<p>Notes: I know that Thoreau didn't write *Leaves of Grass<a href="Whitman%20did">/i</a>; I just needed a nature-themed Romantic work. My "anecdote" is 100% unadulterated BS. Also, I have no conclusion because I literally have no room left at the end of my essay.</p>
<p>Prompt: Do we need adversity to help us discover who we are?</p>
<p>Essay:</p>
<p>Ever since the dawn and of time and creation of man, civilization and society have existed in which man must learn to live harmoniously with his peers. However, another caveat of societal life is the desire of one to discover his personal self, identity, and role in life. As evident in the lives of Henry David Thoreau and myself, adversity is undoubtedly needed to discover who we are.</p>
<p>Henry David Thoreau was an American Romantic and Transcendentalist writer, famous for his nature-loving works, including Walden and Leaves of Grass. However, Thoreau's legacy lies not in his love of nature but in his adversity-driven concept of civil disobedience. During his life in nineteenth-century America, society was becoming so ever more stratified, with the social gap between aristocratic whites and slave blacks larger than ever before As a white man who believed in equality for all, this situation seriously pained Thoreau. After mulling over this issue, he decided to risk the fame he had already garnered and to face adversity head on by attending a rally for equal rights led by black abolitionist Frederick Douglass. There, Thoreau gave a stirring, extemporized speech which led to his being arrested by local authorities. His nights in jail confronted him with more adversity--would he admit to wrongdoing and be released or would he follow his morals and continue to be incarcerated for, potentially, the rest of his life? While in prison, Thoreau made his choice and discovered the person he really was--a man with postconventional morality who would not let anything stop him from doing the right thing. He penned his now-ubiquitous essay, "Civil Disobedience," while in jail and published his work upon release. A century later, Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) and Mahtama Gandhi both cited Thoreau's essay as a microcosm of Thoreau himself and used his ideas of peaceful protest and civil disobedience in their respective countries. Without the adversity he faced in the slavery issue and in jail, Thoreau would not have discovered who he was and would not have had the impact on future equality movements that he did.</p>
<p>While my personal discovery was nowhere near as momentous or influential as Thoreau's, it has still radically affected the person I am today. When I was twelve years old, I found out that my parents had decided to divorce. This news devestated me; I never expected my loving parents to choose to split apart. I watched my little brother turn into a introverted, cold remnant of the convivial, vivacious sibling he once was. I turned into an apathetic seventh grader; my grades plummeted, and I sunk into a major depression. Seemingly consumed by the adversity I faced, I attempted suicide on June 29, 2005. Lying in the hospital's ER room with numerous broken bones and a drug OD, I realized that I was too good an asset to society to die. I remember hearing the doctors talk about how it was a shame that such a bright kid may never grow up to change our world as we know it. I realized that I had so much potential, I so decided to rehabilitate myself academically and socially. This harrowing event was a wake-up call for me that I certainly cherish.</p>