3 . Jim owned a store. A customer once asked him how he managed to stay ______ all the time. His answer was, “When I wake up in the morning, I know that the day will have good and bad ______ for me, but whatever happens, I’m going to choose to be in a good ______.”

Then one day, something ______ happened. Jim was about to leave the store when an armed robber came in, held him up at gunpoint, and made him open the ______. As he was trying to open it, Jim’s hand ______. The robber saw this and probably thought, “He’s about to attack me!” The robber ______ and fired his gun.

Jim was rushed to the hospital. In the ambulance, he felt ______ because the paramedic (医务辅助人员) kept telling him, “I’m sure you’ll be OK.”

But when Jim was in the operating room and he saw the faces of the doctors and nurses, he got the feeling that they thought he was______ dead. He knew he needed to do something to change their ______.

There was a ______ who was asking him lots of questions, very fast. One question was, “Are you ______ to anything?” “Yes!” Jim said loudly and everybody stopped what they were doing. There was total ______. “Bullets!” Jim said, and all the doctors and nurses burst out ______. And then Jim added, “Please operate on me thinking that I’ll live, and not that I’ll die.”

Jim survived, thanks to the skill of the doctors and nurses. But what also helped was that he managed to remain an optimist even in the most ______ moment of his life.

The traditional Chinese craft of turning thick bamboo into delicate slices achieves fame on overseas short video platform TikTok, receiving more than 10 million     1     (view) and hundreds of thousands of likes. The skilled bamboo craftsmen are recording the daily detailed production process of their handicrafts on social media,     2     are regarded as a “    3     (mystery) Chinese power” in the eyes of foreign netizens.

Anne,     4     TikTok talent from Omaha, USA, filmed a reaction video to the artistry and posted     5     online. While witnessing the process of bamboo gradually turning into bamboo silk and pot brushes, she couldn’t contain her     6     (surprise) expression. “A real craftsman,” she said in the video.

    7     fancy tools, these bamboo craftsmen make amazing works of art     8     (simple) using their own bare hands. Pan Yunfeng, 51, from Lin’an, Zhejiang, started learning bamboo weaving at an early age and by now with over 5 million followers on Douyin, he     9     (become) a genuine influencer for netizens home and abroad.

Bamboo weaving art,     10     (originate) from the Warring States Period 2,000 years ago, has become an essential part of Chinese traditional culture. Now, the popularity of bamboo art on TikTok has opened a window for foreign netizens to better understand Chinese culture.

8 . Around the globe far more bird species are losing ground than gaining, according to an expansive review of a half-century of bird population research published in the journal Annual Review of Environment and Resources in May.

The review, entitled The State of the World’s Birds, showed that more than 5,200 different species of birds-just shy of half the world’s total-are known or suspected to be declining. Around 3,800 species are relatively stable, and fewer than 700 species show increases. Among birds on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, almost 400 birds worldwide have had their conservation status changed for the worse in the past three decades (moving from vulnerable to threatened, or threatened to endangered) — five times more than the number of bird species with an IUCN status that has changed for the better.

“After documenting the loss of nearly 3 billion birds in North America alone (according to a 2019 study published in the journal Science), it was disturbing to see the same patterns of population declines and extinction occurring globally,” says review coauthor Ken Rosenberg, a conservation scientist now retired from the Cormell Lab of Omithology.

The review points to disappearing and degraded habitat-resulting from climate change, urbanization, agricultural intensification, and international trade-as the leading driver of bird declines worldwide. In a note of hope, the authors cite a 2020 study indicating that restoring just 5% of habitat in priority areas around the world could avert 60% of likely extinctions.

Lead author Alexander Lees, a research associate at the Cormell Lab, also points to the need for substantial changes in human behavior to prevent further losses. “Loss and degradation of habitat is often driven by demand for resources,” says Lees. “We need to better consider how commodity flows such as beef, oil, and seed crops can contribute to biodiversity loss and try to reduce the human footprint on the natural world.”

9 . It’s a classic story: A kid is forced to learn an instrument from a young age, they play it throughout their childhood, and they develop a bittersweet relationship with it. Is the constant battle between the love for the music and the hate for the constant challenge worth the fight? For me, it was.

I started playing the piano when I was four-that was 15 years ago! This was huge commitment, so there must have been something worth holding on to, right?

The easy guess is that I was purely in love with music and piano. Although that’s the sweeter tale, it’s a bit more complicated. I struggled a lot with piano. Family and peers were, at least in my own head, constantly placed beside me in competition. I felt pressure to be the best in order to prove something to others-and more devastatingly (破坏性地) to prove something to myself. The seed of my musical interest was grown in the sunlight of competition and doubt. Hate sprouted (滋生) when my self-criticism hit too hard.

It’s difficult to learn to love something that didn’t originate from love. For a while, piano was more of an annoyance than a hobby. But somehow, love grew. It was deeply buried. But it was there, and by high school,it was strong enough that when I was truly on the verge of quitting any kind of formal training. I found the strength to hold on tighter, and dig further. I switched teachers, and got incredibly lucky with one who helped me tunnel into what I loved. I learned pieces for myself, I composed for myself, and I found confidence not because I got “good enough,” but because I learned that anything I had was good enough.

The love and hate I’ve had for the piano were both planted and grown. If you too have learned to hate something, remember that with commitment, it can be uprooted, and love can make a home in its place. There is always time. There is always room.

10 . Have you ever felt the need to be alone for a while? I don’t mean situations when you should be alone, but occasions where you are with a group of people at a party or a restaurant. You get tired of jumping from conversation to conversation, and your mind starts to wander towards that interesting book you left halfway done, or that movie you have been meaning to watch.     1     Now before you rush to defense, please understand that being an introvert (内向的人)is completely normal.

A common misunderstanding about introverts is that they are loners or anti-social.     2     They have friends, probably not as many as extroverts (外向的人), but enough to suit their needs for human interaction. Scientifically, all humans fall somewhere between being an introvert and being an extrovert, and at least 25 percent of us are introverts.

    3     Therefore, the ability to network is extremely valuable. Of course, sometimes introverts might be as capable of talking with people as extroverts, but sometimes they have to force themselves to engage with others in order to “fit in”. While extroverts feel comfortable shaking hands and making jokes, introverts get increasingly exhausted.     4     For the introverted, to continue in this awkward situation could really end up bringing them harm, with individuals reporting to suffer from loss of sleep, panic attacks and depression.

    5     They form deep thoughts, conduct themselves carefully, and pay significant attention to detail. So, for the best results in a project involving group work, both introverts and extroverts are needed.