2 . On Us TV shows, you may sometimes see rubber balls on people’s desks. These balls are known as “stress relief balls”. People can squeeze them when they feel stressed out. It’s believed that by concentrating on the act of squeezing, they can let go of the negative energy in their bodies.

    1    Fortunately, we have many ways to deal with it.

In fact, the rubber stress relief balls that are so popular today in the US are believed to date back to ancient China.     2     By squeezing them during moments of anxiety, soldiers were able to calm themselves down before going into battle. And in the Ming Dynasty (1368—1644), people started rolling walnuts in their hands. Ordinary citizens—not just soldiers—developed the habit of rolling two walnuts, or balls made from iron or stone, around in their hands.     3    

And today, we have many gadgets (小器具) and toys that are designed to reduce stress in addition to stress relief balls. One example is the popular fidget spinner (指尖陀螺).     4     You just spin the gadget around. There’s also the fidget cube, which features different “gimmicks (机关)” on each side of the cube. You can click, spin, pull, push and rotate different parts of the cube.

    5     But perhaps we should take them more seriously. “After all, the history of stress balls is a history of modern-day coping,” reporter Nadia Berenstein wrote for Woolly magazine.

3 . Dancing with your grandma for 15 minutes a week promotes positive and improves her state of mind, a study claims. Doctors from Israel are urging younger family members to have a regular visit to their grandmas and have a dance with their grandmas.

And they found a 15 minute boogie (布吉舞) once a week lifted the spirits of the elder family members and helped strengthen the familial bond. In fact, it is called Dance Movement Therapy (DMT). DMT across the generations, complete with eye contact, was found to promote positive feelings and improve mood for the elderly.

The grandparents reported a bright state of mind, happy memories and uplifted spirits. Dancing has also previously been linked to improved muscle strength, balance and endurance. For the grandchildren in the study, the weekly boogie changed how they view ageing and allowed them to come to accept the eventual death of their elderly relative.

The study, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, assessed how dance affected the well-being of 16 dance movement therapists and their grandmothers. Dance movement therapy was paid attention due to the fact it is easily accessible and does not cost more to practice. The researchers were eager to examine a low—cost method to treat issues commonly faced by an ageing population—such as limited mobility and depression. Grandchildren were instructed to make eye contact and encourage playfulness and touch. They were also told to mirror their grandmothers’ movements and give them time and space to rest when needed,

The sessions were recorded and then analyzed while diaries and interviews captured the opinions and feelings of the participants. As well as the benefits to the health of the senior, the experiment also changed the idea of the younger family members.

Getting fit no longer require a pencil-and-paper workout plan. If you're looking for some new and creative ways to improve your health, just try Fit Time, a APP acting like your personal trainer. After getting all the informations about you, it will give you a plan, that asks you to work out four times a week for two months. The exercises focus to a different part of your body every day. For instance, on Monday, you do push-ups to build up your arms but on Tuesday, do deep-knee-bends helps you build up your legs. With this APP, you can share their workout results with others. It is probable a great way for you and your friends build stronger bodies.

5 . One can never find his/her potential until he/she has a try. When I retired five years ago, I started running. I was not a natural _________. I wanted to lose weight and it seemed that running was a_________way. At first it was very_________ — I was mainly walking more than running when I started — but I didn’t _________．When I started training running, I was just trying to build up stamina (耐力), and just the idea of even going two miles, but even walking was a_________. In the beginning, I just walked as much as I could and then as time went on, I_________began running. Later I kept on adding more and more _________．

I_________ my coach, Albert, in my running club, and he’d been running for over 25 years. He had a lot of knowledge and often sent various quotes to_________ and encourage us. Running the Los Angeles Marathon for the first time was probably the greatest__________of my life. I was really prepared, __________ Albert. I learned a lot of life lessons during the__________ : you have to believe in yourself   __________nobody else will. When I crossed the finishing line, I was so excited. I remembered just getting to the__________and realizing, “Oh, my God, I’m going to do this! ” I heard them say, “Welcome to the finishing line,” and I thought, “Wow, I was actually going to__________this!”

I could never have imagined myself doing the Los Angeles Marathon, and here I am and I made it. I was a true example that it’s never too late to present yourself with a new image, as long as you have faith and let that faith direct you.

The Chinese arm swinging exercise, also     1    (call) Shuai Shou Gong is so simple. You do nothing more than swing the arms, and     2     takes you only 10 minutes to learn. If you do it     3    (continuous), you will enjoy its benefits in a matter of days. It is an excellent way     4    (relax) your body after a day’s work. Practice it daily over time, and it brings you many benefits. It helps you stay healthy and in shape. There are also many reports     5     how it helps in healing. The women,     6     were in their 60s and 70s, also found day-to-day     7    (activity) easier after practicing it. Researcher Professor Neil Roberts of Edinburgh University, said “These findings demonstrate that the gentle, rhythmic, whole-body sequence of movements of Shuai Shou Gong may be readily learned and enjoyed by older adults and improves general health and wellbeing.”

The exercise routine, which is more than 1,000 years old,     8    (consist) of a sequence of five arm swings. The first four involve swinging the arms back and then forward, to shoulder height. During the     9    (five) swing, you bend your knees twice-once when     10    (swing) your arms back and again when bringing them forward. The sequence is then repeated multiple times.

Yours,

Lihua