“One day you will understand that kindness is harder to achieve than intelligence”

Jeff Bezos, the president of Amazon, the world’s largest online bookstore, often spent time during summer vacation when he was a child. Going on a driving trip with my grandparents.

When he was 10 years old, Bezos traveled with his grandparents again. While traveling, he saw an anti-smoking advertisement that said that every time a smoker takes a puff of cigarette, his life span will be shortened by two minutes. It just so happens that Bezos's grandmother also smokes and has been smoking for 30 years. So Bezos smartly started counting the number of times his grandmother smoked. The calculated result is: Grandma's life will be shortened by 16 years due to smoking. When he proudly told his grandmother the result, she burst into tears.

When my grandfather saw this, he asked Bezos to get out of the car, then patted his shoulder and said: "Son, one day you will understand that kindness is harder to achieve than intelligence." This behavior of my grandfather Although the sentence is only 19 words, it will be unforgettable for Bezos for the rest of his life. Since then, he has always followed his grandfather's teachings.

“Go back and face them bravely, there is no room for cowards in our family”

When the former first lady of the United States, Hillary Clinton, was 4 years old, her family moved to Chicago. Suburban Park Ridge residence. After arriving in a new environment, the lively and active Hillary is eager to make new friends, but she soon discovers that this is not easy. Whenever she went outside to play, the neighborhood children either laughed at her or bullied her, sometimes pushing her around or knocking her to the ground. Whenever this happened, she would run home crying and never leave the house again.

After several weeks of silent observation, Hillary's mother finally one day, when Hillary ran home crying again, her mother stood at the door blocking her way. Her mother loudly said to her: "Go back and face them bravely. There is no room for cowards in our family." Hillary had to bite the bullet and walk out of the house again, which surprised the children who bullied her. They did not expect this little girl to be so quick. Back again. In the end, Hillary won new friends with her courage. In the years to come, whenever she encountered difficulties and setbacks, Hillary would muster up the courage to meet the challenge boldly.

“You can lose your wealth, but you must never lose your character”

Vartan Gregory, former president of Brown University and current chairman of the Carnegie Foundation An's childhood was very unfortunate. When he was 6 years old, his mother died of illness. It was his grandmother who raised him in the mountains of Iran.

Gregorian's grandmother was also a very unfortunate woman. She lost all her children to war and disease. Although fate was very unfair to her, she did not lose her confidence in life.

In order for Gregorian to come out of the shadow of losing his loved ones and grow up healthily and happily, his grandmother often taught him: "Child, there are two things you must remember. The first is fate. That is beyond your control; the second is your character, which is within your control. You can lose your beauty, your health and wealth, but you can never lose your character, because it is. It's in your own hands." These words from his grandmother played a key role in Gregorian's growth.

"If something is worth doing, it has to be done well"

Walter Cronkite is a famous American television news host who began as a child Interested in news. At the age of 14, he became a reporter for the school's own newspaper "Campus News".

Mr. Fred Burney, the news editor of a daily newspaper in Houston, goes to Cronkite's school every week to teach an hour-long journalism course and guide the editing work of the "Campus News" newspaper. Once, Cronkite was responsible for writing an article about the school's track and field coach Cap Harding. Since there was a class reunion that day, Cronkite wrote a perfunctory manuscript and handed it in. The next day, Fred called Cronkite to the office alone, pointed to the article and said: "Cronkite, this article is terrible. You didn't ask him the questions he should have asked, and you didn't do a comprehensive report on him. You didn't even figure out what he did." Then he said something that Cronkite will never forget: "Cronkite, you have to remember that if there is something worth doing, you have to do it well. ”

In his journalism career of more than 70 years, Cronkite always kept Mr. Fred’s teachings in mind and remained loyal to journalism.

“Girls can definitely do anything that boys can do”

The mother of Zhong Binxian, the female president of Avon Company, is a very outstanding woman. She studied at the University of Toronto in Canada in her early years. At that time, she was the only female student majoring in chemistry in her class.

Zhong Binxian’s mother hopes that her daughter can be self-reliant like her. Therefore, she often taught Zhong Binxian: "Girls can definitely do anything boys can do. As long as they work hard, women can reach the top in any field."

