1 . From birth, every person needs other human beings. Babies need to be cared for to survive. Their first connections usually come from parents and other family members. But as children grow up, they spend more time with others. And they may or may not feel connected to the people they see every day. Some people feel different from or rejected by their neighbors, people they work with or even their families. People who don’t feel like they belong often feel lonely, even when others are around.

People find different ways to meet their natural desire to belong to a group. Some rely on their families while others find communities based on other interests. These can include shared goals, life experiences or popular culture.

You need others for many reasons. Community members can offer advice or practical help when you go through difficult times. You can also grow as a person from helping others

So what can you do if you lack a sense of belonging? The first step will usually be to make a conscious effort to reach out to others. You could join groups based on interests you share. Or you could contact an individual with whom you have something in common and decide when to meet up. This may be uncomfortable at first, but as with most things, it becomes easier with practice. Focusing on others more than on yourself may help. Ask questions that show you care about others’ lives. This will help them feel valued. If you are shy, it will spare you from having to talk about yourself too much.

Finding community requires a willingness to accept others. But it is also important to remain true to yourself. If a person always hides his or her true thoughts and feelings to fit in, how could he or she feel a sense of belonging? And it will be much easier if you ask yourself what matters most to you.

Finding a place where you belong may not be easy. But it will help you live a happier, more fulfilled life. So if you are the one looking for it, don’t lose heart easily since it truly deserves the effort.

When Susan Greenstein Prescott was a high school senior, her English teacher, Fred DiMeo, gave her a terrifying task: recite (背诵) a poem in front of the whole class.

“I had a stutter (口吃). I’d be trying to get a word out that might begin with ‘D’ or ‘TH’” Susan said. The thought of getting up in front of her classmates and stuttering through the poem was too much to bear. Susan went home and told her mom how scared she was. Her mom agreed to write a note asking for her to be excused from doing the work in front of the whole class. When the day of the recitation came, Susan recited the poem one-on-one to Fred. Once she was done, he said something she’d never heard before: he liked listening to her voice.

For the first time, Susan considered the possibility that public speaking didn’t have to be a source of trepidation. “I think in his mind he wanted me to understand I have nothing to be afraid of,” she said. After college, Susan landed a job as a corporate trainer. The new position made her realize how big an impact Fred had had on her confidence. “I stand up in front of people and I speak. I do it all the time, and if I do stutter once in a while, no big deal,” she said.

Susan recently found a way to contact her former teacher, and plans on sending him a letter expressing her appreciation. “He truly is an unsung hero,” she said. “I don’t know where I would’ve gone if I felt like I had to keep my voice quiet because I was afraid of embarrassing myself. I’d like to give him my thanks for that kindness.”

The environmental group Heal the Bay organized a beach clean-up. And I was one of the volunteers. We went to Venice Beach to clean up the trash.

At first glance, the beach didn’t look dirty at all. But then I saw a Styrofoam (泡沫) cup half buried in the sand on the beach. I pulled hard and finally got it out. As we moved farther, we found pieces of Styrofoam spread all over the sand. Sea animals eat the plastic. After eating it, they think they are full. As a result, they can die of starvation as they are cheated by their feeling and don’t think they need to eat any food.

We kept on picking up the trash. Then I saw someone with a full Heal the Bay trash bag and I went to see what was inside. When I opened the trash bag, I found everything from a pair of old jeans and a brown belt to headphones and some plastic bags. It made me very angry with the people who left their things behind without thinking what effects they might have on the ocean.

By noon, the sun was shining and the temperature was rising. The volunteers that had spread out across Venice Beach were coming back to throw the trash they had collected into the truck. I could not believe how much trash there was. All together we collected more than 135 bags of trash. I do hope that next time people go to the beach, they will stop littering.

Robots help us in many ways — from assembly lines to looking after the elderly. Now they’re turning their attention to coping with climate change by helping to plant trees.

