I was about 14 years old when Michelle Obama gave her last speech as First Lady and proclaimed that ''With hard work and a good education anything is possible''. Her impassioned words inspired me immensely because it was very seldom that I saw a woman of my skin tone who possessed so much power. However, it made me question how she gained so much confidence as a woman with a dark complexion. How did she overcome the insecurities that society imposed upon her? As I was growing up, I felt very self-conscious about my dark skin, and as a result, I felt unintelligent, incompetent, and unattractive. Growing up as a brown-skin Bengali-American made it difficult for me to have confidence because of the outdated, colorist standards that still existed and affected the way Bengalis treated one another. Subsequently, whenever we went out as a family, they regularly told me to wear foundations, powders, skin bleaching creams, and home remedies to disguise myself to be much lighter. Although I was only eight years old, my family conditioned me to believe these items were typical for my skincare routine. Even in Bollywood movies that I watched growing up, they rarely included actresses who resembled me. The most popular actresses were light skin because people with darker skin are considered less prestigious. Being underrepresented made me feel lonely and ashamed. When I visited Dhaka, Bangladesh, in July 2019, the air felt moist and dirty. I wasn't used to being in such a crowded place where people were inconsiderate of their surroundings. When I visited my family in the village, they consistently made me feel as if my aspirations were unrealistic. They often told me that I would have to marry a man with fair skin so that our children would also have fair skin. As a little girl, I never understood the concept of beauty, and I was oblivious to my natural features. I didn't know about colorism and how women of all ages were adversely affected because of their brown skin. It wasn’t until I was 13 years old that I started to realize that beauty is a subjective experience and that my skin tone doesn't define me. During that time, I noticed that Rose, my older Bengali cousin who immigrated to New York, spoke negatively about dark skin people as if she were superior because of her fair skin. I remember her doing my makeup and making my complexion much lighter. I angrily told her ''You do really bad makeup. You made me too white. I hate it.'' That night, as I went home and searched Youtube for makeup tutorials, I was excited to see many other brown skin South Asian girls. For the next few years, my mom and I occasionally shopped at makeup stores, and I continued to see notable improvements as I practiced every day. Over these years, I began to appreciate my dark complexion, and I feel proud to be a part of a diverse group that also enjoys doing makeup. Although my family still tells me to wear a lighter foundation, I turn them down because I have no reason to be ashamed. My skin color isn’t undesirable, and being darker doesn’t make me lesser than a light-skinned woman. Today, Bengali-American women are still deemed inferior. We are taught to stay home, cook, and clean, or else we are rendered useless. Being a darker skin woman, however, only exacerbates these experiences in Bengali culture. My darker skin tone requires that I work even harder so I can prove that I am as beautiful and valuable as a light-skinned woman. Colorism gave me a negative view of myself and I don’t want it to hold me back anymore. I was gifted with brown skin and will be a thriving woman who will empower other young girls that are constantly shamed for being of a darker skin complexion.