Zhong Binxian will always remember it These words from my mother. At Avon, she achieved success step by step, and eventually became one of the six female presidents of Fortune 500 companies.

Of course, on the way forward, Zhong Binxian also encountered many difficulties and resistance, such as being looked down upon because of her youth and gender. But her mother's firm confidence in herself, her daughter, and all women always supported Zhong Binxian to overcome these obstacles and move forward bravely. Zhong Binxian is very lucky to have such a precious family wealth.

"Just go to work, and then take the money and go home"

Toni Morrison is a famous black female writer in the United States. She won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993 who. When Morrison was a teenager, due to her poor family, starting from the age of 12, she had to work in a rich man's house for several hours every day after school, which was very hard. One day, she complained to her father about work. After hearing this, her father said to her: "Listen, you don't live there. You live here. At home, with your relatives. Just go to work, and then come home with the money."

Morrison later recalled that from these words of her father, she learned four lessons in life: 1. No matter what kind of work you do, you must do it well, not for your boss, but for you. yourself; 2. Take control of your own work, and don’t let work take control of you; 3. Your real life is to be with your family; 4. You and the work you do are two different things, and you are who you should be.

After that, Morrison worked for all kinds of people: some were smart, some were stupid, some were big-hearted, and some were small-minded. But she never complained again.

"The life God gives you is just a lot of minutes. You must make good use of every minute."

Kurt Hamilton is a famous American figure skater. His mother turned out to be just a figure skater. She was an ordinary middle school teacher, but she cherished her time very much and made full use of every minute to study hard on her own. Later, she finally became an associate professor in the Department of Marriage and Family at Bowling Green University. She often said to Hamilton: "The life God gives you is only many minutes, and it is limited. From the day you are born, you only have so many minutes to live, so you must make good use of every minute."

We are free to choose what to do with every minute of our lives, every day. You can spend it in coffee shops and bars, in the lab or on the sports field. Due to the influence of his mother, Hamilton also cherishes time and seizes every minute of training. His hard work finally paid off, and he won four consecutive world championships from 1981 to 1984.

"You should give 150% effort, no matter what you do"

Carlos Santana is a world-class guitar master, he was born in Mexico, When he was 17 years old, he immigrated to the United States with his parents. Due to poor English, Santana's homework in school was a mess at first. One day, his art teacher Knudsen called him into the office and said: "Santana, I looked at your grades in all subjects after coming to the United States. Except for 'pass', it means 'fail'. It's really bad." But your art scores have many "excellences". I can see that you have a talent for painting, and I can also see that you are a musical genius. If you want to become an artist, then I can take you to the Academy of Fine Arts in San Francisco. Go visit it so you can see what you're up against."

A few days later, Knudsen actually took the entire class to the San Francisco Academy of Fine Arts. There, Santana saw with her own eyes how others painted, and deeply felt the huge gap between herself and them. Mr. Knudson told him: "People who are absent-minded and unmotivated will never get in here. You should give 150% of your efforts, no matter what you do or want to do." Knudson's words It had a profound impact on Santana and became his motto. In 2000, Santana won eight Grammy Awards for her "Supernatural" album.

“Adjust yourself as the times change, but stick to the same principles”

When Jimmy Carter, the 39th President of the United States, was in middle school, Miss Julia Coleman It's his class teacher. She encouraged Carter to study music, art, and especially literature, and set out a reading list for him.

Miss Julia cares about every student in her class. She told them: "We should adjust ourselves as the times change, but the principles we abide by remain unchanged." After growing up, Carter had a deeper understanding of Miss Julia's words. What Miss Julia was telling her students was that we should always analyze new situations, but whether we are choosing a lifelong partner or when we are faced with difficult times, testing times, or temptations and making difficult decisions, we are not only To adapt to these new challenges, we should also adhere to certain principles we have learned, such as fairness, integrity, loyalty, etc.

Carter will never forget Miss Julia’s words and always adheres to the basic principles he learned from Miss Julia and his parents. In his inaugural address, the President quoted Miss Julia: "Adjust yourself as the times change, but remain true to the same principles. No matter how great the difficulties we face, I am determined to hold myself and the American people true to belief in justice and truth.

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