Failure is probably the most exhausting experience a person ever has. There is nothing more tiring than not succeeding.

We experience this tiredness in two ways: as start-up fatigue (疲惫) and performance fatigue. In the former case, we keep putting off a task because it has either too boring or too difficult. And the longer we delay it, the more tired we feel.

Such start-up fatigue is very real, even if not actually physical, not something in our muscles and bones. The solution is obvious though perhaps not easy to apply: always handle the most difficult job first.

Years ago, I was asked to write 102 essays on the great ideas of some famous authors. Applying my own rule, I determined to write them in alphabetical order, never letting myself leave out a tough idea. And I always started the day’s work with the difficult task of essay-writing. Experience proved that the rule works.

Performance fatigue is more difficult to handle. Though willing to get started, we cannot seem to do the job right. Its difficulties appear so great that, however hard we work, we fail again and again. In such a situation, I work as hard as I can—then let the unconscious take over.

When planning Encyclopedia Britannica( 《大英百科全书》), I had to create a table of contents based on the topics of its articles. Nothing like this had ever been done before, and day after day I kept coming up with solutions, but none of them worked. My fatigue became almost unbearable.

One day, mentally exhausted, I wrote down all the reasons why this problem could not be solved. I tried to convince myself that the trouble was with the problem itself, not with me. Relived, I sat back in an easy chair and fell asleep.

An hour later, I woke up suddenly with the solution clearly in mind. In the weeks that followed, the solution which had come up in my unconscious mind proved correct at every step. Though I worked as hard as before, I felt no fatigue. Success was now as exciting as failure had been depressing.

Human beings, I believe, must try to succeed. Success, then, means never feeling tired.

It is sad to learn that fewer of us now own pets. According to Mintel, just 56% of UK households（家庭）today include a pet, compared with 63% in 2012. It is down to our smaller homes. The housing crisis（危机）is taking away one of our life’s joys: pets.

Pets can help us get over serious illness. Pets lessen our anxiety. Pets can be a godsend for people experiencing various forms of mental disorders. As if all that were not enough, pets also help their owners get a date because of complex psychological reasons.

There do, of course, remain oppositions to the very idea of pets. The charity PET A puts it thus: “This selfish desire to own animals and receive love from them causes immeasurable suffering, which results from selling or giving them away casually, and taking away their opportunity to enjoy their natural behavior.” This is undoubtedly true in some situations. But seen from a different point of view, there’s something quite lovely about the story of people and their companion animals.

What was once a relationship based only on the animal’s functional effects—its ability to kill pests（害虫）, guard houses, and the like—has developed into something much more about care and love.

We share 84% of our DNA with dogs. We share 90% of our DNA with mice, for good ness sake. I have no idea how that works. But still pets remind（提醒）us we’re part something bigger. Pets break down the barriers between us and the animal kingdom. We may teach pets to roll over, stand up, order takeaways and so on. But they teach us much more: that life is actually really quite short and so should be filled as much as possible with life-giving experiences.

The coronavirus has been a catalyst for change in many areas of our lives. As things return to normal, one thing that is likely to remain for many is the practice of working from home, known as telecommuting.

Much like the cloud classroom, the cloud office enables employees to cooperate, access resources and operate software from any location. Without doubt, communication tools play an important role. Video and voice chat allow a team, regardless of location, to work together as if they're in the same office.

The rise of telecommuting is due in part to time-tracking applications and software that allows employers to monitor productivity. Wechat Work and Work Examiner are all popular options that have been adopted by thousands of companies. These tools make employers feel secure that remote workers are staying on task. As an increasingly popular approach to work, the objective of the cloud office is to find the ideal balance between home and office work.

According to CNBC, a study showed that 85 percent of millennials（千禧一代）preferred working from home as it gives them a healthier work-life balance, flexible hours and more autonomy. It also showed that firms could save $ 11,000per person each year by allowing employees to work from home.

However, not everyone sees this revolution as positive. According to Bloomberg, in a survey of 1,001 US workers, 45 percent felt burnt out due to the increased workload, decreased communication and the requirement to juggle（兼顾）professional and personal life.

There has indeed been a mixed reaction to the move amid the pandemic.

It's believed that it will become more manageable once lockdown measures are fully lifted worldwide. And by then, who knows what tasks we could all achieve from the comfort of our sofas?