What Influence's You?

As people do we really have a free will, or is everything already predetermined for us? I believe it is somewhat a combination of both. I think that we make our own choices, but we use past experiences and events to make those decisions whether we realize it or not.

For example I am a huge fan of skiing. The decisions I make while I am on the mountain doing my thing are influenced by past experiences. Say I was trying a new trick on a jump and I had crashed very hard before, I might make the decision to either try the trick on a smaller jump, or try a different trick, or even not try the trick at all. By crashing it made me think about it and not do the same thing again or at least not right off the bat. It will make me work my way up to the trick instead of going for it off of the biggest jump I can find.

So far in the book, Jasmine by Bharati Mukherjee, we see the main character Jasmine having to make some choices. In her making of these choices she is very influenced by past and even current events that take place in her life.

Even early in her life we see events that influence Jasmine’s decision making. At an early age back in her home city of Hasnapur, she was told “Gods with infinite memories visited girl children on women who needed to be punished for sins committed in other incarnations.” (p. 39) So at a young age when she was probably most vulnerable she was told that she was a burden to her family because of sins her mother committed in some other life. Even though she may not realize it, this is probably on the back of her mind somewhere and influences her thinking.

The influence on her is so great that as well as her decisions being altered she even has to watch the things she says. Bud’s mother does not understand Jasmine’s culture or where she came from. She makes jokes about her being Indian. “She can’t begin to picture a village in Punjab.” (p 16) Because of this Jasmine says “I have to be careful of everything I say.” (p. 16) Since people seem to not care about foreign places so much in this book, Jasmine has to be careful about what she talks about when she talks about her home.

Not only do things affect our thought processes and decisions, but they even affect what we feel we can and cannot say.