1 . Gratitude, which is a positive emotional state, can have a profound impact on our mental, emotional, and physical well-being.

Gratitude offers us a way of embracing (拥抱) all that makes our lives what they are.     1     It includes the willingness to expand our attention so that we perceive more of the goodness we are always receiving.

Robert Emmons is one of the world’s leading experts on the science of gratitude.     2     The first is an affirmation of goodness: People can learn to wake up to the good around them and notice the gifts they have received. The second part of gratitude is recognizing that the source of this goodness rests outside of oneself — we receive these gifts from other people, and sometimes from fate, or the natural world.     3    

In one study involving nearly 300 adults seeking counseling services at a university, one group wrote a gratitude letter each week for three weeks. The gratitude group reported significantly better mental health (compared to the control group), 12 weeks after the last writing exercise.     4     A study of this practice found that people who wrote down three things that had gone well in their day and identified the causes of those good things were significantly happier and less depressed.

    5     When you practice gratitude, you shift your thoughts away from negative emotions and uncomfortable sensations. Instead, you begin to focus on good things that you may have overlooked. Rather than focusing on the misfortune of having a flat tire, for example, you consider how your job has made it possible to pay for repairs. Or you shift your focus to how fortunate you are to have close friends who are willing to drive you home.

2 . The Ark

Shanghai International Dance Center Theater will present “The Ark” this weekend, a two-dance performance by Chinese and foreign female choreographers (编舞者).

“Build Beauty” by Chinese choreographer Gong Xingxing and “Last Man Standing” by German choreographer Sita Ostheimer, comprise “The Ark”. Artists from Xiexin Dance Theater will perform both works.

Time: December 23, 7:30 pm

Admission:180 — 580 yuan

Venue: Shanghai International Dance Center Theater

Belt and Road Initiative

The exhibition narrates the history of the ancient Silk Road and Shanghai’s modern development. It features over 250 documents, artifacts, photos and videos. About 80 percent of the exhibits are on display in Shanghai for the first time. Highlighted items include a tiny replica (模型) of the treasure ship of Zheng He and some historical documents.

Time: Through late April, 2024

Admission: Free

Venue: Shanghai Archives

Live in Love!

The Shanghai Rainbow Chamber Singers will lead audiences to welcome the New Year with a concert “Live in Love!”

Starting at 10:00 pm on Sunday, the concert features RCS’s original compositions covering the themes of love, memory, and farewells. The concert will end with the title song “Live in Love!” Audiences will be invited to stand up and set their emotions free together with the singers to welcome the New Year.

Time: December 31, 10:00 pm

Admission:180 — 1,080 yuan

Venue: Shanghai Oriental Art Center

Inside No. 9

The popular British TV series “Inside No. 9” has been adapted into an immersive (沉浸式的) live theater performance. Three “Inside No. 9” stories will be performed live for the audience. The specially designed seats and stages will provide audiences with a one-of-a-kind immersive theater experience.

Time: Through February 29, 2:50 pm/7:30 pm/8:20 pm

Admission:489 —   589 yuan

Venue: Shanghai Grand Theater

3 . Climate change causes tens of billions of dollars in economic damage in the United States every year. Climate change is expensive, deadly but preventable, according to the new National Climate Assessment, the most sweeping, sophisticated federal analysis of climate change compiled to date.

“Climate change affects us all, but it doesn’t affect us all equally,” says climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, one of the authors of the assessment.

“The research indicates that people with lower income have more trouble adapting to climate change, because adaptation comes at a cost,” says Solomon Hsiang, a climate economist at the University of California.

For example, one of the simplest ways to adapt to severe heat waves is to run your air conditioner more. But “if people can’t pay for it, then they can’t protect themselves,” explains Hsiang.

Weather-related disasters in the U. S. cause about $150 billion each year in direct losses, according to the report. That’s a lot of money and it’s only expected to go up as the Earth gets hotter. And the hotter it gets, the more profound the economic harm. Twice as much planetary warming leads to more than twice as much economic harm, the assessment warns.

But it also points out many successful efforts underway to adapt to the new reality and to prevent worse outcomes. “It’s not the message that if we don’t hit 1.5 degrees, we’re all going to die,” says Hayhoe. “It’s the message that everything we do matters. Every 10th of a degree of warming we avoid, there’s a benefit to that.”

There’s been a slight shift in the report’s perspective since the last one, says Candis Callison, a sociologist and author of the report. There’s now a clear acknowledgement, development, developed through years of rigorous research, that the fossil fuel-powered society the U. S. built over generations was profoundly unjust. “Climate change actually provides us with an opportunity to address some of those inequities (不公平) and injustices — and to respond to these impacts,” Callison says. “That’s really a powerful thing.”

4 . Do you believe that most people are greedy or generous? It is easy to come up with examples of stories that could support either conclusion if we are relying on our memories or on our guts (直觉).

