Character Change in 'Other Words For Love'

After reading the book 'Other Words For Love', the main character, Ari, makes a huge change in her character. In the beginning of the book, her life isn't all that great. She goes to a regular public school, her only friend goes to a private school in Manhattan, she has extremely low self esteem, and all of the pressure is on her to succeed because her sister dropped out of high school pregnant. Then everything changes when her rich uncle dies and they inherent money and are able to send Ari to the private school in Manhattan. There she makes new friends and the biggest thing that happens is she meets Blake. Blake changes everything. In the beginning Ari had no self confidence and hated everything about her life and by the end, even though not everything worked out, she became a young woman who believed in herself and stood up for herself and was ready to work hard for great things.

The change begins with meeting Blake. He tells her she is beautiful and cares so much about her. She is happy and begins to believe that she is beautiful. He also make her believe that she can become an artist. Blake is the start of all confidence that Ari gains in herself. As time goes on there relationship grows. But then Blake's dad gets sick and he breaks up with her. This causes Ari to not care about anything in her life. She blows off the SATs, stops caring about school, gets in a fight with both of her best friends which leaves her with no friends, and gets declined from her college. Her life has changed and so has her personality. But then somehting clicks in her head that she has to change something. She retakes the SATs, gets into college, and gets a job at a design studio. The last scene in the book is her and Blake talking. He wants her back, but she won't. Even though she still thinks about him and may still love him a little, she is stronger. She realizes she doesn't need him, and she believes in herself, that shw will go on to do great things. In the beginning of the book, Ari didn't believe in anything about herself, at the end, she grew up to believe that she could become something and didn't need Blake to help her.

I have learned so much from Ari's change. I am a lot like Ari. I have a hard time believing that I can do what I want, which is to become a dancer. And sometimes I get caught up in all the friendship stuff, and the pressure just like Ari did. But now that I see that although it took a lot, she realized she could do what she wants if she tries. So I now know that every experience in life is for a reason and in the end I will find what I need to to know what I want to do. I think so many people can benifit from Ari's experience. Lots of people have low self esteem, or are put under tons of pressure, or just can't seem to break out of a shell. But reading this book and seeing how Ari did it gives am a lot of hope and should give others the same feeling.