Before your puppy can start offering its tricks for a specific reward, it needs to learn them! When training is started at seven to eight weeks of age, use methods that rely on encouragement and gentle teaching. Puppies have short attention spans (持续时间), so training sessions should be brief, but should occur daily.

Puppies can be taught to sit, lie down, and stand using a method called food-lure (食物引诱) training. Small pieces of food or a favored toy can be used to motivate your puppy to perform most tasks. Provided the reward is appealing enough, the puppy can be encouraged to give the desired response by showing the puppy the reward, moving the reward to get the desired response and then after some time, pairing a cue (a verbal command) with the behavior.

You should only ask your puppy to perform a behavior with a verbal cue once you are sure the puppy knows it well. If the puppy does not immediately give the behavior on the first encouragement, then you are likely proceeding a little too quickly. If you keep repeating the cue, the puppy will learn that several repetitions are acceptable before it needs to respond.

You do not necessarily need to train in a set session daily. Rather, integrate these tasks throughout the day. A goal to strive for is at least 15 minutes of training every day. These can be short five-minute sessions spread throughout the day. Try to have all family members ask your puppy to do these tasks. Remember to try and train in every room of your house. You want your puppy to sit, lie down and stay everywhere, not just in the training location.

How are you feeling today? Often when we ask people that question, they reply “not bad”, or “could be worse” 【小题1】 Maybe we could live better by being healthier, less stressed, more motivated-but how?

Of course there are many treatments for improving our mental health, but sometimes there are small and simple solutions to help improve our wellbeing. It’s something the BBC TV programme Easy Ways to Live Well has been looking at. 【小题2】 And maybe they could help us too.

Firstly, to tackle putting on weight and to cut the calories, the programme found sniffing peppermint (嗅薄荷) stops our desire for a snack. Presenter, chef and writer Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall says “a scientific theory called” mutual competition’ shows that a strong smell can distract (分心) our brain from the food we’re thinking about.”

If your addiction to your smartphone is getting you down, it’s suggested that turning your phone screen grey helps you reduce screen time. 【小题3】 With recent studies showing our phones can make us 26% less productive, it seems easy to try this idea.

【小题4】 Well, the BBC programme found a daily swim in freezing water gets you used to the stress of doing it and therefore prepares you for other life stresses. And another way to relax is to leave your smartphone at home, bury yourself in a forest, and breathe in the fresh air. Forest bathing is the perfect medicine for the stresses of urban life.

Other life-improving ideas included things such as singing to reduce pain and moving morel to get away from our sedentary (久坐的) lives. 【小题5】

Do you ever feel really afraid of failing? Do you think you have to be perfect all the time? Do you get very upset over small mistakes that you think you made and then imagine that makes the whole thing you are working on wrong? 【小题1】.

Perfectionists think that if they don’t act perfectly, they are really bad or worthless. 【小题2】. For example, you imagine other people judge you very harshly for very small mistakes. Perfectionists set really unrealistic goals for themselves, such as, I will make honor roll every year or never miss a step in that dance sequence. 【小题3】. This kind of thinking means you view situations as all good or all bad—nothing in between.

【小题4】. The first step is to help them identify their thoughts about a situation that’s distressing. They are advised to ask themselves, “What is going through my mind right now?” Then, if their next thought is along the lines of all-good or all-bad thinking such as “I made a mistake and now my project is ruined,” it is suggested that they ask themselves something about that thought. They could ask, “Is there a way to see my situation as not all good or bad, but as something in between?”

Setting realistic goals sounds like a crucial part of trying to avoid perfectionism, while still being motivated to do well. Yes, contrary to what most people think, you can still become very successful without being a perfectionist! 【小题5】. They can fail at a task and more easily bounce back from that failure.