Milrem Robotics, an Estonian company, has developed an autonomous robot forester. The new robot forester can plant a hectare of forest in less than six hours. The robotic planters are equipped with Lidar (Light Detection and Ranging) which uses laser pulses to build up a three-dimensional image of the robots’ surroundings and global positioning (GPS) to navigate precisely. The position of each sapling is recorded in a database as it is planted, which means that a specialized brush cutter version of the robot forester can reduce competitive growth without harming the young trees.

The robot forester is designed for working in commercial forests and it could be used to restore natural forests, too. Deforestation (滥伐) contributes 15% of all global greenhouse gas emissions. Conservationists say, “We lose 10 million hectares of trees every year to agriculture and logging and we need to plant a trillion trees to reverse forest cover loss to help slow down climate change.” A mature tree can capture an average of 0.62 metric tons of carbon dioxide over its lifetime — equivalent to the carbon emissions from driving a car 2,400 kilometres. Tree planting is just one of a range of measures needed to fight climate change and scientists say it’s important to plant the right trees in the right place for it to be effective.

These robotic planters are just one of the many new solutions beginning to surface in time for the decade of delivery on climate change. We can do a lot to help in our daily life.

Skyscrapers (摩天大楼) are the ultimate symbol of urban life. By 2050, almost 80 percent of the earth’s population could live in cities. The human population could increase to 9.1 billion people yet the amount of land available for farming will be the same. How to meet the increasing food needs of our planet could be a big problem.

Vertical farms, where urban farmers could grow crops in environmentally friendly skyscrapers, could be the solution. In spite of concerns over high costs, experts want to make these urban farms a reality and use these skyscrapers to grow crops. They believe that we can increase food production by changing our thinking from out to up.

Vertical farms would have many advantages, experts say. The food would be grown with minimal effects on the environment. Unlike traditional farming, vertical farming would not force animals out of their habitats by taking over large areas of land, nor would it pollute the air with the use of heavy farming equipment. Those farms would also reduce the cost and negative effects of transporting food over long distances. These have been well recognized.

Growing prosperity has led to many people demanding that all foods are available all year round. Indoor farming could produce crops constantly and crops would not suffer from weather-related problems like drought or flooding. In addition, the use of agricultural chemicals for controlling insects would be minimal.

Experts agree that new farming practices are needed to support the planet’s need for more and more food at affordable costs, both to the farmer and to the consumer. Vertical farms may be a small-scale answer, but the best ideas could be yet to come.

There are always people who take great pleasure in finding faults with others. However, life can become wonderful when you are not constantly busy pointing out its flaws.

A few years ago, I received a letter from Kerry, a seventeen-year-old, who described herself as an expert fault-finder. She was almost always bothered by things and found that people constantly annoyed her. Nothing was ever good enough. She was extremely critical of herself and also found faults in her friends, which made her quite a boring person to be around.

Unfortunately, it took a terrible accident to change her attitude. Her best friend had a serious car crash and was badly injured. What made it almost unbearable was the fact that the day before the accident, Kerry had visited her friend and spent the entire time criticizing her choice of boyfriends, her lifestyle, her relationship with her mother, and various other things she felt the need to point out. It wasn’t until her friend was badly hurt that Kerry realized that she needed to appreciate life rather than harshly(严厉地) criticize everything. She was able to extend her newfound wisdom to other aspects of her life as well.

Perhaps most of us aren’t as extreme in fault-finding, but if we are honest, we can be sharply critical of the world. I’m not suggesting that you ignore problems or pretend things are better than they are, but rather that you learn to accept things as they are — most of the time, especially when they’re not of significant importance.

Train yourself to “bite your tongue” and with a little practice, you’ll become really good at letting things go. When you do, you’ll regain your enthusiasm and love for life.

So learning to accept and appreciate life’s imperfections can bring about positive changes in our attitude and well-being. By redirecting our focus to the good things in life, we can create a more fulfilling and joyful existence.