Reflective Essay: Perception of My Identity

Imagine having to move far away from a familiar place at the commencement of your senior year. That is exactly what I had to do the summer before I began my senior year of high school in Massachusetts. My father had gotten a job at Cono Christian School in Walker, Iowa. As a result my mother, my father, the horses, and I packed up and moved to Iowa. I had to leave a place I had called home for eleven years, my older brother and sister, and friends I had known for a little over a decade. Massachusetts was my home, and where I had developed the roots to my personal identity. I knew little about my identity before I came to Iowa. However, after the completion of my senior year, I learned a lot about who I am, and how I operate. Moving to Iowa was the hardest thing I ever had to do, but my personal identity is no longer a foundation, it is a two-story house.

When I arrived in Iowa, I was simply disoriented and in denial. I could not believe I had to move to the state that is most often forgotten when naming all fifty states. The people around me were different, and much more friendly than I was used to. I felt out of place and did not know how to describe myself to people. All I knew about myself was that I love horses, and everything that goes with it. I did not have personal views on political issues or opinions about certain subjects. In my one-track mind all I could express about my identity was my love for horses. I felt as though I couldn’t identify myself with my new home. My home in Massachusetts was all that crossed my mind, and I was not willing to give that up and move forward.

Being stuck in my denial was not helping my foundational identity grow into the two-story house it is now. I was constantly thinking of what I used to have, and that the only thing I could relate with were my horses. No one seemed to notice that I was stuck in a snowdrift, until one day a new friend of mine made an eye opening comment. She told me that, “if I was going to move forward, I was going to have to accept the fact that I was in Iowa.” This comment went into my ears and lodged itself in my cerebellum. I pondered what she said, and then took action. Quickly I began to make many friends, I joined the volleyball team, made the tour choir, and progressed in my classes. I even developed a best friend relationship with a girl who helped me adjust to my new home. Ironically, she was from Massachusetts as well. She helped me discover that life exists in more than one place, and no matter where I live I have to be all that I can be.

After, I had made a place for myself in my new school and home, it did not go unnoticed. Many of my teachers told me how much I had grown, and developed my personality. I developed and organized my views, tried new things, and learned how to adapt and embrace change. I did not even give up on horses, they are the foundation of my identity, and I had build on them. Being in Iowa, helped me to figure out that I am laid back, and am unconsciously humorous. Those new developed characteristics facilitated my transition to college. They even helped me to figure out that horses are not the only things that I am good at. This huge change and uprooting of my home built on my identity. I am now stronger and daily challenges do not throw me off track.

My identity is still building, but it is no longer a foundation. I feel it has a strong foundation, but there is so much more to it now than there ever was before. Sometimes the hardest things that must be done do not damage a person’s identity. Instead they only make it stronger.