1 . Tricks To Becoming A Patient Person
Here’s a riddle: What do traffic jams, long lines and waiting for a vacation to start all have in common? There is one answer.
In the Digital Age, we’re used to having what we need immediately and right at our fingertips. However, research suggests that if we practiced patience, we’d be a whole lot better off. Here are several tricks.
●Practice gratitude (感激)
Thankfulness has a lot of benefits: Research shows it makes us happier, less stressed and even more optimistic.
● Make yourself wait
Instant gratification (满足) may seem like the most “feel good” option at the time, but psychology research suggests waiting for things actually makes us happier in the long run. And the only way for us to get into the habit of waiting is to practice.
●
So many of us have the belief that being comfortable is the only state we will tolerate, and when we experience something outside of our comfort zone, we get impatient about the circumstances. You should learn to say to yourself, “
| A．Find your causes |
| B．Start with small tasks |
| C．Accept the uncomfortable |
| D．All this adds up to a state of hurry |
| E．It can also help us practice more patience |
| F．This is merely uncomfortable, not intolerable |
| G．They’re all situations where we could use a little extra patience |
2 . Back in 1964, in his book Games People Play, psychiatrist Eric Berne described a pattern of conversation he called “Why Don’t You — Yes But”, which remains one of the most annoying aspects of everyday social life. The person adopting the strategy is usually a chronic complainer. Something is terrible about their relationship, job, or other situation, and they complain about it endlessly, but find some excuse to dismiss any solution that’s proposed. The reason, of course, is that on some level they don’t want a solution; they want to be validated (认可) in their position that the world is out to get them. If they can “win” the game — dismissing every suggestion until interlocutor (对话者) gives up in annoyance — they get to feel pleasurably righteous (正当的) in their anger and excused from any obligation to change.
Part of the trouble here is the so-called responsibility/fault fallacy (谬误). When you’re feeling hard done by — taken for granted by your partner, say, or obliged to work for a stupid boss — it’s easy to become attached to the position that it’s not your job to address the matter, and that doing so would be an admission of fault. But there’s a confusion here. For example, if I were to discover a newborn at my front door, it wouldn’t be my fault, but it most certainly would be my responsibility. There would be choices to make, and no possibility of avoiding them, since trying to ignore the matter would be a choice. The point is that what goes for the baby on the doorstep is true in all cases: even if the other person is 100% in the wrong, there’s nothing to be gained, long-term, from using this as a justification to evade responsibility.
Should you find yourself on the receiving end of this kind of complaining, there’s a clever way to shut it down — which is to agree with it. Psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb describes this as “over-validation”. For one thing, you’ll be spared further complaining, since the other person’s motivation was to confirm her beliefs, and now you’re confirming them. But for another, as Gottlieb notes, people confronted with over-validation often hear their complaints afresh and start arguing back. The concept that they’re utterly powerless suddenly seems unrealistic, not to mention rather annoying — so they’re prompted instead to generate ideas about how they might change things.
“And then, sometimes, something magical might happen, ” Gotlieb writes. The other person “might realize she’s not as trapped as you are saying she is, or as she feels. ” Avoiding responsibility feels comfortable, but turns out to be a prison; whereas assuming responsibility feels unpleasant, but ends up being freeing.
1. What is the characteristic of a chronic complainer, according to Eric Berne?| A．They are angry about their ill treatment and feel bitter towards whoever tries to help. |
| B．They are habitually unhappy and endlessly find fault with people around them. |
| C．They constantly dismiss others’ proposals while taking no responsibility for dealing with the problem. |
| D．They lack the basic skills required for successful conversations with others. |
| A．People tend to think that one should not be held responsible for others’ mistakes. |
| B．It is easy to become attached to the position of overlooking one’s own fault. |
| C．People are often at a loss when confronted with a number of choices. |
| D．A distinction should be drawn between responsibility and fault. |
| A．Stop them from going further by agreeing with them. |
| B．Listen to their complaints attentively and sympathetically. |
| C．Ask them to validate their beliefs with further evidence. |
| D．Persuade them to clarify the confusion they caused. |
| A．What is the responsibility/fault fallacy for chronic complainers? |
| B．How can you avoid dangerous traps in everyday social life? |
| C．Who are chronic complainers and how to deal with them? |
| D．Why should we stop being a chronic complainer and assume responsibility? |
3 . Do you think you need to shout at yourself to force yourself to finish your homework? If so, think again.
