A friend of mine was in low spirits one day. He usually dealt with this state of mind by avoiding people until the mood passed. But on that day Fred had an important meeting with his boss, so he decided to put on a false front. During the meeting Fred smiled, joked and played the part of a happy, good-natured person. To his surprise, he soon discovered he was no longer depressed.
Without realizing it, Fred chanced to find an important new principle of psychological research: acting a part can help us feel the way we want to feel — more self-assured in a trying situation, more cheerful when things go wrong.
How can you put this principle to work in your own life? There’s more involved than simply mimicking a few expressions. You have to be systematic about it. Here’s how:
Smile to cheer yourself up.
Relax to reduce anxiety or fear.
Look your best to increase your self-confidence.
Keep cool in a crisis.
Using our bodies and actions to change the way we feel can be a useful tool in helping us through life’s difficult times. As novelist George Eliot wrote more than a century ago, “Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.” People who remember that — and act upon it — can only be richer and happier for the experience.
小题1:In paragraph 1 the underlined phrase “to put on a false front” means ______.
A．to wear a wrong coat
B．to act a part unsuccessfully
C．to show a pretended happy appearance
D．to put on airs小题2:According to Paragraph 1, Fred ______before the meeting.
A．had very few spirits
B．had many spirits
C．was in bad mood
D．was in good mood小题3:The underlined phrase “mimicking” in Paragraph 3 most probably means ______.
A．learning quickly
B．making faces
C．behaving well
D．imitating others小题4:In the last paragraph, the quotation “Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds” may show that ______.
A．actions speak louder than words
B．the more we do, the happier we are
C．our feeling cannot change our behavior
D．actions are very important for us to beat bad moods for good
