【推荐2】Some photographers have the good fortune to find a mentor in their young years who both inspires and encourages them. Jessica Backhaus found one in Gisele Freund, the great French photographer remembered for her portraits(肖像) of artists, especially writers. Gisele was a wonderful, sensitive portraitist whose pictures of Virginia Woolf, Andre Gide, James Joyce, George Bemard Shaw, Jean Cocteau, and a long list of well-known artists are unforgettable.

Jessica, a young photographer from Germany, was studying photography in Paris when she met the famous Gisele Freund, on November 5, 1992. Slowly a friendship developed, lasting until Gisele's death. in 2000; and in a way it still continues today. Gisele was generous in her concern for a new generation of photographers, and Jessica took to heart her advice to forget about technique and to take pictures with her eyes and heart. To thank her, Jessica decided to take the series of pictures published in the book One Day in November.

One day, before Jessica moved to New York, Gisele suggested that she write about their friendship. The book One Day in November begins with Jessica's essay on their shared memories and conversations, followed by her photographs. She calls it a visual poem, pointing out that she expresses in pictures rather than words.

The excellent photographs from her book can be seen in a splendid exhibition at Laurence Miller Gallery, along with a series of pictures from three of her other books: Jesus and the Cherries, portraits taken in a Polish village where time stood still; What Still Remains. pictures of objects left behind; and a new book of light reflections on water, I Wanted to See the World. All are guided by Gisele's advice and all are quite wonderful.

【推荐3】If you’re one of the people who find it difficult to make small talk at parties, it may be because you’re asking the wrong questions, experts said.

For example, while the question "What do you do? "is a classic conversation starter，it may lead to an embarrassing moment if your conversation partner is unemployed or simply doesn’t want to talk about work.

Instead of “What do you do?”, try asking "What keeps you busy?"expert Daniel Post Senning said. That way, the question applies to people whether or not they have traditional jobs.

As it turns out, Senning considers work life one of the most intimate(私密的) conversation topics, right up there with family, health, and finance. Slightly less intimate topics include politics and dating, while the safest topics to discuss include sports, weather and pop culture.

Meanwhile, in other countries, the "What do you do? " question could even be taken as offensive (冒犯的). In France,for example, "They will be offended, believing you’ re trying to put them into a box, "culture writer Julie Barlow said. “And they just don’t think it’s interesting to work for a living. There are other things they’d much rather talk about.”

But other than rephrasing(改述) the question, there are plenty of other strategies you can use to start meaningful conversations with strangers.

For one, it helps to ask your conversation partner open-ended questions, which prompt(引起)more detailed answers than yes-or-no questions. A question like "Did you have a good weekend? "will get a less thought-provoking (发人深思的) response than “What was the best part of your weekend?”

Communication expert Yasmin Sara Merchant also recommends preparing a few conversation topics in advance related to the event, like "How do you know the host? "or “What is your connection to this event?”

【推荐2】When I was five years old, I played the role of the tortoise in a play. I had one line at the end when I beat the sleeping rabbit: The slow and steady one wins the race. I’ve always felt that those words guide my work. I am never the fastest, but I keep going. My goal is always the same: to learn more this year than what I learned last year.

The goal of education is not to have much knowledge as quickly as possible, but to have much knowledge and keep it in the brain. I don’t care how “fast” students learn something as a teacher. There may be a lot of reasons someone picks up a subject or topic more quickly: more background, knowing the material early, more sleep that night, less stress, and so on. We deal with information differently. When I see slow students, that’s what I think of: Are those the students who will keep learning over their entire lifetime, and leave the “quick” students far behind?

I was slow in my math classes in university. Looking back on those days, I’ve come to realize that one of the ways I learn is “mistake based”. That means I learn by making mistakes. This may be slower than other ways of learning, but when I learn something, I really learn it.

I seldom worried about “slow learners” when teaching medical students. I knew these young men and women could learn. There is a lot of material to learn in medicine, but there is also lots of time. Like in so many other jobs, knowledge is only a part of being a doctor. I spent decades learning enough to be a doctor and decades more keeping up and improving. It never stops, and never should.

【推荐3】Sometimes people come into your life and you know at once that they were sure to be there. They serve some certain purpose, teach you a lesson or help find out who you are or who you want to become. You never know who these people may be: your classmate, neighbor, teacher, long-lost friend or even a real stranger. But you know that every moment they will influence your life in some serious way.

Sometimes things happen to you. At the time they may seem terrible, painful and unfair. But later you realize that without overcoming those difficulties, you would have never realized your further ability and advantages. Everything happens for a reason and nothing happens by chance or with good or bad luck.

The people you meet influence your life, and the success and failure you experience create who you are. Even the bad experience can be learned from. In fact, they are probably the most poignant and important ones.

Enjoy every day even every moment and take from it everything that you possibly can, for you may never be able to experience it again. Talk to people whom you have never talked to before, and really listen. You should set your goals high, hold your head up, tell yourself you are a great one and believe in yourself.

You can make your life anything you wish. Create your own life and then go out and live it.