Self-compassion is the practice of being kind and supportive to ourselves. The opposite is being self-critical and mean to ourselves when we make a mistake.
A 2017 study found people who practice self-compassion tend to handle stress better. Their bodies have less of a stress response when, for example, they meet with difficulties at work or school.
With practice, we can learn to treat ourselves with kindness and unconditional love — not tough love.
| A．So how do we develop self-compassion? |
| B．It may be more effective to be kind to yourself. |
| C．It includes letting go of your strict self-criticism. |
| D．Mindfulness is the key to practicing self-compassion. |
| E．But this approach does not make us feel or perform better. |
| F．They have more confidence to look for areas where they can improve. |
| G．Also, show ourselves kindness in ways that nourish (滋养) our spirit and body. |
4 . Perhaps you’ve stopped doing what you want because you’re afraid of what others think of you. You feel that you must do what they expect and that you must meet their expectations, otherwise you’ll lose their approval.
Think about yourself, about what you really like and are interested in. You must lead your life independently.
By surrounding yourself with people who think like you, you’ll realize that you don’t feel judged. Then, you’ll start doing what you really want.
To overcome your fear of what others think and of their non-approval, you should start talking about your plans, For instance, you might want to tell a handful of friends about your wishes and dreams.
It’s unavoidable that not everything will be plain sailing, and you’ll find obstacles along your way.
| A．There is no need to think about what you want. |
| B．You don’t have to change your circle of friends. |
| C．Your life belongs to you, as well as your actions. |
| D．By talking to them, you’ll be able to organize your plans and ideas. |
| E．If this is the case, it’s time to start working on your self-esteem (自尊). |
| F．You must do what you want without being affected by what others think. |
| G．However, you must trust in yourself and seek the necessary strength to move forward. |
5 . For my daughter's 19th birthday, we bought her tickets to go and see Linkin Park, as they were playing in our city. We didn't really have the
The night before she was like a
Needless to say when they
Later that day they returned, with faces full of happiness and warmth. They presented my husband and me with a
This wasn't something
| A．money | B．time | C．interest | D．news |
| A．worker | B．baby | C．kid | D．parent |
| A．dance | B．learn | C．walk | D．sit |
| A．speak | B．sleep | C．stand | D．leave |
| A．healthy | B．happy | C．pretty | D．surprised |
| A．stayed | B．left | C．returned | D．turned |
| A．worrying about | B．caring for | C．looking at | D．listening to |
| A．lent | B．earned | C．saved | D．spent |
| A．Still | B．Only | C．Just | D．Also |
| A．continued | B．tried | C．decided | D．struggled |
| A．kept | B．lost | C．realized | D．discovered |
| A．gift | B．prize | C．ticket | D．picture |
| A．richest | B．oldest | C．best | D．cleverest |
| A．important | B．ordinary | C．new | D．valuable |
| A．feelings | B．concerns | C．understandings | D．opinions |
6 . When reading, my mother likes to slice a paragraph or a sentence out and attach it to the wall of her kitchen. She picks boring sentences that puzzle me. But I prefer copying favorite bright lines into a journal in soft, gray No. 2 pencil, word by word.
She doesn’t know any of this. There's nothing shocking: for our chatting. we seldom begin certain conversations though we talk on the phone weekly, sometimes making each other laugh so hard that I choke and she cries. But what we don't say could fill up rooms. Fights with my father. Small failures in school. Anything that really upsets us.
My mother has never told me “I love you, Lisa.”—as if the four-word absence explains who I am—so I carry it with me, like a label on me. The last time she almost spoke the words was two years ago, when she called to tell me a friend had been in hospital. I said, “I love you, Mom.” She stopped for a while and then said, “Thank you.” I haven't said it since, but I've wondered why my mother doesn't until I've found a poem that supplies words for the blank spaces I try to understand in our conversations:
Don’t fill up on bread. I say absent-mindedly. The servings here are huge.
My son, middle-aged, says: Did you really just say that to me?
What he doesn’t know is that when we’re walking together, I desire to reach for his hand.
