I do not read a lot of non-fiction, but I was interested in reading about Michelle Obama’s life and how she handled being a Black First Lady in a country that is still too full of racists. Her story is very inspiring and examines on a macro level the racism that still persists in America and on the sexism that still persists in our society’s views towards women. If you have any interest at all in Michelle Obama, then it is definitely worth your time to read Becoming.

Two other memoirs that I have read (and highly recommend) are The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls and Educated by Tara Westover. Both memoirs are written by white women who had interesting childhoods – interesting in that they grew up poor with unstable parents (which is a polite way of putting it) and had to rely on their own wits and resources to grow up to live stable adult lives. Michelle Obama’s childhood is refreshing to read about because although she grew up poor in the South Side of Chicago, she had stable, loving parents who worked hard so that their children could have better lives. Her parents never even owned their own house, until they inherited a house from Michelle’s great-aunt, because they put all their resources into their children. They were the kind of parents that all children should have.

Both Michelle and her older brother, Craig, have ivy league educations; they both went to Princeton, and Michelle went on to Harvard law school. She is smart, but mainly she is a hardworking, goal-oriented person. She is also very civic-minded, like her husband, and cares very much for the Black community, which is why she gave up a cushy job as a lawyer to work in the non-profit sector. She was working at the University of Chicago Medical Center helping South Side residents find affordable health care at the time Barack Obama became president. Her parents inspired her to aim high, so she works to inspire people in the Black community to also aim high, while also very practically telling them they are going to have to work hard to improve their lives and not rely on (white) politicians to do it for them.

The beginning of Michelle and Barack’s relationship, as recounted by Michelle, had me grinning at times; I thought it very cute how when they first met (she mentored him while he was a law school student working at her law firm one summer) she told herself she was not attracted to him, especially after he pulled out a pack of cigarettes (gross) when she took him out for a work lunch. The story of how he proposed to her is like something out of a rom-com. But honestly, Barack sounds like he would be very frustrating to be married to. It seems like he always has a million things on the go at once. When they were first married, he was working part time at a law firm, teaching at the University of Chicago, writing a book, and starting to get into politics. When they had their two girls, his political career was really taking off and he was hardly ever around to help raise their kids. But it is made perfectly clear that Michelle loves him very much and he loves her very much, and that he has been there for his family when it really counted.

Michelle candidly describes how she did not want Barack to get into politics and how she never thought he would succeed in becoming the first Black president in America. She is a much bigger person than I could ever be, though, because she gave up her own ambitions so that he could pursue the presidency. But she did not want to be just the smiling wife at her husband’s side, and why should she be? It was angering to read about how she was vilified by the media and Barack’s opponents with the stereotypically racist “angry Black woman” label just because she is a passionate, opinionated, and intelligent woman.

Becoming does not focus heavily on Barack’s time in the White House; he is not even elected president until about two-thirds into the book. But this book is not about him, it is about Michelle. She does not necessarily gloss over her time in the White House; she was the First Lady though, which is not actually an official position in the White House. She was not privy to everything going on in the White House, but she did not want her time spent there to be completely useless either, which is why she put all her effort into her own initiatives that included encouraging healthy eating and exercise to combat childhood obesity and supporting military families.

Michelle Obama has shared her life story to encourage other people to do the same and to encourage everyone to “invite one another in” despite our differences. I admire anyone who is brave enough to share the intimate details of their life with everyone else. I hope that everyone who reads Becoming is inspired to aim high and to not let anyone, especially those with racist and misogynistic opinions, get them down.