<p>Assignment: Is the way something seems to be not always the same as it actually is? </p>
<p>One can never expect to get a panoramic view of a predicament or person. There will always be information that is hidden from perception. In fact, first impressions are almost always the wrong impressions. Many people are fooled into believing that the first impression is the only impression, when in reality, it takes a long time to understand every aspect of the situation or personality.
In the field of literature, there are a myriad of examples that show that first impressions are inaccurate. In the book, Jane Eyre, Jane trusts Mr. Thornfield to be a man who is disappointed with life and so never tries to reach out for help. When she later learns that Mr. Thornfield’s demeanor was so because of his marriage to a mentally handicapped women, her opinions about him change. This shows that Jane’s first impressions were wrong because Mr. Thornfield was not rejected with life, he was actually keeping a very dark secret – a fact she had been oblivious to when she met him.
Jane’s example is one of fiction; in the real world, an example of wrong first impressions is one of Benedict Arnold. Known as the “greatest traitor in American History”, Arnold’s renege was not predicted by the American generals of yore. Arnold was seen as a respectable man with many credentials; he served alongside General Washington during the Revolutionary War. His desertion of the American army was unexpected – Washington’s cognizance about him was restricted to his first impression of Arnold, which was that Arnold was a loyal man.
Benedict Arnold’s example might be hard to grasp due to his stature in history books. On a personal level, I, myself, learned that first impressions are usually incorrect. My classmate in 4th grade was known as a heckler; she would constantly harass everyone. One day she did not come to school and we classmates learned that she had died due to cancer – she had been a cancer patient for the whole school year. The origins of her heckling were left unknown, but if I should take a guess, I would surmise that it was because she did not want anybody to know how physically weak she was. She was afraid that people would form wrong first impressions about her if she told them that she had cancer.
These examples show how first impressions are usually inaccurate and how they are not good indicators of neither the person nor the situation that the person is embroiled in.</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
</p>