首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
A Simple Truth about Happiness After I gave a talk on the subject of happiness, a woman in the audience stood up and said, "
A Simple Truth about Happiness After I gave a talk on the subject of happiness, a woman in the audience stood up and said, "
admin
2010-04-12
22
问题
A Simple Truth about Happiness
After I gave a talk on the subject of happiness, a woman in the audience stood up and said, "I wish my husband had come." "Much as I loved him." she explained, "it wasn’t easy being married to someone so unhappy." This woman enabled me to put into words what I had been searching for—altruistic, as well as the personal, reasons for taking happiness seriously. I told her that each of us owes it to our spouse, our children, our friends to be as happy as we can.
I was not a particularly happy child, and like most teenagers, I took pleasure in my anguish. One day, however, it occurred to me when I was taking the easy way out. Anyone could be unhappy, it took no courage and efforts. True achievement lay in struggling to be happy. The notion that we have to work at happiness comes as news to many people. We assume it’s a feeling that comes as a result of good things that just happen to us, things over which we have little or no control. But the opposite is true: happiness is largely under our control. It is a battle to be fought and not a feeling to be awaited. To achieve a happy life, it’s necessary to overcome some stumbling blocks, three of which are:
Comparison with Others Most of us compare ourselves with anyone we think is happier—a relative, an acquaintance or, often someone we barely know. I once met a young man who struck me as particularly successful and happy. He spoke of his love for his beautiful wife and their three daughters, and of his joy at being a radio talk-show host in a city he loved. I remember thinking that he was one of those lucky few for whom everything goes effortlessly right. Then we started talking about the Internet. He blessed its existence, he told me, because he could look up information on multiple sclerosis the terrible disease afflicting his wife. I felt like a fool for assuming nothing unhappy existed in his life.
Images of Perfection Almost all of us have images of how life should be. The problem, of course, is that only rarely do people’s jobs, spouses and children live up to these imagined ideals. Here’s a personal example: no one in my family had ever divorced. I assumed that marriage was for life. So when my wife and I divorced after five years of marriage and three years after the birth of our son, my world collapsed. I was a failure in my own eyes. I later remarried and confided to my wife that I couldn’t shake the feeling that my family life had failed. She asked me what was wrong with our family now (which included her daughter from a previous marriage and my son). I had to admit that, aside from the pain of being with my son only half the time(my ex-wife and I shared custody), our family life was wonderful. "Then why don’t you celebrate it?" she asked. That’s what I decided to do. But first I had to get rid of a "perfect" family.
"Missing the" Syndrome One effective way of destroying happiness is to look at something and focus on even the smallest flaw. It’s like looking at the tiled ceiling and concentrating on the space where one tile is missing. As a bald man told me, "whenever I enter a room, all I see is hair." Once you’ve determined what your missing tile is, explore whether acquiring it will really make you happy. Then do one of the three things: get it, replace it with a different tile, or forget about it and focus on the tiles in your life that are not missing.
We all know people who have had a relatively easy life yet are essentially unhappy. And we know people who have suffered a great deal but generally remain happy. The first secret is gratitude. All happy people are grateful. Ungrateful people cannot be happy. We tend to think that being unhappy leads people to complain, but it’s truer to say that complaining leads to people becoming unhappy.
The second secret is realizing that happiness is a byproduct of something else. The most obvious sources are those pursuits that give our lives purpose—anything from studying insects to playing baseball. The more passions we have, the more happiness we are likely to experience. Finally, the belief that something permanent transcends us and that our existence has some larger meaning can help us be happier. We need a spiritual faith, or a philosophy of life. Whatever your philosophy is, it should include this truism: if you choose to find the positive in virtually every situation, you will be blessed, and if you choose to find the awful, you will be cursed. As with happiness itself, this is largely your decision to make.
Acquiring happiness needs fighting with anguish and the result is beyond our control.
选项
A、Y
B、N
C、NG
答案
C
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/9Uj7777K
0
大学英语四级
相关试题推荐
A、15.B、135.C、50D、150C[听力原文]M:HowmanypeoplewillbecomingtothepartyonSaturday?W:Wehadtocrossofffifteennames
A、Tothesupermarket.B、Totherestaurant.C、Tothefitnessclub.D、Totheuniversity.AW:I’mmakingalist,havewerunoutof
A、Adesiretoexpressoneselfanddisplayone’swealth.B、Loveforbeautyandadesiretoimpressotherpeople.C、Individualtas
A、Becauseitwastheonlywaytobringaboutchanges.B、Becauseitofferedmoreopportunitiesforjobs.C、Becausewomendidnot
Givingyourfirstdinnerpartyisasourceoflaughter.Thecuesthattriggerlaughterhavebeenstudiedbyscientists.
A、InIndia.B、InEurope.C、Throughouttheworld.D、BothAandB.B信息明示题,本题的关键是文章中的one-third和Europe,文章虽然提到了India,但说的是老鼠给印度带来饥荒,故
Mediamogul(显要人物)TedTurneryesterdaysoldmorethanhalfofhisAOLTimeWarnerInc.holdingsforabout$780million,amovet
Thewonderswhichmedicalworkershavealreadybroughtupinthediagnosisandtreatmentofdiseasesuggestthatatime
A、Turningrightataredlight.B、Drivinginfreewayswithoutalocaldriver’slicense.C、Passingaschoolbusthatislettingo
A、Topracticedrivingwithanexperienceddriver.B、Todriveundernormalhighwaycondition.C、Tohavethecarcheckedbytheli
随机试题
前后都有缺隙的孤立前磨牙上最好设计A.单臂卡环B.三臂卡环C.对半卡环D.圈形卡环E.U形卡环
下列人员不属于知悉证券交易内幕信息知情人员的是()。
纸币流通条件下的特有现象是通货膨胀与()相联。
电算主管负责保证计算机硬件、软件的止常运行,防止利用计算机进行舞弊。()
个人及家庭收支流量大多以收付实现制计算。()[2009年5月二级真题]
物业服务合同可因()终止。
_______,_______,天似穹庐,笼盖四野。(北朝民歌《敕勒歌》)
简述《中华民国临时约法》的主要内容和特点。
对测谎仪的有用性无论怎样地过高估计都不为过。尽管没有100%准确的雇员审查程序,但是测谎仪对雇主和雇员来说都是一个非常有用的工具。最近,测谎仪的有用性被一名牌大学进行的一次调查报告充分地证实。在这个调查报告中,申请某一大公司内新设立的一个职位的职员被问及他
以下关于控件的叙述中,正确的是
最新回复
(
0
)