(Beautiful Essay)美文+录音20篇
来源：英语周报
发布时间：2009-09-02 18:21:00
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内容提要：Is it worth it?Put first things firstThe power of encouragement
Go for the gold
（第20期）
（第20期）
A young man didn’t know what he was going to do with his life. One day he was sitting in a park watching squirrels run and jump in the trees. Suddenly, a squirrel jumped from one high tree to another. It seemed to aim for a branch so far out of reach that the jump looked impossible. And sure enough, the squirrel missed. But it still landed safely on a branch several feet lower. Then it just climbed up a little higher and reached the branch it really wanted.
An old man sitting near the young man said, “It’s funny. I’ve seen a lot of squirrels jump like that. A lot of them miss, but I’ve never seen one of them get hurt. I guess they’ve just got to risk it if they don’t want to spend their whole life in one tree.” Then the young man thought, “If a little squirrel is prepared to take a chance, do I have less courage than a squirrel?”
At that moment he decided to take a risk he’d been thinking about. And sure enough, he landed safely in a position higher than he ever thought possible.
Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars. You’ll still end up higher and better than where you are now. But if you aim for nothing, you’ll hit it every time. On your gravestone is going to be the dates of your birth and death with a dash in-between.
So since life is a dash and goes by so fast, you might as well go for the gold! You only get one life. Don’t you want to make it the best one possible?