【推荐2】Music With A View

Summer may well be the favourite season of classical music lovers, with numerous festivals taking place worldwide. And what’s better than enjoying a live performance of your favourite piece? Enjoying it in the great outdoors, of course!

Edinburgh International Festival Scotland

Edinburgh International Festival is Edinburgh’s arts offering, and in 2023 welcomes violinist Nicola Benedetti in her first year as festival director. Picking up the baton (接力棒)from previous director Fergus Linehan, she is the first female Festival Director since the Festival began in 1947. Benedetti will invite some popular symphony orchestras.

August 4-August 27, eif.co.uk

Puccini Festival, Italy

Since 1930, the festival has been presenting Puccini’s masterpieces to crowds of thousands in beautiful Torre del Lago every summer. We’re picturing hot Italian summer days closing with a gentle warmth, together with fine opera and a cool glass of wine in hand and the waters of Lake Massaciuccoli.

July 14 -August 26, puccinifestival.it

Verbier Festival, Switzerland

One of the main reasons to visit the Verbier Festival in the summer is that it’s a magical two-week celebration of classical music at the top of the world. The festival has become known for attracting the biggest soloists (独唱者) in the world. The real magic of Verbier is its ideas of connecting great musicians at the height of their careers with ambitious young artists.

July 14 - July 30, verbierfestival.com

Granada International Festival, Spain

Since 1952, the International Festival of Music and Dance of Granada has been held in the palace to show opera, ballet, Spanish dance and more. In 2023, the festival will team up with University of Granada to invite talented students to take part in the Manuel de Falla Courses, which offer masterclasses in composition, musical analysis, performance and face-to-face talk with great musicians including Víkingur Ólafsson and Daniil Trifonov.

June 21 - July 19, granadafestival.org

【推荐1】Strategies for Getting Kids off Screens

It’s time to keep kids off the screens! Parents should use the winter vacation to remind their children of what it’s like to play freely, offline for hours on end.     1    . Here are some practical strategies for giving kids a screen-free winter.

Set clear screen time limits

Establish how many minutes or hours you’re OK with them each week, and make it something that can never be changed. For example, you could say they’re allowed to watch for an hour on Sunday morning, or for 15 minutes in the evening while dinner is being made, or none at all for the rest of the winter—and then stick to it.     2    

Get kids cooking

Involve them in meal preparation by assigning recipes that you’d like them to make each day.     3    . And you’ll have many tasty dishes at the end of it,

    4    

There are numerous half- and full-day camp options and lessons that can occupy a child’s time, such as swimming, art classes, tennis, dinosaur camp and sports camp. Look around your community for activities that can get them out of the house for a few hours each day.

Establish a reading routine (习惯)

    5    . Take your kid along to choose what she or he wants to read, and that will help keep them enthusiastic. Back home and see if you can set up a comfortable reading corner where they will be willing to read and let reading become a good habit gradually.

【推荐2】Since terrorist attack in 2019 that killed 50 people in New Zealand was livestreamed on Facebook, many of the negative effects of social media have begun to be known. So far, it’s not looking good.

Not that social media is bad in nature. It does not necessarily cause mental health problems. What it is doing, however — especially in young people, a new study argues — is increasing the number of cases of young people’s depression (抑郁) and suicide (自杀).

The new study, led by psychologist Jean Twenge at San Diego State University, has researched the effects of technology and social media on the teenager brain. For this study, Twenge and her partners researched data (数据) from 2005 to 2017. They wanted to know what age groups suffered more from depression. Chance of mood disorders (紊乱), they write, “generally becomes less with age.” In this date range, depressive cases increased by 63 percent among young people aged 12 to 17, and 52 percent among young adults aged 18 to 25.

There are two tendencies that appear to be causing this problem.

According to the study, the increased use of electronic communication and digital media during this time period may have changed ways of socializing enough to affect mood disorders and suicide-related results. For example, people who spend more time on social media and less time with others face-to-face report poorer health and are more likely to be depressed.

Tied into increased screen time, which could lead to being affected by cyber-bullying, are sleep issues. Sleep duration is decreasing among all age groups, but especially young adults during a time in life when they need it the most. Lack of sleep has been linked to mood disorders, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts.

Using the technology for good is one step forward. But another would be to put the phone down more often. If you’ve only grown up in a world viewed through a screen, learning that other world — namely, the real one -— exists might seem impossible. Therefore, some distance is feeling more necessary day by day.

【推荐1】In high school, she was bullied. After college, it was difficult to find a job. But through all the difficult times, Collette Divitto, has had one thing that makes her happy: baking. Divitto, who has Down syndrome (唐氏综合征), decided to channel her passion into a career, opening her own cookie company.

“So actually, I always loved baking, since I was 4 years old. From high school, I had been taking baking classes,” said Divitto, 31. “It was a hard time for me. I had no friends. I didn’t have a social life. I got bullied. I got picked on. And that’s why I had been taking baking classes.”

