Joan Didion and Daniel Gilbert

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October 17, 2012 Professor Johnson Comp. 1500 Joan Didion and Daniel Gilbert’s perspective on our imaginations to future happiness and unhappiness Joan Didion’s essay, “life after death” explains her personal thoughts on grief, and outcomes of predictions on future unhappiness. Daniel gilbert gives examples in his essay, “Reporting live from tomorrow” of how our imaginations lead us to false beliefs on future happiness. I will examine the relationship between Gilbert’s thoughts on how our imagination renders our future happiness, while examining Didion’s perspective on using our imagination to predict the outcome of grief and how it is played into our imagination. Didion’s thoughts on how grief approaches us shows that grief just comes out of the ordinary, and when it comes it does not compliment our anticipations nor does it inform us that it is approaching. Gilbert’s supporting ideas on imagination elaborate on Didion’s perspective on expectation and reveals that we must be prepared for the worst, and since we can not predict future outcomes we should “practice” accepting and rejecting the outcomes we believe will occur. Didion states “Grief, when it comes, is nothing we expect it to be (Didion 10).” Didion explains, that what we expect is nothing compared to what actually happens. We can’t necessarily predict the Sheikh 2 outcome of a certain event, such as grief. As Didion explains, our expectations don’t always match up to what grief has to offer, Gilbert’s supporting claims relate to Didion’s feelings on expectations. Gilbert mentions “ No one can imagine every feature and consequence of a future event, hence we must consider some and fail to consider others (Gilbert 224-225).” Gilbert wants us to know that no matter what happens, no one can really imagine every detail that will take place in the
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