A lot of people today are used to working, going on holiday, and having money---but many of them aren't happy. Yet other people seem to be really happy , even if they are poor. Why? Professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, from the University of Chicago, has interviewed thousands of people who have a happy life to find out how they do it. "I've been studying happiness for over 30 years," he says. "My interest in the subject came from my own experience as a child during World War II , when I saw many adults destroyed by the terrible events. But there were always a few who kept their courage, helped others, and were able to give a sense of purpose and meaning to their lives. I wanted to find out how a person could build a fulfilling and enjoyable life." In general, his research showed that people were unhappy doing nothing. The professor stresses that happy people didn't waste time, either at work or when they are free. "Many people feel that the time they spend at work or at school is wasted. But often their free time is also wasted. Many people are used to doing passive things----watching television, for example----without using any skills. As a result, life goes past in a series of boring experiences." But it doesn't have to be this way. The professor has found that people are happy when get into something he calls "flow". When people get very involved in a task that they have chosen, and which is well-defined and challenging , they experience "flow", a state where they don't notice time passing. They also experience enjoyment. Professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, makes a contrast between enjoyment and pleasure. "I used to think they were the same thing---- but they're not! Pleasure is a big bowl of ice cream, or taking a hot bath on a cold day ---nothing bad at all! But enjoyment is about doing something and achieving something. It isn't really important what we do, it's more important to do something, and feel positive about it, and to try to do it well." People who are... What can we learn from the passage? A) Pleasures add a sense of purpose and meaning to lives. B) Happiness results from engaging in meaningful tasks. C) Happy people often relax themselves by doing nothing. D) Happiness has much to do with living conditions.
B
(Question)
"I was only thirteen when four of my team members and I were chosen by my swim coach to train with the Chinese National Team. The following piece shows how that experience has influenced me." The night before I left for China, my mother called me into her room. I entered not knowing what to expect. I sat down at the end of her very neatly-made bed, opposite the bedroom table on which she kept a Ming-style vase illustrated in great detail. She told me that my great-grandmother was still living in the surroundings of Beijing. Her name was Ren Li Ling and she was 97 years old. This was the first time I had ever heard of her. The dragon on the vase snaked through the flowers and vines as my mother said, "Pu Pu, look at me. You need to hear this so that when you go to China you will understand. You must keep this knowledge in your heart." She told me a story about my grandfather, Ren Li Ling's son, who left Beijing to go to college in Taiwan. She told me how the Chinese civil war kept him away from his mother for fifty years, so neither of them even knew that the other was alive. No one from Taiwan could visit, write, or call anyone in mainland. All lines of communication were cut off. She told me of my grandfather's devotion to his own children, and how difficult it was for him to send his daughter to America for her education, fearing that same separation. He gave my mother all that he could give -- nineteen years of love and fifty years of savings. I learned how my mother, through means only available in this country, would finally be able to unite my great-grandmother with my grandfather again. The dragon curled around the vase, connecting the separate vines. For a fleeting second, I felt it was present in my mother's room. It was all very strange, yet very clear. I began to understand that this trip to China was not just for me; it was for my mother, and her father, and his mother. Now, I had not only a future, but more significantly, a past. I saw the world with new eyes. And so I went to China and met my... How old was the writer's mother when she was sent to America for her education. A) 13 B) 16 C) 19 D) 20
(Answer)
C
Question: Years ago there was a group of kids who would hang around at some local ponds in the woods near their houses in Warwick, Rhode Island. In summer they caught frogs and fish. When winter arrived they couldn't wait to go skating. Time passed, and the ponds became the only open space for the kids to enjoy themselves in that neighborhood. One day a thirteen-year-old boy from this group of kids read in the local newspaper that a developer wanted to fill in the ponds and build over a hundred small houses called apartments. So the boy went door to door and gathered more than two hundred signatures to stop the development. A group of citizens met and decided to support him. At the meeting of the town planning organization,the boy was quite nervous at first and spoke very softly. But when he saw the faces of his friends and neighbors in the crowd and thought about what was happening to their favorite ponds,his voice grew louder. He told the town officials that they should speak for the citizens. He also insisted that they should leave enough space for children. A few days later,the developer stopped his plan. Nine years later, when that teen was a senior in college, he was informed that the developer was back with his proposal to build apartments. Now twenty-two years old, he was studying wetlands ecology. He again appeared before the town planning organization. This time as an expert, he used environmental protection laws to explain _ on development in and around wetlands and the knowledge of wetlands ecology to help to improve the development. Finally some apartments were built, but less than half the number the developer wanted. The ponds where those kids used to hang around were protected by a piece of natural land, and are still there today. Which statement is true according to the passage? A) The apartments were built as the developer had planned. B) The grown-up boy helped to protect the wetlands as an expert. C) The developer stopped the boy's plan at the meeting years ago. D) The ponds were filled in and some apartments were built on them.
Answer:
B