21世纪大学英语读写教程第二册textA(4-6).docVIP

4Vicky — beautiful, talented, very bright, voted Most Likely to Succeed in college — got a promising job with a large company after graduation. Then, after two years without promotions, she was fired. She suffered a complete nervous breakdown. It was panic, she told me later. Everything had always gone so well for me that I had no experience in coping with rejection. I felt I was a failure. Vickys reaction is an extreme example of a common phenomenon. Our society places so much emphasis on making it that we assume that any failure is bad. What we dont always recognize is that what looks like failure may, in the long run, prove beneficial. When Vicky was able to think coolly about why she was fired, for example, she realized that she was simply not suited for a job dealing with people all the time. In her new position as a copy editor, she works independently, is happy and once again successful. People are generally prone to what language expert S. I. Hayakawa calls the two-valued orientation. We talk about seeing both sides of a question as if every question had only two sides. We assume that everyone is either a success or a failure when, in fact, infinite degrees of both are possible. As Hayakawa points out, theres a world of difference between I have failed three times and I am a failure. Indeed, the words failure and success cannot be reasonably applied to a complex, living, changing human being. They can only describe the situation at a particular time and place. Obviously no one can be brilliant at everything. In fact, success in one area often precludes success in another. A famous politician once told me that his career had practically destroyed his marriage. I have no time for my family, he explained. I travel a lot. And even when Im home, I hardly see my wife and kids. Ive got power, money, prestige — but as a husband and father, Im a flop. Certain kinds of success can indeed be destructive. The danger of too early success is particularly acute. I reca