OBAMA OPENS UP AT BELL CENTRE
Don’t hide your weaknesses, she says
Michelle Obama had a warning on Friday night: life is full of challenges, and people will try to convince you to quit on your goals.
“There were times I was called an ape in heels,” Obama told a sellout crowd at the Bell Centre. “There were people throughout my life who told me I should be quiet or not dream too big. If someone is really trying to tear you down, they’ll do it, and it doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
The first lady of the United States from 2009 to 2017 was candid, humorous and sentimental with the crowd on Friday as part of the tour for her best-selling memoir, Becoming.
The evening was moderated by Valerie Jarrett, a former senior adviser to Barack Obama and Michelle’s former boss in Chicago. Jarrett read several questions sent in by Twitter and had some of her own questions as well.
Montreal was the 30th event of the book tour. Becoming, released last November, became the best-selling book of 2018. Now, with more than 10 million copies sold, it is said to be one of the best-selling memoirs of all time. The Montreal event was the largest so far in the tour, Jarrett announced at the top.
Obama’s message was simple: Children and adults should not feel that life is a finite journey, but rather a series of dips and valleys, and that includes marriage.
“I tell young people who are about to get married: You might go for years … years when you won’t like your husband,” Obama said.
The book details intimate and intricate details of her life from her childhood growing up in Chicago’s South Side, to her courtship with the would-be president and the life of their two daughters, Sasha and Malia.
In the book, and during the conversation with Jarrett, Obama said there were many moments in her life as a mother, a high-powered lawyer and as a first lady when she struggled to find her path.
She said one of her most difficult moments was when she faced criticism for being outspoken while on her first campaign.
“There was this question about the role of the wife: are you supposed to be outspoken or stand by your husband and blink occasionally when he talks,” she said.
Jarrett asked Obama about the challenges of being first lady, and she confided she felt enormous pressure in the role.
“I knew how hard I needed to work,” she said. “I had to work harder, faster and stronger, because I was not only a strong woman, but I was a strong black woman,” she said.
She said it was important in her memoir for her to dwell not just on the successes of her life, but the challenges.
“Older people, we hide our struggles. That makes young people think that there are no struggles,” Obama said.
“We do a disservice to people in life when we only show people our strengths.”
There was plenty of love for the former first lady. Before the show, dozens of people lined up to take selfies with life-sized images of Obama on posters set up in the arena’s hallway. There were also T-shirts on sale with quotations from the memoir.