It's humble, yet heartbreaking. After copying it down in my journal, I emailed it to mom, adding “This poem makes me think of you.” My mother doesn’t read poetry—or at least, she doesn’t tell me, and I felt nervous clicking “Send”.
She never mentioned the poem. But the next time I went home for vacation, I noticed something new in the kitchen fixed to an antique board: the poem. The board hung above the heater, the warmest spot in the kitchen. The poem still hangs there. Neither my mother nor I have ever spoken about it.
1. What's the function of paragraph 1?| A．To stress the theme. | B．To establish the setting. |
| C．To represent the characters. | D．To create the atmosphere. |
| A．Shaky. | B．Distant. | C．Reserved. | D．Intense. |
| A．It reminded her of mom's love. |
| B．She wanted to apologize to mom. |
| C．It suited mom's taste of literature. |
| D．She needed an interpretation from mom. |
| A．A memory of golden days. |
| B．Daughter’s gratefulness to her. |
| C．A decoration in the plain kitchen. |
| D．Daughter's understanding of her. |
I like staying overnight at my Gramma’s house — that is, until Gramma starts telling me how wonderful my cousin Maya is. Then it’s Maya this and Maya that until I don’t ever want to hear another word about her.
That’s why I wasn’t too excited when Gramma called me on the phone to “come on over and bring your pajamas.” When I got there, it was worse than I’d expected. There, in Grandpa’s big leather rocker, sat Maya, all dressed up and formal-looking and wearing fancy shoes as if she’d just been to a party.
“Surprise, Kristen!” Gramma said. “Your cousin Maya and her parents have traveled in from the East Coast on business. Maya gets to stay with us this afternoon.” Gramma chattered away about how excited she’d been for this surprise get-together, and how cousins ought to get to know each other better.
I hung my baseball cap in the closet and set my backpack by the stairway, all the time smiling and nodding as if I’d been waiting forever for this chance to spend an afternoon with Maya. Grandpa’s chair squawked (咯咯叫) as Maya rocked back and forth. It’s the chair I like best in the house, the one I usually sit in. I sat down on the sofa across from her.
Shortly, Gramma went off to the kitchen to “see about some lunch,” she’d said. That left me stuck in the living room with rocking Maya.
She was still small but taller than I’d remembered her from her last visit four years ago. She was good at small talk, though, and was chatting away about how nice it was to see me again. But I could tell that she didn’t really think so. The last time she was here, we’d had hours of fun together building caves out of Gramma’s sofa pillows.
After that, I’d heard about her only through Gramma’s tales. Maya taking piano lessons. Maya learning math. Maya, Maya, Maya. Now Maya was here, looking great with the latest haircut and a fancy dress.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Glancing down at my jeans and my old sneakers, I wished I hadn’t come.
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“How do you know all these things about me?” I asked.
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8 . “Anxiety.” The very word invites discomfort. Its effects—shortness of breath, pounding heart, muscle tension—are outright upsetting. But, as a clinician, I find that we tend to miss out on many valuable opportunities presented by this human emotion. In and of itself, anxiety is not deadly, nor is it a disease. Quite the contrary: it is an indicator of brain and sensory health. Once we accept that it is a normal, though uncomfortable, part of life, we can use it to help us.
We all know working out at the gym is hard. By nature, a “good workout” is uncomfortable, since it involves pushing our physical strength past what we can easily do. The sweet spot of exercise is always a somewhat challenging experience. Similarly, if you want to be emotionally stronger, you need to face some tension. For example, one effective treatment for fear is exposure therapy (疗法), which involves gradually encountering things that make one anxious, reducing fear over time.
Humans are social creatures. When my patients learn to open up to their partners about their anxieties, they almost always report a greater sense of emotional closeness. Also, as international relationship expert Sue Johnson teaches, when we express our need for connection during challenging moments (e.g., “I’m having a hard time right now and could really use your support”), it creates greater connection and turns our anxiety into love.
From time to time, we find ourselves at the end of our rope. Our responsibilities pile up, our resources break down, and we feel uncomfortably anxious—what we’re experiencing is called stress. Simply put, the demands placed upon us outweigh our available resources, just like a set of scales (天平) going out of balance. Focusing on work and pretending everything is OK only leads to disastrous results. Medical treatment for stress may function for a while, but it tends to make things worse in the long run. The only solution to deal with stress is to do the mathematics to balance the scales.
