Langston Hughes A Turning Point Essay

Turning points are by definition a time of decisive and often beneficial change. An example of this can be seen in the following line written by Langston Hughes, “I didn’t believe there was a Jesus anymore, since he didn’t come to help me” (130). That line comes from a story about Langston Hughes’s turning point with religion. The story spoke of when he needed salvation and how he expected to see a physical manifestation of Jesus. When he did not appear, he no longer believed in Jesus. While reading this story it was hard not to see the overlap into my own life. I too had a struggle with my religion that led to a major turning point in my life. Something I believe most people do, because we all have our ups and downs, but those shifts only happen after a cataclysmic event. For me, failing my Honors Algebra 2 class did that. After which of course, I was forced to open my eyes to behaviors that I needed to mend.

My sophomore year of high school was far from ordinary. I was working four days a week part time at a gym, while trying to balance an AP course load, while also, maintaining a student council committee chair seat, and starting a non-profit for domestic violence awareness. This list does not include all of the

other clubs and odd jobs I took on but is a list of the more important things I did. Now, I was only overachieving this much because I come from a home where I was being raised by a single unemployed Hispanic mother in Northern Virginia. Also, we are proud survivors of domestic violence. Most people look at us and assume the worst that I would be knocked up in a few weeks or that I was just going to be a maid for the rest of my life. I wanted to prove them wrong so I did everything I could to do that. However, I was angry about having to do that.
I was mad at God for giving me such a rotten life. I was mad at my father for being the devil. I was mad at my aunts and uncles for being awful people. I was mad at myself for being so mad. I was mad all of the time over every little thing.
I was also supremely stressed out!
So, with a year full of excess work and activities and a boiling rage it all came to an end with me failing a very important class. Something I could have avoided by asking for help or by stopping to breathe. Both of which could not have been done by me at that time. However, looking at a big red F next to my name put in to perspective that I was nuts and I needed to change. So, I enrolled in summer school and I retook the class and I finished with a B. Then, in the fall I started going to counseling to work on my anger and my other mental issues. In my last two years of high school I made great strides to becoming a more balanced and happier person. So, much so that most people who have met me in college cannot picture a darker and angrier version.
This turning point for me has definitely been seen as significant because my foundation and core of my being did not change but the wrapping and the picture that others see has. This makes it crucial and definitely noticed by others. This is different from Hughes’s turning point because his was an exterior element changing an interior reaction only displayed internally. Where my turning point was an exterior element changing interior reactions displayed externally. Both did of course have huge effects on us.
All in all, I believe that without having failed that math class I would not have had the push I needed to make a necessary change in my life.

At the time I was devastated and felt that I had disappointed my family which is truly the only fear I have in my life. After, talking with them though it was made quite clear that I had actually done the opposite because they did not need to yell at me or punish me for my actions. I had done it all and I had even gone so far as to fix more than just the immediate problem I had fixed myself. This made my Mother and older sister proud. To this day they reference the change they see in me and I live a much better life now then I would have prior to this moment and for that I am an even more appreciative

person.