Dealing with Difficult Relationships

Everyone has at least one awkward or     1     relationship. It may be with somebody who will     2     your energy whenever you are with them. Or worse, it could be someone who always cuts you down. This person may be a family member or even a friend. No matter who it is, it’s necessary that you learn to set boundaries for yourself. Otherwise this kind of relationship can chip away at your self-esteem.

Setting boundaries for difficult relationships starts by     3     how you are affected by the relationship. Do they bring you closer to your goals or pull you farther away? For example, it’s time to study for tomorrow’s test. But your friend wants to take you to a party. Here, setting boundaries will help protect your     4     goals.

Next, decide how much time you should spend with these people. It’s easy to overcommit yourself. But it’s difficult to help others if you forget to protect your own     5    .

How do you know if a relationship is unhealthy, and it’s time to set boundaries? Here are a few practical questions to ask yourself.

1. How does this relationship affect me?

Every     6     can affect you positively or negatively. For example, someone who pressures you to something you’re not comfortable doing will     7     you out. But a friend who considers how you feel will respect your     8     to try something new.

2. Why am I in this relationship in the first place?

People may try to keep you in an unhealthy relationship. By     9     you it’s your obligation or duty, you forget about your own needs. Sadly, by remaining     10     to these people, you forget who you are. You allow them to take advantage of you or even belittle you.

Settling boundaries requires taking a long, honest look at yourself. By saying “no” to harmful patterns in relationships, you say “yes” to a healthier you.

Some personal characteristics play a vital role in the development of one’s intelligence. After a 30-year follow-up study of 8, 000 males, American psychologists found out that the main cause of disparities in intelligence is not intelligence itself, but non-intelligence factors. The so-called “non-intelligence factors” include one’s feelings, will,       1    , interests and habits.

Though people all know that one should have       2     objectives, a strong will and good learning habits, quite a number of teachers and parents don’t pay much attention to       3     these factors.

Some parents are greatly worried when their children fail to do well in their studies. They blame either       4     factors, malnutrition, or laziness, but they never take into consideration these non-intelligence factors. At the same time, some teachers don’t inquire into these as reasons why students do poorly. They simply give them more courses and exercises, or even       5     or laugh at them. After all, these students lose self-confidence. Some of them just feel defeated and give themselves up as hopeless. Others may go astray because they are sick of learning. An investigation of more than 1，000 middle school students in Shanghai showed that 46. 5 percent of them were afraid of learning because of examination and 36. 4 percent       6     persistence, initiative and conscientiousness.

It is clear that the lack of cultivation of non-intelligence factors has been a main obstacle to intelligence development in teenagers. It even causes a(n)       7     between physiological and psychological development among a few students.

If we don't start now to       8     the cultivation of non-intelligence factors, it will not only obstruct the development of the intelligence of teenagers, but also affect the       9     of a whole generation. Some experts have put forward suggestions about how to cultivate students’ non-intelligence factors.

First, parents and teachers should       10     understand teenage psychology. On this basic, they can help them to pursue the objectives of learning, exciting their interests and toughening their willpower.

What is the first thing you notice when you walk into a shop? The products displayed at the     1    ? Or the soft background music?

But have you ever noticed the smell? Unless it is bad, the answer is     2     to be no. But while a shop’s scent（香味）may not be     3     compared with sights and sounds, it is certainly there. And it is proving to be an increasingly powerful tool in encouraging people to purchase.

A brand store has become famous for its distinctive scent which     4     through the fairly dark hall and out to the entrance, via scent machines. A smell may be attractive but it may not just be used for freshening air. One sports goods company once reported that when it first introduced scent into its stores, customer’s     5     to purchase increased by 80 percent.

When it comes to the best shopping streets in Paris, scent is just as important to a brand’s success as the quality of its window displays and goods on sale. That is     6     because shopping is a very different experience to what it used to be.

Some years ago, the     7     for brand name shopping was on a few people with sales assistants’     8     attitude and don’t-touch-what-you-can’t-afford displays. Now the rise of electronic commerce (ecommerce) has opened up famous brands to a wider audience. But while e-shops can use sights and sounds, only bricks and mortar stores（实体店）can offer a full experience from the minute customers step through the door to the moment they leave. One brand store seeks to be much more than a shop, but rather a    9    . And scent is just one way to achieve this.

Now, a famous store uses complex manmade smell to make sure that the soft scent of baby powder floats through the kid department. Another department store has even opened a new lab,     10     customers on a journey into the store’s windows to smell books, pots and drawers, in search of their perfect scent.