Recently, a team of researchers sought to investigate this question in partnership with the TED organization. TED generously gave away $10,000 each to 200 lucky individuals (yes, you read that correctly), which essentially means these participants won a lottery. Besides, they were asked to spend all the money in three months rather than save it). These participants were from three low-income countries (Indonesia, Brazil, Kenya) and four high-income countries (Australia, Canada, UK, USA). Over the next three months, participants were asked to track their spending to examine how generously or selfishly this money was spent. They reported their spending to the researchers a few months later.

Of the $10,000 participants received, they spent $6,431 on other people. To be clear, this also included certain behaviors in which the participants themselves benefited personally (such as taking their friends out to dinner or paying for a family vacation). But still, people are very generous. Participants gave away $1,697 strictly to charity or nonprofit organizations.

The researchers expected that if people publicly shared how they spent their money, they would be more generous. To check if this was correct, they asked half of the participants to post on Twitter about how they spent the money. The other half were asked to keep their spending “private”.

Surprisingly, the researchers saw that “generous spending was similar” between Twitter and private groups. The mini lottery winners were no more or less generous depending on whether they posted their spending on Twitter or kept it to themselves. The authors admitted they expected the Twitter group to spend more generously, but this prediction was not supported by the data. People did not need to have their spending shown publicly to behave generously.

5 . I was sitting in the doctor’s office waiting for my annual check-up. The doctor threw in a(n) ________ that took me off guard.

“So Robin, what are you going to do after high school? Why don’t you go to college to become a(n) ________ like me?” he asked while writing on the file.

Go to college to become a doctor? Who was this man kidding? I thought he was ________ for even suggesting it. My grades were ________ and I wasn’t college material. Embarrassed by his question, I ________ to the doctor, “I’m not ________ enough to be a doctor.”

The doctor immediately looked at me straight in the eyes when he said very ________, “You don’t have to be clever to be a doctor. You just have to be persistent (坚持不懈的).”

Even though I wasn’t college material, what the doctor said ________ me. Three years later, I ________ to a college close to my home and soon found myself walking the campus as a new student.

I began ________ anything that seemed frightening. I put all my energy toward passing the assignments one by one. I ________ that when I was persistent, I could ________ things I never believed possible.

I graduated with a master’s degree in September 2023, two decades after that ________ with my doctor. I ________ I could shake his hand and tell him “thank you”. Sometimes even the smallest moments in time can have a life-changing ________.

Bai Tinggui, who was born in the 1990s, is     1     attendant for the high-speed trains on the Chongqing section of China Railway Chengdu Bureau Group Co Ltd. This     2     (year) Spring Festival travel rush marks a decade of her dedicated service.

Every time she met elderly passengers     3     traveled alone, she would think of her grandparents, which made her start to think about how to provide more assistance for the elderly.

Gradually, through her work, Bai became familiar     4     more public welfare work and was     5     (active) engaged in related projects. In the last three years, she     6     (participate) in various activities as a volunteer, offering help to those in need. In addition to her daily work, Bai also uses her time off     7     (help) key groups such as the elderly and children at the railway station.

Bai Tinggui’s story is a beacon(灯塔) of hope     8     a reminder of the impact one individual can make. Her dedication to service extends beyond her professional responsibilities. Her involvement in volunteer activities     9     (be) a testament to her belief in giving back to the community. And there surely will be a growing trend among individuals in the railway sector to participate in social welfare activities,     10     (contribute) to a more inclusive and supportive society.

9 . This year, it was harder than ever to get into Harvard University. The prestigious college announced their lowest acceptance rate ever, welcoming only 1,968 of 57,435 first-year applicants into their hallowed halls. Thanks to Abigail Mack’s moving, insightful essay, she will be one of the lucky students to matriculate this fall.

The Massachusetts high school senior used TikTok to share a part of the essay that made her one of the 4 percent of applicants who made the cut. Her essay focused on an unusual theme: the letter “S.”

“I hate the letter ‘S’,” she read aloud on TikTok. “Of the 164,777 words with ‘S’, I only struggle with one. To condemn an entire letter because of its use 0.0006 percent of the time sounds statistically unreasonable, but that one case changed 100 percent of my life. I used to have two parents, but now I have one, and the ‘S’ in ‘parents’ isn’t going anywhere.”

“‘S’ follows me,” she continued. “I can’t get through a day without being reminded that while my friends went out to dinner with their parents, I ate with my parent. As I write this essay, there is a blue line under the word ‘parent’ telling me to check my grammar; even Grammarly assumes that I should have parents, but cancer doesn’t listen to edit suggestions.”

She went on to explain that she fled that dreaded letter by throwing herself into school activities. She joined clubs, sports, and performed in theatrical productions, all in an effort to lessen the pain of losing her mom. Eventually, she realized she was hiding from her pain and decided to face it head-on. She took over the “S” for her own purposes. Now, instead of thinking about the “S” in parents, she concentrates on the double “S” in passion.

Abigail’s essay earned her a spot at several top colleges and she has officially been accepted into the class of 2025 in Harvard. In the meantime, her essay has gone viral (走红) with over 16 million views!