Why Do You Need to Write Who Am I Essay
Of course, the first purpose for writing a “Who I Am” essay that comes to mind is to attain a better understanding of yourself. The desire to explore your own thoughts, feelings, and behavior is a part of human nature. If you can make an objective analysis of your personality, you will resolve all possible conflicts more easily, improve your relationships with people, and mitigate the negative effect of traumatizing experiences, if any. As you can see, writing “Who Am I” papers really makes sense! It most definitely will influence your well-being in a good way. Besides, you don’t need to stick to any rules when you are writing this type of essay just for a self-examination – so there will be no limits on your creativity and imagination!
Things are a little bit different if you have to write a “Who Am I” essay for high school, college, or work, though. Your essay is your chance to prove yourself and convince everyone that you deserve the job or the scholarship. If you are to impress an admissions committee or your employer, you really must take your “Who Am I” assignment seriously. But don’t worry! We have gathered all the important tips to help you succeed.
How Does Who Am I Essay Differ From Other Essays
For a little warm-up, let’s find out which characteristics distinguish a “Who Am I” essay from other papers. The title in a question form implies that you will talk a lot about yourself, using the first-person narrative. Such a format is not usual for any kind of academic or formal writing. Make sure you substantiate your statements with expressive examples and descriptions so that the readers could believe you. Your audience must be shown, not told.
Good Ideas For Who Am I Essay
Struggling to make the first step towards your brilliant “Who Am I” paper? Here are some prompts to get your train of thought moving!
- Think of your achievements.
The advantage of this option is clear: it is time-tested. You cannot slip up here. There are some pitfalls, though. You actually should have a meaningful accomplishment to tell a story about. Watching 3 seasons of a TV show in a day doesn’t really count. It might be some charity work, winning the contest, or anything else impressive. - Reflect on how your failure changed you.
Present a “fall-and-rise” story to your readers. Recall some events from your life, when you made a mistake, then tell about the way you fixed it and lived happily ever after. - Question your principles.
One wouldn’t be able to grow as a personality, blindly following one’s beliefs without hesitating. Doubts are fundamental to our existence because in these challenging times we discover new things about this world every day. You may take advantage of this fact and write a “Who Am I” article about your lack of faith in some of your former convictions. For example, you have always considered women to be weaker than men. - Make people believe in wonder.
If you have a miraculous experience of traveling to Africa or suddenly changing your job from an accountant to a blogger – perfect! You really have an ace up your sleeve. All you need to do is to tell the audience about the way this adventure affected you. By doing it, you will inspire everyone to be brave and do some unexpected twists in their predefined life scenarios.
Bad Ideas for Who Am I Essay
Now, that you have some good “Who Am I” essay ideas, we want to prevent you from setting your foot on the wrong track.
- Do not pay much attention to other people.
Especially if it’s a “Who Am I” college essay or you are writing this paper to apply for the manager post. It’s not your parents, friends, and teachers who want to be admitted to the university or get the job. Focus on yourself. - Don’t be out of touch with reality.
Mentioning your school achievements is not a good choice for a “Who Are You” essay if you graduated from high school years ago. If you are not a professional sportsman, writing about your sports victories may sound a bit ridiculous. No offense, but nobody cares about you scoring a goal in the match against your classmates. Your employer in particular.Being too philosophical is not a good choice either. You are not an abstract concept, you are a real person with real ambitions, troubles, hopes. And your main priority is to show it. - Don’t talk politics or religion.
Leave these themes for a dinner table discussion. You may lose your chance to succeed if your essay will be read and assessed by someone with completely different views. It’s better not to take unnecessary risks here.
How to Make Your Essay Exceptional
Even if you have a strong, powerful, and magnetic personality, you still have to make people notice it. One wouldn’t eat even the most delicious chocolate without an attractive cover. With the help of the following tips on how to write a “Who I Am” essay, your work will stand out!
- Be passionate about the topic. If you’re going to apply for the teacher opening, you don’t have to describe your teaching methods in the slightest detail. Instead, emphasize your love for children and desire to develop along with your students.
- Be honest. Sooner or later, the truth will out. Do not try to fake anything. If you do, your readers will notice it. Hiring managers and admissions officers read zillions of essays, and, believe us, they will easily distinguish lies.
- Do some “make-up”. Lying is bad. But nobody said that you cannot smooth your flaws and accentuate your powers a little bit.
- Avoid bragging. It’s important to demonstrate your strengths, but don’t let your audience think of you as a conceited and self-important upstart. They should see that all your accomplishments are the result of hard work and determination.
- Don’t get carried away using quotes and additional sources. Your perspective is more valuable. You already have all that is required to write an excellent “Who Am I” essay in your mind.
- Use proper vocabulary. Jargon, colloquialisms, and contractions may be out of place.
- Show more than just numbers and facts. Your certificates, diplomas, and other academic achievements, as well as previous work experience, can be seen in your CV. Do not concentrate on this information in your paper. An interesting story will give you many more benefits.
- Manifest your potential. Explain what contribution you will make to the development of a company or a community. Describe your future plans – this way you will make an impression of a smart and rational person.
