What's on your mind?
1. Money
2. Appearance
3. Health
4. Improving relationships
5. Getting a promotion.
6. Getting a new job
7. The in-laws
8. The future
7. Skill acquisition
Sample answers
(A) What's wrong with being worried about how I look? It‘s a known fact that the so-called beautiful people get the best jobs, make the most money, find the best mates, and are the most popular, no matter how well they do in school. So any time I put into improving my appearance is just a good investment in life. If others think I'm vain, that‘s their problem; they're probably just jealous anyway.
(B) I don't think I have just one thing on my mind at all. Like other people, I go from subject to subject throughout the day. At work, I concentrate on my job. When I'm with my friends, we are concerned with our mutual interests. When I‘m by my myself, my thoughts wander over many fields: sometimes I worry about mistakes I made, sometimes I think about what I need to do to get ahead, sometimes I'm not much interested in anything at all. We don't really have any control over the contents of our thoughts; our brains just randomly surf across whatever slims// they happen to encounter.
Speak your mind
1. What is the most urgent thing for you to do now?
2. What should you accomplish this year?
3. What 1s your 10-year plan?
4. What is the ideal retirement situation?
3. What would your next job be if you had a choice?
6. What are your most pleasant memories?
7. What are your worst memories?
8. Do your relatives give you headaches or happiness?
Speak your mind helpers
1. What is the most urgent thing for you to do now?
(A) I‘ve allowed my life to drift lately, so I need to get focused on what's really important. I‘ve bought a lot of useless stuff and put myself in debt, and I've neglected my real friends. So, starting tomorrow, I want to put things right. I will control my wild spending habits and spend more quality time with the people who really matter.
(B) I've promised myself to lose some weight. I just started going to the gym regularly, and I'm watching my diet. And I have my eye on some wonderful clothes that are a size smaller than what I wear now. So my reward for getting my weight down will be to buy a new wardrobe.
2. What should you accomplish this year?
(A) I have to pass my entrance exams this year. I can't afford to waste any more time. My whole future depends on accomplishing that goal, and I've promised myself to achieve it.
(B) This year I am determined to get more exercise. Usually, I make an ambitious plan but I don't stick to it. So, this year I'm setting goals that I can realize instead of reaching for impossible objectives. I will walk for an hour every evening after I eat, without fail. In six months, unless I have achieved my desired weight, I will add another ten minutes every week. I enjoy walking because it is easy and social, so I don't expect any problems this time!
3. What is your 10-year plan?
(A) In a decade I want to be happily married with two wonderful kids. We will live in a nice place, close to work and school. I‘ll have a stable job and be saving some money for the kids' education. I have it all planned out in my mind, step by step.
(B) I don't have any idea what I‘ll be doing ten years from now. All that I'm sure about is that it won't be the same as now. Who knows? Maybe I will be living the life of comfortable luxury, part of the international jet set. Or maybe I'll have my own company and be well on my way to becoming rich. Of course, it's also possible that something bad will happen. Maybe I‘ll be Dandruff or ill or even dead, but I don't think so. Basically, the future takes care of itself in its own way, and things mostly work out fine, even if not in the way we imagine they will be.
4. What is the ideal retirement situation?
(A) It doesn‘t matter how successful we've been, we can't be happy in retirement without good health. I can't imagine living to a hundred and being sick every day. What could be worse than that? Money can pay the medical bills, but it can‘t buy health; and without health, there can't be any happiness. So we need to take care of ourselves early and consistently throughout our lives.
(B) I can see it now: living in some hot, low-cost place, perhaps in South East Asia. With a very modest savings and pension, I could have a very nice house in a tropical paradise. The people around me would be beautiful and friendly, and life would be very easy. No cares or troubles, just living the good life! And this should be relatively easy to accomplish.
5. What should your next job be if you had a choice?
(A) I've always wanted to be a photographer. I think I have a good eye for composition, and the new cameras do all the work. It's hard to get started in the profession, but I think that's the job for me.
