January 16

ARRTI – Literary Exploration

Question: What is your opinion on the idea that an individual’s life can be altered by a particular experience?

Life Altering Experiences

 

          An individual’s life can be changed through a certain experience. This experience could be the one that we have never encountered before, which could affect your decisions or attitude. When individuals encounter first time experiences, they find it difficult to react, doing nothing to affect or change the experiences. This situation should be able to teach us lessons on what to do, as for the next time something similar happens, the individual will be prepared to face and deal with the situation properly. From learning specific experiences, the individuals will be able to properly commit a decision. In the story, “A River Runs Through It”, Robert Redford reveals a character that does not know how to react to a certain situation, causing him to commit an action that he can only think of that works in different situations. The same character as well also uses these actions which soon affect his behaviour towards others. This has also affected me in a way to commit similar actions towards specific people for specific reasons. An individual’s life is changed through experiences that they have never faced before, as these experiences teach lessons that people can possibly use in the future.

 

          In “A River Runs Through It”, the character Norman Maclean reacts to his brother Paul Maclean, who acts rebellious in secret ways. For example, Paul and Norman had taken a boat and decided to “shoot the chutes” through a waterfall, and after that experience, it is seen that Norman separates from his friends and Paul. Later through the film, the audience can witness how Norman explodes with anger towards Paul about a sandwich, which is really not the reason for his anger. Although Norman decides to act as a brother’s keeper and rides with Paul down the waterfall, he has never experienced being in danger, which causes him to separate from his group of friends, as well as get in trouble with his parents.This experience had changed his mood, as Paul’s recklessness continues when nobody is watching except for his brother. This reaches a point that Norman had exploded in anger, which ends up in a fight scene. On this point onwards, Norman’s life is changed, and sometimes affected through Paul’s attitude. From this experience, he has no choice but to commit an action that is known to work towards others.

 

          Through the same film, Norman and Paul had decided to celebrate his success with winning over Jessie, and as Norman becomes drunk, Paul had taken him to a known illegal poker place called Lolo’s. From going inside, Norman later witnesses what happens to Paul and he attempts to play in a poker table, and sobers up. Through this experience, like other experiences he faced before, he knew that him and his brother were not welcome into the area, and causes him to leave, although his brother wanted to stay. Norman had decided to ignore Paul’s invitation to join him for poker, as his anger also caused him to drive Paul’s car back home. His reaction to this scenario shows how he used the exact same action to earlier situations as it is known to work with previous times. Considering their promises to never fight again, Norman had no other choice but to leave in anger towards Paul, who had kept his reckless behaviour towards maturing. Ever since the change in Paul’s behaviour, Norman has had some situations where he had to deal with it himself towards his own brother. Without being Paul’s brothers keeper, Norman would not learn how to deal with situations that have a negative outcome. I may not have a brother myself that I have a responsibility of, but I have a similar reaction to experiences such as Normans.

 

          When I was in Grade 9, only had I faced situations of bullying or fighting between others in the school, and that has affected my views towards others, as well as a bit of a change in attitude. I was in a class to which I barely knew anyone and overheard somebody judging me already to others. They have also attempted to made fun of me through their own languages, which I found it frustrating. From this experience though, it  taught me how to ignore sentences that I find disturbing when said verbally, and learned how to react to it. Another was nearby summer when I was hanging out with friends when all of the sudden two friends started fighting each other through an argument they had made. I reacted to this a bit in a fearful way, as this was the first time I ever found people that I know were physically hurting each other. All of these situations had forced me to commit actions similar to Norman’s, which is just to walk away and ignore any hurtful comments that may affect you. My life still consists of some bullying, whether its to me or others, but I am still able to commit actions that work, but has changed my lifestyle throughout highschool. If I haven’t faced these situations back then, I would find it hard to react to similar experiences in the future.

 

          Lessons that are learned from previous experiences, can help change an individual’s life in the future, as they would learn how to react. Norman first experienced dangerous acts through his brother and learned that his brother would still continue these acts. Norman had learned lessons from these experiences to just walk away from negative experiences that Paul had faced. This had always affected me when I first learned that life is not always perfect, as it made me more pessimistic than optimistic, although it has taught me lessons. Without these experiences, how would people react to new situations?

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Posted January 16, 2020 by miguel912 in category Miguel, Sept 2019

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