- Be creative. We have told you that a “Who Am I” essay differs from the academic papers. There is no need in adhering to a standard structure, so you may come up with something innovative and fresh!
Structure of Who Am I Essay
Those, who find it difficult to figure out a unique way of expressing your thoughts, may use a three-component structure: introduction, main body, and conclusion. Further, we will discuss all nuances of applying this structure to a “Who Am I” essay.
Tips on Writing a Captivating Introduction
This is the point where it is of crucial importance to grab the attention of your audience. Be crystal clear about your purpose of writing. In a “Who Am I” essay introduction you should present yourself briefly and make a compelling statement. Don’t let yourself sound verbose and tedious at the very beginning – it will tire your readers, and they will put your paper aside.
What Should Be Included In Main Body
Okay, the first checkpoint is passed, you hooked the audience. What should you do next to keep their full attention?
Firstly, set the background of the topic you are going to expand on. Then get people involved by telling them a joke, for example. It will help you to establish a stronger connection. With that being done, begin telling a story, building it up to a climax. In the end, close your narrative with a dramatic remark, but don’t draw conclusions so far.
Another way of composing your main body is to use each “Who Am I” paragraph to introduce a new supporting idea of the core statement.
Teach Your Readers a Lesson in Conclusion
Imagine you are a teacher and ask yourself: “What lesson should people learn from my story?” That is what you need to write in your conclusion. Restate the message delivered in the introduction, contemplate your objective once more and add a moral.
How to Understand Who You Are
One thing you may be worried about right now is: “How to understand who am I as a person?” That is a cornerstone question every person should find his or her own answer for. But we are here to give you a helping hand!
- Take personality tests. Although it may seem silly, it is a good starting point if you have never plunged into self-analysis. MBTI is a huge test many people know about. There is actually not that much science to back it off, so while it is very well-loved, a lot of people would say that it’s not valid, but there are arguments for and against it. Anyway, the world will not collapse if you just try!Another pretty popular test is “The Five Love Languages”. It is more practical if you are in a relationship, but it can help even with a friendship, just knowing how you like to receive love the most.You do not have to take the results as absolute because it can lead to misleading conclusions about your character.
- Question your values. Ask yourself questions like:
- “What qualities do I like in other people and why?”
- “What qualities do I dislike in other people and why?”
- “What makes me feel absolutely happy in relationships, and what makes me feel suffocated? What are the examples?”
- “How do I like to spend my free time and why?”
- “How do I hate spending my free time and why?”
- “What inspires me?”
- “What makes me feel frustrated?”
- “When am I the most and the least productive?”
- “What do I care about and what I do not?”
There are so many questions of that kind that can help you to realize why you act the way you do. Literally, take some time to sit down and think. Remember, what we told you about doubt, right?
- Get out of your bubble. Sometimes we get so comfortable with our identity we forget that our identity is to be shaped. It is kind of unhealthy to put yourself in a box and not to pop your head out of that box once in a while. Some people say: “I am who I am today”. But our entire set of behaviors is just a habit. And if you don’t go for anything new sometimes, you are not going to grow. Have you ever played tennis? No? And what if it is your favorite sport, but you don’t know about it yet? Getting yourself out of your usual identity and doing things that aren’t maybe usual to you might be an awesome way to learn who you are.
- Write a reflective essay. Often there are patterns going on in the background that you don’t even notice, but if you did just a little bit more reflection you might get some valuable insights. Besides, we have already provided you with an ultimate guide for beginners!
For additional information on this topic, watch a video down below:
What Makes a Person Great
There hardly could be a definite answer. But we have collected some general pieces of advice from people who are perceived as successful:
- love what you do;
- work really hard;
- focus on one thing, not everything;
- keep pushing yourself;
- come up with good ideas;
- keep improving yourself and what you do;
- serve others something of value:
- persist, because there’s no overnight success.
Great people worth following are called “role models”. There you will find everything you need to know about them, even how to be one!
We hope, that now you know everything to write a perfect “Who Am I Now” essay! Take a look inside yourself and reveal your strengths to become a better version of yourself right away!
Answers to some popular questions
What to write in a “Who Am I” essay?
You should focus on your personal experiences that will help the audience to understand you. For example, include personal attributes, work experiences, and future aspirations.
How do I know who I am?
Explore yourself by trying new things, keep a reflection diary, analyze events that took place in your life. You may also see a therapist or take a personality test.
What makes people great?
A great person is kind, respectful, caring, hard-working, reliable, patriotic, and selfless to others.
How can I be myself when I don’t know who I am?
You may try seeing a therapist or taking a personality test. That would help you to sort things out.
An interesting way to get to know yourself, which works very well, when you write, new possibilities of knowledge open up, as if a certain abstraction, distance from yourself. Something happens that you can look at yourself from the outside, and analyze yourself. Something very similar to meditation or cyanosis, but it works! And I liked it! I would like more advice from you on such existential things, I like them!
A very short but at the same time meaningful and extensive overview of this philosophical topic, because people can spend their whole lives trying to find an answer to this question. Who am I? Nothing simpler is as complicated as it seems to me. However, your advice turned out to be very effective and brought me significantly closer to the answer. Thanks for the interesting and informative content!