(B) I just hope that my next job is not “unemployed.” Times are bad, and lots of people are afraid of losing their positions. It also happened to me in the past, so I know what it feels like to have to worry about paying one's bills and the despair of not feeling useful. But I don't have any prejudice; I‘ll take any job and do it well, so I'm not too worried about being jobless for long.
6. What are your most pleasant memories?
(A) When I was about seven my family went to New York on a vacation. The skyscrapers, the busy crowds, the bright lights at night, the sounds of the constant traffic: these things made a great impression on me. I don‘t really remember the details of our trip, but I can't forget the sense of excitement I had |ust being there. I think this attitude has shaped the way I look at the world and my place in it.
(B) Nothing can deal the feeling of being in love the first time, especia||y when it's a shared feeling. I had had crushes before, but they were always accompanied by feelings of inadequacy and despair since the object of my affections did not care about me. But then I finally found someone who I fell in love with at first sight and, I was pleased to discover, felt the same way about me. We have spent many happy years together. Some of the times we experienced were not so good, but the fact that we had each other made them bearable.
7. What are your worst memories?
(A)
I'll never forget the terrible car accident I had when I was twenty-three. One moment, everything was fine; and the next, all hell broke loose. It was like being in slow motion as the two cars came together, and I felt helpless to prevent it. And then immediately after that, all I could feel was the worst pain I've ever experienced and the feeling that it would never end. Those are the most vivid memories, but after the crash I also had to go through months of rehabilitation and pain. I hope nothing like this ever happens to me again.
(B)
Basic training for the military was by far the worst experience in my life. I hated the early hours, the hard work, the feeling of being lost all the time. I couldn‘t stand the mind games that the people in charge constantly played, or the personal degradation that they in(/iCfed on me nearly every day. The pay was miserable, and there was no free time to spend it anyway. There were many times that I just wanted to kill myself and end it all. But, fortunately, it was over in a few weeks. The actual military service that followed was not much fun either, but it was sure better than that.
8. Do your relatives give you headaches or happiness?
M: I feel very lucky to have the in-laws I do. Sometimes I think they care more about me than my real parents do.
F: You are lucky indeed. I don't think my in-laws have ever forgiven me for marrying into their family. I don't think they believe anyone is 8 €1d enough for their son, and I'm the unfortunate e evidence of that belief.
M: Maybe you're over-reacting. Have you tried to get close to them? They can't be expected to de all the work, can they?
F: I’ve tried many times, but to no effect. Whenever I thinly we've achieved some sort of breakthrough in our relationship, they make sure that I am quickly disabused of that notion. If 1 didn't love my husband I d get a divorce just to get rid of his parents.
M: Wow, that sounds pretty bad. My in-laws and I had to make a rough adjustment in the very beginning, but we all learned to make the necessary compromises, and then everything worked out fine. I don't know what I'd do without them. If I ever have any problem, they are always there to help me out. I think that my wife and I may have actually split up without their support.
F: It's very strange. We can't choose who our parents are, end sometimes people get very bad ones. But usually, we can depend on our parents to love us and help us, no matter what. Then, when we grow up, we actually get to choose someone to share our lives with; but we also inherit their parents as well. I'm glad that this has worked out for you, but I don't think that most people get along very well with their in-laws.
M: Maybe not. I guess that it's because of some sort of rivalry in their affections. Your in-laws must love their son very much and can’t tolerate the notion that he has to share his love between themselves and you.
F: But they should realize that their interference in our lives makes him unhappy too. It isn't just mc who is hurt by their actions. If they truly loved him, as you say, they should want him to be happy, not miserable.
M: Yes, you're right, of course. I suppose there is nothing you can do about it, though. But I hope you can remember how bad you feel now, when your own children get married. Then maybe their spouses can say how lucky they are to have such a wonderful mother-in-law!
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