The Right to Rewrite Your Origin Story

Sor Juana's intellectual work included a reimagining of women's roles, historical narratives, and spiritual authority—a rewriting of the stories told about her sex and station. For those with adopted identities, the origin story often carries pain or incompleteness: stories about abandonment, rejection, or circumstances beyond your control. Sor Juana demonstrates that you need not accept the narrative handed to you as final. Rewriting your origin story doesn't mean denying facts; it means claiming interpretive authority over what those facts mean. It means asking: What was actually true about why I was adopted? What false conclusions did I draw? What strengths emerge from my unconventional beginning? This act of narrative reclamation is fundamentally political—it asserts that you are the author of your own meaning-making, not merely a character in someone else's story. It's an essential step toward transforming an imposed identity into a chosen one.