Death is part of the circle of life and it is the end of your time on earth; the end of your time with your family and loved ones. No one wants to die, leave their family and miss the good times your loved ones will have after your death. In the Mercury Reader, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross' "On the Fear of Death" and Joan Didion's "The Afterlife" of The Year of Magical Thinking" both share common theses on death and mourning. Both Didion and Kübler-Ross explain mourning and dealing with death. Steve Jobs' commencement speech for Stanford's graduation ceremony and, through his personal experience, takes us deeper into death and how I feel about it. Your time on earth is limited, one day you will die, and there are many ways to grieve the death of a loved one. I believe that fear of death and the death of a loved one will prevent you from living your own life and that fear of your own death is selfish. Everyone grieves the death of a loved one or close friends differently. The loss of a loved one is never an easy thing to overcome. You never know how long someone will stay in your life. Death has no timetable and you will never know when you or someone will die. There's a chance I won't finish this essay, and there's a chance I won't have a family, or a chance for me to live my life to the fullest, but I have to live my life without letting it hold me back. How do you deal with the death of a family member or friend when their relationship ended on a bad note because of an argument? Elisabeth Kübler-Ross further compliments the situation when she writes: "A husband and wife may have been fighting for years, but when the partner dies, the survivor pulls his hair, cries and cries harder and beats.. . middle of paper ......h can prevent anyone from living. Grieving is difficult and there is no clear “right” way to do it. Although my grief over my father's death wasn't as difficult as my family thought, I couldn't tell anyone how to deal with death. In conclusion, death is the clearing of the old path to the new and it should not be feared, but more energy should be invested now, while you are alive and living your life to the fullest. Works Cited Didion, Joan. “The Beyond” of the Year of Magical Thinking. » Neuleib Cain and Ruffus 68-87. Jobs, Steve. "Steve Jobs' 2005 Stanford Commencement Speech." Video clip online.YouTube. YouTube, March 7, 2008. Web. March 31, 2014. Kübler-Ross, Elisabeth “On the fear of death. » Neuleib, Cain and Ruffus 89-98Neuleib, Janice, Kathleen Shine Cain and Stephen Ruffus, eds. Mercury Reader for English 101. Boston: Pearson Learning Solutions, 2013 Print.