After high school, Divitto went to Clemson University in South Carolina, but after graduating, it was difficult for her to find jobs. So, she turned to her mom, who helped her create her own job: CEO of Collettey’s Cookies.

“There’re lots of amazing things happening,” Divitto said of the opportunities coming her way. She says her favorite part about running her business is hiring people with disabilities. Collettey’s Cookies helps people with disabilities prepare for their careers, by offering workshops and guidance.

In 2020, just 17.9% of people with a disability were employed. But Divitto believes many want to work, federal law does not require employers to pay them minimum wage. That means companies can pay people with disabilities whatever they think they’re worth — something Divitto is working to change.

She has appealed to society to help create more jobs for people with disabilities, which she hopes gets the attention of Congress. Collettey’s Cookies now has 15 employees, and about half of them are people with disabilities. And they have a strong leader to look up to. “No matter who you are, you can make a great difference in this world,” Divitto said. “Don’t let people bring you down... Do not focus on your disabilities. You only need to focus on your abilities.”

【推荐2】If you’re like me, patience is a virtue that doesn’t come without effort. It takes a lot of practice, and I’m devoting a year to the pursuit. Patience is my word for 2022. Maybe you’ re still trying to settle on yours, and I’d love to hear about it.

I picked patience one Saturday after my daughter Evie had pressed the “Can I call you later?” auto reply instead of answering her cell phone. Twice. I’d waited a couple hours in between calls, and that was after having texted her first thing that morning just to say hi. Worry built while I cleaned the fish tank, slightly admiring the simple aquatic life.

Evie was a college student, living off campus with three roommates. They looked out for one another, all were smart and careful, and I had no reason to think Evie was in real trouble. But maybe she’d had a spat with one of her friends or was running low on money. Maybe she was drowning in schoolwork. I imagined a million what-ifs. Weren’t cell phones made to put a parent’s mind at ease? Evie was going to get a mouthful when she finally found a free minute to tell me that I didn’t need to worry.

I filled the aquarium with fresh water, and my impatience reached the top as well. The fish swam laps in the crystal-clear tank. I wished I were more like these peaceful angels living in the moment. Evie finally called late that night. She was at a party but wanted to catch me before I went to bed. “Sorry, Mom. Today was so busy and great!” I told her that was just what I had imagined. I didn’t mention that I was practicing a whole new way to wait.

【推荐2】The comfort zone is a safe space where we don’t risk, but neither do we grow.     1     Change and growth occur. We can not become what we want to be, remaining in what we are today. There are many good reasons to be encouraged to leave the comfort zone.

Prepare yourself for difficult times. Safe as we feel in our comfort zone, that space will not protect us from the problems, which usually appear in life in an unexpected way producing great changes.     2     These problems can produce psychological disorders. But learning to live outside the comfort zone, dealing with novelty and uncertainty will make us people emotionally stronger.

    3     The comfort zone represents everything we know. Outside is another world to discover. In the comfort zone there are no great ideas or new discoveries. It’s necessary to leave the known to find the inspiration to creativity. In fact, a study conducted at the University of Florida found that students who spent just one term outside their country scored better on creativity tests than those who had been studying at the same university.

Feel more alive. Leaving the comfort zone, we meet new people and live new experiences. Some of these experiences will not be positive but others will become a driving force that gives us new energy. Thus we’re learning to enjoy more life.     4    

Exercises to get out of your comfort zone will allow you to expand your growth zone without experiencing too much anxiety.     5     That’s in the growth zone, and you can reach the best of ourselves, learn new things.

【推荐3】Challenges are part of life and something we can all expect to encounter at one point or another during our lifetime. We handle challenges differently;some of us choose to face them head-on, while others flee in uncertainty.     1    The following are simple methods and strategies we can all employ to overcome challenges more effectively.

    2     Nike couldn’t have said it any better with their slogan, "Just do it! "Some challenges require us to do just that. Grab the bull by its horns and have the courage to conquer it, no matter how unsure we might feel. Some challenges are urgent and require immediate attention, leaving us with no option but to go ahead full-steam.

Educate ourselves. The reason why some issues prove challenging for us is that we aren’t familiar with them.     3     The internet, books, forums, etc. , offer platforms where we can research and learn about our challenges to find strategies against them. Knowledge is definitely powerful and essential in conquering anything.

Be persistent. This is what is required to accomplish anything, especially when it comes to overcoming challenges. No matter how difficult our challenges might be, we must be willing to push through and try again and again until we achieve victory over them.     4    

Ask for help. There are times when we can’t go it alone and need others to help us conquer whatever challenges we face.     5     Networking with like-minded individuals who can offer us support, suggestions, and solutions is useful in helping us overcome challenges.