For many parents, raising a teenager is like fighting a long war, but years go by without any clear winner. Like a border conflict between neighboring countries, the parent-teen war is about boundaries: Where is the line between what I control and what you do?

    Both sides want peace, but neither feels it has any power to stop the conflict. In part, this is because neither is willing to admit any responsibility for starting it. From the parents' point of view, the only cause of their fight is their adolescents' complete unreasonableness. And of course, the teens see it in exactly the same way, except oppositely. Both feel trapped.

In this article, I'll describe three no-win situations that commonly arise between teens and parents and then suggest some ways out of the trap. The first no-win situation is quarrels over unimportant things. Examples include the color of the teen's hair, the cleanliness of the bedroom, the preferred style of clothing, the child's failure to eat a good breakfast before school, or his tendency to sleep until noon on the weekends. Second, blaming. The goal of a blaming battle is to make the other admit that his bad attitude is the reason why everything goes wrong. Third, needing to be right. It doesn't matter what the topic is —politics, the laws of physics, or the proper way to break an egg—the point of these arguments is to prove that you are right and the other person is wrong, for both wish to be considered an authority—someone who actually knows something—and therefore to command respect. Unfortunately, as long as parents and teens continue to assume that they know more than the other, they'll continue to fight these battles forever and never make any real progress.

    Our lifestyles today are very busy. We have family, school, sports, entertainment and social activities to fit into a time that seems never enough. We need to be healthy to meet the demands of daily life. But what does it mean to have a healthy lifestyle?

To have a healthy lifestyle, we need to:

◆ eat different kinds of healthy food most of the time

◆ do exercise often

◆ have time to relax

◆ get enough sleep to give our bodies time to grow healthy and strong

Read about a normal day in the lives of two children.

    No matter which kind of lifestyle you agree on, just remember it's important to balance all aspects of life.

    situation in which they had to observe two circles on a screen.

    At first glance,price-comparison websites are an example of capitalism at its best.But it has caused fierce competition on price and eviscerated profits.Towers Watson,a consultancy,said that "unnecessary" price competition following the rise of comparison sites in Britain had cost insurers ￡1 billion a year.

    Consumers should celebrate that;the firms' losses are their gains.But there is a catch.Comparison sites introduce a new layer of costs,including their own advertising campaigns.In theory,competition in the market for comparison sites ought to keep those costs down.But David Ronayne of Warwick University argues that consumers often lose out from comparison sites.They earn a commission for each shopper who uses them for consumption such as buying insurance.That referral（委托）cost is included in the price the consumer ends up paying.If the increased costs outweigh the saving the comparison enables,consumers end up worse off.

    These worries are not just theoretical.In 2014,Britain's competition regulator found that many comparison sites were using their contracts with retailers（零售商）to ban them from offering lower prices elsewhere.That weakened rivals' incentive（对手的动机）to cut fees,because prices on their site could not fall.By keeping prices similar,the contracts also reduced the incentive for consumers to search on multiple sites,thus helping sites retain their users.

    Weaker incentives to lower commissions mean weaker incentives to lower costs,too.That might explain why comparison websites advertise so heavily,and sometimes offer free gifts to those who use them.In a recent paper,Ben Edelman of Harvard Business School and Julian Wright of the National University of Singapore argue that when a site knows that the prices merchants provide through it will always be the lowest available,it increases investment in attracting customers,safe in the knowledge that the merchants and at last consumers will bear the cost.

    Is there any way to ensure the market for price comparison is competitive?Asking consumers to check multiple websites defeats the point of using them.One solution is to have only one site,but regulate it as a public utility（功用）. Alternatively,the governments could run the site itself.But creating good search and comparison sites may be too hard for them.It is much better to acknowledge that consumers will always have to do some comparison themselves to "keep the system honest".

    Websites that compare the comparison sites can help,although it is easy to see how they could fall prey to the same problems.Any firm with captive users（被动用户）,be it a comparison site a search engine,or a social-media platform,can charge a high price for access to the eyes of its customers.For all their innovation,Internet middlemen are not unlike supermarkets.Shoppers would never imagine that a single store had the lowest price for all the items they need.

