Sometimes divorce, single parents and tragedy can make us feel like the family units that many of us came from are a thing of the past overnight. 【小题1】 They link our past general-lions with the bright hopes of our future.

Almost every family tradition has its roots in necessity. Over time, that necessity be-comes a feeling of sadness mixed with pleasure and affection when you think of happy times in the past, and eventually it just becomes another way for families to connect with one another. 【小题2】 , those traditions once again become necessities as they assume new meaning in the context of our need to communicate and understand our loved ones.

【小题3】 For example, it occurs lightly, weekly or on holidays. While your concept of family dinner may descend from a prior generation, it's those same traditions that we choose to preserve that keep us from sitting at the table.

The reason behind the usual traditional holidays, in fact, is about establishing a healthy and meaningful purpose for coming together. 【小题4】 and even for the unreligious family, they provide the simple pleasure of knowing that you'll see your loved ones at least that often. For religious families, the winter holidays still provide a healthy reminder to let the world go on spinning while we connect with our families and engage in our heritage together.

【小题5】 : not the holiday itself, but the reason it gives us to strengthen our faith—not just in our beliefs or our cultural duties, but our faith in our families and the love we share, too.

Have you ever wondered why other people don’t see things the same way you do? Isn’t it confusing that you don’t necessarily share the same viewpoints even when you come from the same family? Why can’t they just see it my way? The scientific explanation comes from cognitive (认知的) psychology; it’s a mental process known as information processing.

From a psychological perspective, you have your own internal set of core values, memories, and quality of emotion. With every external event you experience, the information comes in and is filtered (过滤) through your emotions, memories, and values. How you “see” yourself, others, and the world you live in will be flavored by what you’ve experienced or believe to be true. In other words, you don’t see things as they are — you see things as you are.

You have a process for filtering information and it may strike you as being odd, to say the least, when others don’t subscribe to the same beliefs, thoughts, and opinions. What if you considered, even for just a moment, that what you are perceiving is only one possibility — and that there are several other ways to interpret a situation?

In every walk of life, you find yourself defending your beliefs, arguing for how you remember something that happened, and positioning yourself to influence others to see things your way. But what if you’re missing the important point that your differences are what make life colorful? Those differences are what stimulate your mind and emotions. Without differences, life would be dull. There would be no “aha” moments if you knew everything. There would be no inspiration in the form of art, music, poetry, style, or communication.

There will be times in your life when boundaries may need to be enforced with others and, at the end of the day, you want to feel understood and appreciated. Learning to honor your viewpoints while others have their own is vital for coexisting in a world where every individual is perfectly unique.

More than 30 years ago, there was a well-known boxer named Eugene Hart. Hart was heavily favored to win his next round against an ungifted boxer, Antuofermo. It was said that the only thing that Antuofermo could do was “he bled well". However, here was an important thing. He had good qualities that you couldn't see.

During the fight, Hart controlled Antuofermo, knocking him down and giving him a good beating. Antuofermo absorbed the punishment that was dealt to him by his naturally superior opponent, and he did it so well that Hart became discouraged. In the fifth round, Hart began to tire, not physically but mentally. Taking advantage of the situation, Antuofermo attacked and knocked Hart down, thus ending the fight.

When the fighters went back to their temporary restrooms, only a thin curtain was between them. Hart's room was quiet, but on the other side he could hear Antuofermo's coach talking about who would take the fighter to the hospital. Finally he heard Antuofermo saying, "Every time he hit me with that left hook （左勾拳）to the body, I thought I was going to quit. After the second round, I thought if he hit me there again, I'd quit. I thought the same thing after the fourth round. But he stopped hitting me there."

At that moment, Hart began to weep. He was crying because for the first time he under- stood that Antuofermo had felt the same way he had and even worse. And the only thing that distinguished the guy who was talking from the guy who was crying was perseverance （毅力）. The coward （懦夫）and the hero had the same emotions. They're both humans.

The important question to ask yourself here is this： How does each man respond to the tough situation that they are experiencing? Maybe you are in a tough position right now or, if not, one might be coming. How will you react? Like a hero or a coward?