Do you know the proverb “no pain, no gain”? It gives the impression that we ought to be suffering while we study. It seems that the only way to know if we’ re putting in enough work is how much hardship we bear. We are totally taken up with study, shutting ourselves away for a big exam. Is that necessarily true?

When we haven’t taken the time to come up with another idea, we just shut ourselves in a room with a book. It’s no surprise that we find revision boring and difficult. Just as children learn from playing, we can learn from doing, or at least from study techniques that interest us, rather than make us switch off. Shutting ourselves away can make us learn to hate studying, leading to a situation where, instead of being able to concentrate on our work, we are troubled by how unfair it is that we must study. This can be part of a vicious cycle (恶性循环) that traps us into ineffective revision, or poor progress fueling further annoyance.

Thankfully, working in the company of other people really helps fight against that. We just need to learn how to deal with distractions(使人分心的事). It’s not necessary to avoid all company, just lazy company. They constantly try to keep others in conversation, while studying in the same room with someone who is ironing or working out is perfectly possible. Of course, it’s also a good idea to avoid the company of people involved in activities where you would rather be playing than studying. Working while sitting next to someone playing video games is most likely to end with a new high score of games rather than productive revision.

If being around others means working in a noisy environment, a pair of headphones and some background music can block out noises. They also act as a psychological barrier, so that people think twice before interrupting you. Besides, we should know friends and family can lessen feelings of isolation. And connecting with other people makes us happy, so it’s important not to give that up and to make sure that we take the time to socialize.

When night falls in the Netherlands, lights dance across a farm and create a dreamy landscape. Here, in a field inspired by beauty and equipped with photobiology, art meets with agriculture. Yet, there is more than what meets the eye; these glowing lights also provide higher production and more sustainable crops.

This magical field is part of a project called GROW and was created by Dutch designer Daan Roosegaarde. Living in the city, he had a desire to connect people to the source（源头）of their food in an inspiring way. “How can we make the farmer the hero? We barely know where our food comes from,” Roosegaarde said in the video describing the project.

His vision was to combine science and art, and in so doing, create a better world. Desiring to offer the world light in dark times, he set to work in a 5-acre field of leeks（韭葱）. He used his own design concept alongside artists, a team of designers, and experts at the Wageningen University.

Using the science of photobiology, the group discovered that certain mixes of red, blue, and ultraviolet lights accelerate plant growth. The team then put LEDs in different places across the field. These lights move up and down in order to ensure the light is evenly distributed across the area. And when these lights move at night, they seem to dance, creating a poetic dreamscape. “It’s very futuristic and also very romantic, in a way,” Roosegaarde said.

Aside from being beautiful and promoting growth, the team observed that due to these lights, they needed to use 50 percent less pesticides（杀虫剂）on the crop. This is because this specific recipe of lights activated the defense system of the plants. And as it works on all crops, not just leeks, Roosegaarde foresees a way to reduce the use of pesticides on many other plants. And his project will soon be touring 40 countries, and sending its dancing lights across the world.