1. What does the author say about anxiety?| A．It is an invitation to diseases. |
| B．It indicates stable mental health. |
| C．It costs us many valuable chances. |
| D．It is a natural emotional expression. |
| A．To prove how exercise influences emotions. |
| B．To suggest an effective way to challenge limits. |
| C．To explain how anxiety builds emotional strength. |
| D．To show a positive connection between mind and body. |
| A．The key to closeness is partners’ support. |
| B．Sharing anxieties improves relationships. |
| C．Humans are defined by their social nature. |
| D．Expressing feelings keeps us off anxieties. |
| A．Devote more energy to our work. |
| B．Increase resources available to us. |
| C．Seek professional medical treatment. |
| D．Master advanced mathematical skills. |
9 . During my first year in college, I was silent. I was too afraid of saying something wrong.
I declared a religion major as a sophomore and took a class from Barbara, a young theologian. My mind was split open by a range of new thinkers and writers and by the quality of Barbara’s questions, I finally had something to say and the energy to say it. I was a frequent visitor during Barbara’s office hours, a rocket of words. She listened and calmly responded, a perfect contrast to my feverish ramblings. I loved what she saw in me, which was a range of abilities I had never seen in myself. In the following years, our relationship gradually deepened, but I was always conscious of a teacher-student dynamic.
This changed fundamentally when I became a parent. I had my son in March 2010, and Barbara was one of the first to congratulate me. When, nine months later, my child was diagnosed with Tay-Sachs disease, a rare and always terminal illness with no treatment and no cure, she sent me a letter-handwritten on a white legal pad. For the next two and a half years, Barbara wrote me regular, sometimes weekly, letters, remarkable letters that are revealing, loving, and kind.
The letter written right before my son died, when he was three, was the most personal and perhaps the most profound. “I think he’s made you better by opening up the great fire of your love,” she wrote, “with his small but magnificent existence.” I have never in my life read a more deeply comforting sentence, one that spoke to my grandest hopes, my deepest fears, and the only faith that remains to me, which is a belief in chaos. Our love had bloomed and deepened from a guarded mutual respect to a richer, deeper friendship.
Mentors are meant to lead those in their charge into fresh understanding, help them sort and filter new experiences, assist in the project of making sense out of the chaos that is human life. Mentors observe and accompany the darkest despair, the wildest sorrow, and the most unexpected joy.
1. What can we learn from paragraph 2?| A．The author took the class because she excelled1 in theology. |
| B．Their relationship changed significantly beyond a teacher-student mode. |
| C．The author was a frequent visitor to Barbara’s home after working hours. |
| D．Barbara’s peaceful exterior was a contrast to the author’s overexcited talk. |
| A．The way Barbara treated her students. | B．The fact that the author kept silent in class. |
| C．The role of the author as a college student. | D．The relationship between Barbara and the author. |
| A．Barbara’s efforts to solve the problem. |
| B．Barbara’s sympathy shown in the letter. |
| C．The author’s in-depth understanding of Barbara. |
| D．Barbara’s congratulations on the birth of the author’s son. |
| A．Demanding and dedicated. | B．Responsible and reasonable. |
| C．Insightful and inspiring. | D．Aggressive and ambitious. |
10 . On the night of the speech contest, I was worried about the shy girl. My heart
My palms (手掌) began to
But the moment that
| A．beat | B．sank | C．lost | D．broke |
| A．sure enough | B．worse still | C．above all | D．in addition |
| A．crying | B．warning | C．clapping | D．screaming |
| A．sweat | B．tremble | C．change | D．turn |
| A．try | B．pose | C．guess | D．slip |
| A．thought | B．admitted | C．ignored | D．noticed |
| A．confused | B．interested | C．surprised | D．challenged |
| A．loud | B．weak | C．tight | D．low |
| A．support | B．attention | C．vote | D．silence |
| A．determined | B．puzzled | C．relaxed | D．bored |
| A．crowded | B．hurried | C．bounced | D．flowed |
| A．started | B．ended | C．progressed | D．rested |
| A．sincerely | B．easily | C．wildly | D．eagerly |
| A．misted | B．hid | C．prevented | D．shaded |
| A．pushed | B．threw | C．pulled | D．lifted |
