Search for Identity in It's Hard Enough Being MeIn the essay "It's Hard Enough Being Me," Anna Lisa Raya recounts her experiences as a multicultural American Columbia University in New York and the confusion she felt about her identity. She grew up in Los Angeles and identified primarily with her Mexican origins, but sometimes also with her Puerto Rican origins. However, upon arriving in New York, she discovered that everyone considered her a "Latina." She emphasizes that a typical "Latina" should dance salsa, know Mexican history and, most importantly, speak Spanish. Raya claims she doesn't know any of these things, so how could that label apply to her? She is caught between being both a “seller” of her heritage and a “spicatrice” in the eyes of Americans. She adds that trying to cope with college life and the confusion of finding an identity is a burden. Anna Raya ends her essay by presenting advice she was given on how to manage her identity. She was told that she should try to be content and not worry about other people's opinions. Anna Lisa Raya's essay is an informative account of the life of a multicultural American as well as an important insight into how people from multicultural backgrounds deal with the labels placed on them and the confusion this causes in the attempt to find an identity. The search for identity in a society that seeks to place a label on every individual is a difficult task, especially for people of multicultural ancestry. Raya's essay is an informative account of the life of a multicultural American because it is told from the book of a true multicultural author. point of view. This makes the reader feel like the information is accurate. It would be more difficult to accept this view if the author were, for example, a white man writing about how a Mexican or Puerto Rican woman feels. As Connie Young Yu points out, information told by someone who has not had these experiences is most often misperceived. Yu uses the example of white American historians who write about the lives of Chinese immigrants. Yu says there is no accurate account of the immigrants' lives because they did not document their lives themselves. What little information is found in history books only tells of their obvious achievements. There is no official understanding of their personal lives or feelings (Yu 30).