BOOK REVIEW: Finding Me by Viola Davis

 “Who am I? I’m the little girl who would run after school every day in third grade because these boys hated me because I was …not pretty. Because I was…Black.”

–“Finding Me” by Viola Davis

 

If I could recommend one memoir to read in 2022, it would be “Finding Me” by Viola Davis.

This memoir by the award-winning actress was amazing.

Reading “Finding Me” was like having a conversation with her about how her life experiences made her the person she is today.

Davis said the book is her story, starting from a crumbling apartment in Central Falls, Rhode Island, to the stage in New York City, and beyond. On the book jacket, she said, “This is the path I took to finding my purpose and my strength, but also to finding my voice in a world that didn’t always see me.”

She went on to say, as she wrote Finding Me, her eyes were open to the truth of how our stories are often not given close examination. They are bogarted, reinvented to fit into a crazy, competitive, judgmental world. 

“So I wrote this for anyone who is searching for a way to understand and overcome a complicated past, let go of shame, and find acceptance. For anyone who needs reminding that a life worth living can only be born from radical honesty and the courage to shed facades and be...you. Finding Me is a deep reflection on my past and a promise for my future. My hope is that my story will inspire you to light up your own life with creative expression and rediscover who you were before the world put a label on you,” Davis wrote.

These words hooked me and made me want to read this book.

Davis was the fifth of six children born in St. Matthews, S.C. She was born in her grandparents’ house on a plantation. She spared no words in talking about growing up “po” and being bullied.

 

 “Growing up food insecure, washing my clothes by hand in cold water the night before I had to go to school, hanging them up and if they were still wet the next morning, wearing those wet clothes even if I’d pissed the bed—everything had been hard for me.”

–“Finding Me” by Viola Davis

 

Davis grew up in a condemned building infested with rats, no hot water, gas or plumbing. 

Her reason for becoming an actor began during the drama portion of a summer Upward Bound camp. “He (a camp instructor) gave me the ingredient that I needed to be an artist, the power to create. The power of alchemy, that magical process of transformation and creation to believe at any given time I could be the somebody I always wanted to be," Davis wrote.

One of the favorite things I enjoyed reading about was when she adopted her daughter Genesis in 2011. Her joy about one of the best moments of her life leapt off the pages. After all the roles and accolades she had achieved, she wanted joy.

This was an amazing book with Davis being open and honest about her life.

 

“I own everything that has ever happened to me. The parts that were a source of shame are actually my warrior fuel,” she says. “I see people -- the way they walk, talk, laugh, and grieve, and their silence -- in a way that is hyperfocused because of my past. I’m an artist because there’s no separation from me and every human being that has passed through the world including my mom. I have a great deal of compassion for other people, but mostly for myself. That would not be the case if I did not reconcile that little eight-year-old girl and FIND ME.”

–“Finding Me” by Viola Davis

I have always loved the work of Viola Davis but reading this book has made me love her even more. I highly recommend this book.