Staying True To Who You Really Are

     Living in a place where you feel different can be tough. There’s so much going on with your race, you feel judged, different and the need to change. Being a young brown girl in the early segregation days definitely can be hard. At the same time, you want to prove that your race can not stop you from continuing your dreams or thinking about where you belong. In the book “Brown Girl Dreaming” Jacqueline gets through hard times by learning to be herself. Which shows the readers that staying true to yourself can help conquer your struggles.

      This story first shows the reader that comparing yourself to others is not good. Jackie compares herself to her older sister Odella and says she is not as smart as her. Comparing herself to someone older will not help Jackie learn, she feels let down by this and thinks she won’t ever be as good as her sister.  This helps readers see that you are supposed to love who you are and not try to be like someone else. For example, pushing yourself to be like someone else can cause you to forget who you really are. It causes you to feel perplexed and confused about yourself.  Jackie feels pressured to be like Odella. All her teachers want her to be like Odella. “Then they nod slowly, over and over again, call me Odella… Wait for me to stand before class, easily reading words even high school students stumble over. And keep waiting. And waiting”. Jackie feels like she has to follow her sister’s footstep and be as bright as her, she’s always stuck in her shadow.

      In addition, it is also important to stay true to your religion and believe in what you believe in. Jackie and her family are really religious, they are  jehovah’s Witnesses. They not can not celebrate halloween, christmas or birthdays unlike other kids in Jackie’s class. She does have a friend in her class who is also strictly religious, but they tend to get left out of the birthday party's they have in their classes. This may seem really unfair and different to Jackie because many other kids celebrate those holidays unlike her. Sometimes many religions can be tough because you feel different and ridiculed by others, but staying true to your religion is important, it can show respect towards yourself and your family.

    Lastly, everyone has challenges to face. Jacqueline has a hard time with words at first. “When I read, the words twist twirl across the page. When they settle, it is too late. The class has already moved on”. At first it shows readers that something can seem very difficult to you but then you learn how to conquer it because it takes time and practice. Jackie learned to become a  better reader as she grew up because she believed in herself and she dedicated a lot of her time and work to writing, even when a few people did not believe in her.

     I hope many people who are trying to conquer struggles or have a hard time believing in themselves read Brown Girl Dreaming. They can see how similar this book is to real life problems and can guide many people through tough times. Jackie had to be her own person, and she had to find a way to do that even with all her struggles. In the end, she conquers her hard times and the reader can learn that there’s always going to be unfairness and problems in the world, but they’re not impossible to overcome.