicultural environment,

My identity has been formed over the course of my life, especially throughout my pre-teen years, in 2012, when my parents decided to split, and my mother went off to live with in Bristol. I have become a completely different person from when I was ten years old, because of the people in my life, such as my teachers, my parents, and my friends. I feel as though I have become a more well-rounded person, because of my experiences.

Since coming to America, I have moved to an ample amount of places because my father’s job concerns. I changed school frequently and in each new school I was never greeted with a warm welcome. With one glance my classmates saw I was different from them. I was often bullied and teased because of my racial difference from my classmates, from these experiences I became a quiet and docile girl. This way I thought I would not get in anyone’s way. I had closed up in the world in front of me; I never expressed my own opinions and always agreed with the majority. However secretly inside of me, I was frustrated not being able to express myself and yet I was unable to change. I craved to be what I was in the inside to be on the outside. Still by

Identity is an essential necessity for humans to demonstrate the distinct individual. A person’s identity may take time to develope as the person acquires new interests, influences, and comprehension of the surrounding people. Authors such as Adrienne Rich and Gloria Anzaldua write about the struggles persistent in identity. Rich is identified by her gender and race by other people, while Anzaldua is defined as to what a Mexican American women should be. As a Mexican American, Amelia Mendoza, my best friend, encounters the strains of identity.

Leaving high school I was consistently in the majority: I co-captained my basketball team and was always welcome to play. In my Bronx experience overall, I often felt racist, close-minded, and self-centered because of the reactions that I was having internally with this new environment. And even more I felt ashamed for this. I quickly wanted to escape back to Ann Arbor to be back in the majority, but I didn’t want anybody to feel bad for me. I knew that what I was thinking was mostly wrong, but I also felt it was human. Large paradigm shifts in one’s life often come with large sentiments, both good and bad. Also, I felt that my experience in the Bronx became easier and easier as I integrated and adjusted. As the shock to my system eased my feelings eased, too. I eventually began to feel extremely connected to the Bronx, the differing cultures, and even my almost omnipresent

There are many factors that shape us into who we are, and who we will become. Some of these factors we can control, while others we cannot. While we are born into many traits of our identities, much of our other behavior is learned. My identity, for example, is “based not only on responses to the question ‘Who am I?’ but also on responses to the question ‘Who am I in relation to others?’” (Allen, 2011, p. 11). My identity and the question of who I am, are both influenced by many aspects of my life, including my hometown, my family, my friends, and my beliefs and moral values.

For many years, my identity was fluid and varied on how I was perceived socially and physically. There are various characteristics that attribute to my identity; I am a Latina, I am a woman, and I also have a physical limitation.

Throughout my life, certain identities have remained consist. And these identities have come to shape my perspectives and my needs and wants within American culture. Typically, my social

It's quite astonishing to believe just a few years ago I was not content with my heritage, my culture. All throughout elementary school I remember being teased about the way I dressed, the way I acted, the way I didn't celebrate certain holidays, and the way that I brought some weird mysterious food to lunch every day. It is improbable to think I detached myself from my culture so completely. I just wanted to fit in. In elementary school I started to Watch less Bollywood movies, to bring a normal sandwich for lunch every day; but despite this I still didn't fit in. During junior high tried something different, I tried to appear as though I was white not brown. I would use heavy coats of foundation two shades to like intended as a mask, a mask

To be an American is to have traits of freedom the thing that the founding fathers counted on is to have the will to speak freely and to have the will of religion in the constitution it say that every citizen should have life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This impacts and brings everyone from different places to help create a society that is free. The founding fathers also counted for the people to speak for what is right. The reason is because this helps out on what the people want instead of the government wants this goes to show that the people matter and that is what makes a person happy and also makes a person feel like they have the pursuit to be happy.

Over the years, I have attended many different schools, and have met many new, interesting people. Due to this, I have had to adapt to many new environments in Pennsylvania, and Colorado. At first, I often struggled with fitting in, while continuing to maintain my unique identity. However, practice makes perfect, and through the years, I have realized that all you need to do “fit in” is be yourself. This realization has given me much confidence in tackling problems that have arisen during my life, and has instilled the belief in me that anything is possible.

I was looking for who I was for a very long time, while growing up. As a child I wasn’t able to fit in anywhere. I wasn’t hispanic enough for the hispanic, and I wasn’t black enough for the black kids. As a kid that hit to my heart. I had transferred 10 different times before 6th grade, and every time I transferred it as the same thing. One specific moment would that I can remember as if it happened yesterday. I was sitting at my desk waiting for free time in small, hot classroom on the second floor. It was my first school year out of ESL classes. I was always the shy kid because of that I was always the target, you can say. As I said I was twiddling my thumbs anxious for free time. As I left to free time, I went to play and the “leader” told

At the age of 13, my mother moved myself, and my family to the quiet, clean, and quaint, upstate New York. This was difficult for me, as I moved away from all my family who continued to reside in New York City. During this time, I was the perfect of example of Erickson’s Identity VS Identity Confusion stage, as I spent a lot of time hanging out with different peer groups trying to figure out where I fit best (“Through the life stages in counseling”, n.d.). I did not realize how much I desired to fit in until I had gone through my first year of college and noticed I had been bullied a lot. As I began to pick up the pick up the pieces, I decided to love me for whom I truly am and what I have to offer. In this profound epiphany, I decided to continue and

When a person reflects on their childhood, they often remember it filled with events that reflect comfort and delight. My childhood was unique in the aspect that I was immersed in a culture that was different than my own. I was a Latina growing up in a predominantly Asian community, where I was surrounded by a culture that was foreign to the one I was exposed to at home. I did not think much of this until I grew older and began to notice slight differences between the lives of my friends in comparison to my own. Although we had grown up together, I began to notice there was times where people begin to doubt my academic abilities. People underestimated what I could academically achieve simply because I was Latina. I came to realize overtime that I could not change who I was, despite how difficult

I’m native American someone who is indigenous to north America. I came to this identity at young age because both my parent practice our traditional ways and culture beliefs. My identity to me is very important because it plays profound impact for shaping me. It native cultural we do a lot of ceremony’s and I took part in at young age. To Native people our traditions is very sacred thing to us and I’ve always felt that way. I remember witnessing a ceremony around 7 or 8, we went south Dakota to attend sun dance. It ceremony where you don’t eat or drink for four days and you offer of your flesh by tying rope to a tree and you piece little wood stakes on each side of your chest and you lean back until the stakes are rip out of your chest. After that you do your back by dragging 7 buffalo skulls across the ground until they rip out of skin. Seeing never bother to me but it was very powerful thing to see and I think that when I started to get into my heritage. After that I learn how to dance, sing traditional songs and learn from elder on how to make native flutes. They’re was powerful experience I had in 8th grade that to me made taught me prejudice can happen from any color person and I think that when society taught me who I am. I was harassed by Latino kid in class and I did something to piss him off and his response was “go back to your home land” I was furious to hear this so I punch him in face. After 8th grade I left Sonoma county and went to boarding school for only