Michael Jordon is the greatest basketball player so far. Once he was making a television advertisement. All Michael needed to do in the advertisement was to miss a shot. For Michael, this was difficult. He always succeeded whenever he was throwing the ball. Every time he threw a basketball, it went in. Every time he tried to miss a shot, he failed. In total, it took him over 20 times before he missed a shot.

For Michael, success is a strong habit. He had formed a habit which was so strong that it took him a lot of time to break it and “fail”. Just like drinking, smoking and collecting things, success is also a habit. Like all habits, once it is established, it is difficult to break. Many people think that success is difficult to maintain（维持）. They feel that it will be hard work and will need too much action and focus. The truth is that it is simply a habit, and as easy to keep as any other habit.

Spend some time making success a habit in your life. Once you have developed it, it is not something you will want to change again. Then, the only thing you will fail is failing.

    My mom only had one eye. I hated her. She was such an embarrassment.

    She ran a small shop at a flea （跳蚤） market and collected old clothes and some other things to sell for the money we needed. Once during elementary school, it was field day, and my mom came. I was so embarrassed and wondered how she could do this to me? I threw her a hateful look and ran out. The next day at school, my schoolmates laughed at me, "Your mom only has one eye!" I was so angry with my mom. So I said to my mom, "Why don't you have the other eye?" My mom said nothing.

    I hated my one-eyed mom. I told myself that I would become successful in the near future, so I studied very hard. Later, I got accepted by the Seoul University. I left my mom and came to Seoul to study. Then I got married there. Now I am living happily as a successful man. I enjoy the life in Seoul because it's a place that doesn't remind me of my mom and my past. This kind of happiness was getting bigger and bigger, until one day I saw my mom. She was still with her one eye. Even my daughter ran away, scared of my mom's eye. I screamed at her, "Who are you? I don't know you! How dare you come to my house and scare my daughter?" To this, my mom quietly answered, "Oh, I'm so sorry. I may have gotten the wrong address." Then she disappeared out of sight.

    One day, a letter about a school reunion （学校聚会） came. After the reunion, I went down to the old shack, which I used to call a house. There I found my mom fallen on the cold ground. Then a piece of paper in her hand came into my eyes. It was a letter to me.

My son,

    I'm so sorry that I only have one eye, and I was an embarrassment for you. When you were very little, you got into an accident and lost your eye. As a mom, I couldn't stand watching you having to grow up with only one eye. So I gave you mine. I was so proud of my son to see a whole new world for me with that eye. During the couple of times that you were angry with me, I thought to myself, it's because you love me. Don't cry for me because of my death. I love you so much."

    Roald Dahl was one of the most successful writers of children's books. He sold millions of books all over the world. Many of his books have been made into films and videos. He is so famous that there is even a Roald Dahl Museum you can visit.

    Roald Dahl was born in 1916 in Wales, Britain. His father was rich but he died when Roald was very young. Roald and his mother lived a hard life. He had to leave school and went to Africa where he worked for an oil company.

    In 1939, Roald became a pilot, but he had a bad accident. It made him limp(瘸的)for the rest of his life. After this, Roald went to America where he wrote a story about his experience as a pilot. It was so good that it was put in a magazine.

    Roald married an American film star. They bought a house in England and had five children. From 1960 to 1965, ：Theo, one of his children, was hit by a taxi and was seriously hurt. Oliva, one of Roald's daughters, died of a strange illness. Soon after this, his wife also had a serious illness. It took her years to get completely better.

    Gradually Roald became more and more successful. He always did his writing in an old shed(棚)at the back of his house. He always sat in the same old armchair with a wooden board on his lap.

    "One of the nice things about being a writer," he once said, "is that all you need is what you've got in your head and a pencil and a bit of paper."

    In 1983 Roald won a big prize for his book The BFG. During his life, Roald wrote many famous books, such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, Fantastic Mr Fox.

    After he died in 1990, Roald left money to help people with serious illness and those with problems with reading and writing.