8B: Her beloved world

The Common Read that was assigned to the incoming freshmen this year was “My Beloved World” by Sonia Sotomayor. It is a memoir so the entire book is her version of how things occurred in the past. She recounts her life experience and the different hardships that she had to endure growing up, but as you might have already guessed this story has a happy ending. As we all know Sonia goes on to become an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

I really enjoyed this book because I could relate to some of the things Sonia went through. It inspires me to know that even those who start off as less fortunate have the potential to achieve great things. Sonia lived in the projects in New York and beside her disadvantages including her diabetes she was able to get into Princeton University. She continued to work hard way beyond that which explains how she went to Yale for Law school and continued working her way up through the years. Sonia is a great example of deliberate practice because she truly dedicated herself to her dream and continued improving with time. However, she had to sacrifice other things in her life by dedicating herself completely to her job such as her marriage with Kevin. This reflects how sometimes we lose things in the process of trying to accomplish our goals, and how we need to make our priorities clear so that we can continue working towards what we desire most.

Sonia’s memoir is very inspirational and that’s probably the biggest reason why it was chosen to be the Common Read. It shows students that we control our fate and that hard work and dedication ultimately determine how far we can get in life. It gives us hope because Sonia shares that she didn’t start out so well as a student in elementary school but she asked for help from those who knew what they were doing and eventually she found what worked for her and kept working on her weaknesses and improving her study skills. This relates directly to us as incoming freshmen because we have to settle in and find what works for us by asking others and using our resources. Altogether “My Beloved World” is a great story and it helps people realize that if we fight to overcome the challenges and disadvantages that we’re faced with then we can accomplish amazing things in life.

               MY SIX WORD MEMOIR: It’s been worse, it’ll get better.

My memoir reflects how there have been some hard times in my life, and how it’s already gotten better. Also that I plan for it to get even better in the future.