    One day when I was 12, my mother gave me an order: I was to walk to the public library, and borrow at least one book for the summer. This was one more weapon for her to defeat my strange problem — inability to read.

    In the library, I found my way into the “Children's Room.” I sat down on the floor and pulled a few books off the shelf at random. The cover of a book caught my eye. It presented a picture of a beagle. I had recently had a beagle, the first and only animal companion I ever had as a child. He was my secret sharer, but one morning, he was gone, given away to someone who had the space and the money to care for him. I never forgot my beagle.

    There on the book's cover was a beagle which looked identical（相同的）to my dog. I ran my fingers over the picture of the dog on the cover. My eyes ran across the title, Amos, the Beagle with a Plan. Unknowingly, I had read the title. Without opening the book, I borrowed it from the library for the summer.

Under the shade of a bush, I started to read about Amos. I read very, very slowly with difficulty. Though pages were turned slowly, I got the main idea of the story about a dog who, like mine, had been separated from his family and who finally found his way back home. That dog was my dog, and I was the little boy in the book. At the end of the story, my mind continued the final scene of reunion, on and on, until my own lost dog and I were, in my mind, running together.

    My mother's call returned me to the real world. I suddenly realized something: I had read a book, and I had loved reading that book. Everyone knew I could not read. But I had read it. Books could be incredibly wonderful and I was going to read them.

    I never told my mother about my “miraculous” (奇迹般地) experience that summer, but she saw a slow but remarkable improvement in my classroom performance during the next year. And years later, she was proud that her son had read thousands of books, was awarded a PhD in literature, and authored his own books, articles, poetry and fiction. The power of the words has held.

    The park bench was deserted as I sat down to read beneath the branches of an old tree, with good reason to frown, for the world was intended to drag me down. At this time, a boy approached me. He stood right before me, and said with great excitement, "Look what I found!"

    In his hand was a flower, and what a pitiful sight, with its petals(花瓣)all worn. Wanting him to take his flower and go off to play, I faked a small smile and then turned to the other side.

    But instead of leaving, he sat next to my side and placed the flower to his nose and declared, "It really smells pretty and it's beautiful, too. That's why I picked it. Here, it's for you."

    The flower before me was dying or dead. But I knew I must take it, or he might never leave .So I reached for the flower, and replied, Just what I need.

    But instead of placing the flower in my hand, he held it in mid-air. It was then that I noticed that the boy was blind.

    I heard my voice quiver(轻微颤抖) and at the same time my tears shone like the sun. As I thanked him for picking the very best one, he smiled and said, "you're welcome." And then he ran off to play, unaware of the impact he'd had on me.

    I sat there and wondered how he managed to see a self-pitying woman beneath an old tree. Perhaps from his heart, he'd been blessed with true sight.

    Through the eyes of the blind boy, I could see the problem was not with the world; the problem was me. And for all of those times I had been blind. From now on I vowed to see beauty and appreciate every second that's mine. Then I held the flower up to my nose and breathed its fragrance and smiled as that young boy.

    As a college student, I have planned my future career goals. I would like to work as a sales assistant in a computer company, then a sales manager and finally boss of my own company.

    At the very beginning, I plan to find a job in a famous company producing computers, in which all the staff are fully happy at work and I can experience job satisfaction most of the time. Only such kind of company can provide me with good working atmosphere and eagerness to learn more so as to get well prepared for my future profession.

    At first I want to be a sales assistant and always keep myself busy working in and out of the company, such as, answering telephones, doing repair work, even cleaning the rooms. Although the salary may be low, I will seize every chance to learn from other staff. In my spare time, I will take some courses so as to get more qualifications and experience in this field. In three or five years, I am determined to become a sales manager who is responsible for the selling of the computers. I will interview as many customers as possible and do market research and improve our products. Meanwhile I will take care of my staff to make them eager to work to the best of their abilities.

    As is known to us, it is hard to manage a company, but I will make every effort to achieve my goal step by step, and I am sure "There is nothing difficult in the world if you put your heart into it."