In between two worlds...

I am 29 years old and I am a Chicana and Latina that aspires to pay it forward and pay it back. I will give back to honor the many mentors and teachers that believed in me. To the mentor that would tell me that being Chicana was not going to be an identity that will limit me but the identity that would help me flourish. To the mentor that took me under his wing and made sure I learned valuable lessons about "playing nice" and being advocate. To the teacher and mentor that would remind me day in and day out that my duty was to make sure students were happy at least once a day during their college careers.

One of the most valuable lessons that I have learned in my career journey is that I live in between two worlds. The world that nurtured me and gave me morals and values and the world that taught me about myself. I was born and raised in two different nations that share a border because they have to not because they want to. I live a life in the states and in Mexico. I was viewed as different in both worlds. Too Mexican in one world and not Mexican enough in other world. I live in the world that believes in change and advocacy and I belong to a world of struggle and hard work. Both of these worlds feed my soul and enrich me in so many levels. I stay in the world of change and advocacy because my world of struggle and hard work taught me to be great and fearless. I never feel the need to choose but I always choose to remember the world that raised me. The world where I had the never ending of losing my mother and sisters due the flawed immigration reform. A world were social class created a culture of poverty that would rarely let go of you. A world where the simpler things in life made me happy and where your neighbors were fictive kin.

For a long time, I thought I would have to choose a world. I thought that to leave my world can lead to selling out and now I realize that this is a myth that people have made up when they do not understand your purpose. If anything, I have learned that I can explain with precise detail my upbringing and still people would view it through their lens and imagine that best way they can. When this occurs the only thing that you can do is hope that your storytelling skills painted a picture that made your experience justice. Being in between two worlds, has taught me one thing with certainty: that is that my purpose is rooted in mentorship. I pay it forward and back not because I have to but because I want to.