Who am I?

Self Identity has to do with your upbringing, moral standpoint, attitude, beliefs, environment, etc. It is amazing that when it comes down to it, you do not have as much control of who you are as much as you think you do. As people we are thrown into certain environments, certain schools, certain religious practices all chosen by our parents or whoever raises us. The foundation of the environments, schools, teams, and religion we are exposed to will have a huge effect on whom we will be for the rest of our lives. I went to a low-income high school and was exposed to a diverse crowd of students. I have always gone to public school and have always had a diverse group of friends. My whole family is catholic and as a baby I was baptized catholic. When i was 7 I made my first communion in the catholic church and when I was 17 I was confirmed by the catholic church. I am now 20 years old and still stand faithful to my religion but I realize that the Catholic religion is the only religion I am familiar with and I haven’t taken the time into exploring other religions. I feel like my whole life would be different if my parents raised me to be Buddhist or any other religion or maybe just not make religion apart of my life at all. Another thing we talked about in class was about perception. Perception is how you see yourself as a person and how others see you. When I think of myself I feel as if I am a hardworking, smart, and outgoing girl that loves life. When I think of myself I don’t think about my race or what I look like, I just mainly think about my attributes of personality. After today’s discussion in class I realized that others heavily judge and make up a persona of you by what race you seem to be and how you carry yourself as well. Many people think that I am a white girl so when people look at me they probably think that my family is wealthy and that I get everything handed to me on a silver platter. It is the sad truth that when people think you are Caucasian, you get treated better than if you were to look Mexican or have an accent. I was raised in the United States and do not have a Spanish accent because in school I learned to speak, read, and write in English. I feel like I am blessed to be an English speaker because I feel like it helped me get a job, do well in school, and overall communicate better with the public. However, it bothers me how people judge me based on what race I look because I am not white, in fact I am proud to be Mexican/American and I do speak Spanish and I feel that people of my race should be treated with the same respect as I do.