From now on, never spend your precious time thinking of reasons for your failures and shortcomings. Instead, realize that the seeds of success were planted within you when you were born. Only you have the power to make those seeds grow.
The seeds, and the power to grow them, are contained in the most awesome (令人惊叹的) machine ever created: the human mind. Success is a choice and not a chance. You were born a winner. You were born rich. You can be a success if only you make the right choice.
You cannot be successful without first developing your self-esteem (自尊). Your level of self-esteem is always based on the degree of control that you are able to exercise over yourself, and thus over your life. People with low self-esteem are people who do not believe that they have any power, or responsibility for their lives. They are leaves tossed(摇摆)by the winds of chance blown about with any sudden change in the weather.
You can exercise control over your life only to the degree that you believe that you are responsible for everything that happens in your life. Failures think that everything happens by accident and chance. Successful people realize that they are responsible.
Everything happens as a result of something. If we can identify the cause, we can control the effect. We are responsible for what we choose to think and believe. One generally rises to the level that one expects. We are responsible for setting our expectations. Our success is dependent upon our level of confidence.
If you associate with positive-thinking people, you are definitely going to achieve success. On the contrary, the opposite happens. We are responsible for finding, planting, and nurturing (养育) the seeds that contain future victory, born from setbacks (挫折).
In short, in all areas of your life, whether they be financial, physical, emotional, or spiritual, you are responsible. Once you recognize this, accept it, and firmly believe it, you are on the road to success.
【小题1】People with low self-esteem are compared to leaves because they ______.A.are ready to change their minds |
B.don’t have the ability to control themselves |
C.can’t be successful with self-control |
D.are easily affected by windy weather |
A.their failure is accidental |
B.working hard will lead to success |
C.they are responsible for success |
D.they should make efforts to succeed |
A.our success results from our attitudes |
B.one can rise to the level that one expects |
C.we should be responsible for our thoughts and beliefs |
D.setting our expectations is essential before taking action |
A.the proof of the author’s points |
B.an introduction to another topic |
C.the conclusion of the argument |
D.a comparison between two views |
A.The secrets of success. |
B.How to achieve success. |
C.Develop our confidence. |
D.Success depends on you. |
When my son was about five or six, I traveled a lot on business. I worried all the time about what the absence might mean to him. I knew how important it was for a boy to have his father near. When I was small, the times I loved most were the special moments I shared with my father. I cherished these special moments and, to this day, hold those memories dear. I decided to create those kinds of special times for my son.
In one of my letters home, I promised my son that I would teach him how to fly a kite and that we could go to a nearby beach and fly it as high as it would go. Through my travels I would pick up things for our kite adventure and send them to him. In my trip to Japan, I found the most beautiful blue silk with gold threads woven through it. Perfect kite materials! I sent it home with a picture book that would serve as a weight.
When I got home at night, I found him sleeping sound, surrounded by all the items I had sent him for our kite. For the next week, we started to work on our masterpiece. We had our time together in the garage, after dinner. Finally, it was finished. The blue silk made it so beautiful. He was obviously eager to fly it soon. “We’ll fly it tomorrow, right, Dad?” “Yes, if the weather is right,” I explained that we needed wind to lift the kite off the ground. I was afraid that it might rain. “We’ll fly it because I’m going to pray with all my heart for the best kite weather.” He was right. I will never underestimate the power of a child’s prayer any more.
My son is a dad now, with children of his own. Though we are both busy, we still try to make time for each other. The other day, we met for coffee. While paying for our coffee, his wallet dropped on the ground and something fell out. Suddenly, a flood of memories washed over us as he put back his treasure into wallet — the blue silk with gold threads woven through it.
【小题1】What does the underlined word “cherished” in Paragraph 1 mean?A.kept | B.celebrated | C.valued | D.spent |
A.Giving special gifts. | B.Spending time together. |
C.Sending emails during the trip. | D.Teaching a special skill. |
A.Kite materials. | B.Travel books. | C.Foreign kites. | D.Picture books. |
A.People enjoy each other’s company. |
B.Men have the habit of keeping family gifts. |
C.Parents should take good care of their kids. |
D.The father’s love was well treasured. |
Despite the fact that there has never been so much wealth or so many wealthy people in the world, many of the world’s poor people still live in material and energy poverty. Could you and I cut back on our consumption (消耗) so as to make some space for others to increase theirs?
I am sure we could. But, unfortunately, everything about our economic systems is set up to make us believe and behave otherwise. The default (默认) mindset is that there is nothing wrong with wanting ever newer and more expensive things as long as we can afford them.
Look around you for a moment. No society anywhere before lived like this. Further, since our spending must necessarily be someone else’s income, we tell ourselves that we actually make the world a better place every time we buy another pair of shoes or trade in a car for the latest model. And that’s the tug (拉) of war that plays itself out cruelly in our lives, as one side of our age cries out “less”, and from the other side comes the answering cry “more”.
Of course, wanting to live a better life is deeply ingrained in human nature. Otherwise, we would never have generated the progress that has brought us to our present station.
But now we should think deeply about how and why we consume.
After all, even the earliest thinkers in the history of economic—including Adam Smith—thought, having more does not always translate into being happier. Evidence shows that many people in the developing world, despite being hard-up, report being just as happy as those in the materially rich societies of the West.
So what now? The answer, perhaps, is to try to be rich in the enjoyment of things, not in the accumulation (堆积) of them. A pair of good shoes, lightly creased (起皱) but also carefully polished (擦亮) once a month a meal cooked at home instead of a trip to McDonald’s—such as these lie our act of saving from the virus of compulsive (强迫性的) consumption.
【小题1】What can we infer from the first two paragraphs?A.People tend to buy things unreasonably. |
B.People refuse to cut down on consumption. |
C.People all face material and energy poverty. |
D.People believe in political and economic systems. |
A.Held. | B.Rooted. | C.Changed. | D.Possessed. |
A.Trying to be rich. | B.The more, the better. |
C.Enjoying what we have. | D.Focusing on the compulsive consumption. |
A.Entertainment. | B.Health. | C.Education. | D.Economy. |
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