歷年考研英語閱讀理解2001年05

[00:06.51]2001 Passage5 [00:08.42]When I decided to quit my full time employment [00:11.27]it never occurred to me that I might [00:13.38]become a part of a new international trend. [00:16.51]A lateral move that hurt my pride [00:18.93]and blocked my professional [00:20.54]progress prompted me to abandon [00:23.37]my relatively high profile career although, [00:26.69]in the manner of a disgraced government minister, [00:29.93]I covered my exit by claiming [00:32.35]"I wanted to spend more time with my family". [00:36.19]Curiously, some two-and-a-half years [00:38.91]and two novels later, [00:40.82]my experiment in what the Americans term [00:43.94]"downshifting" has turned my tired excuse [00:47.37]into an absolute reality. [00:50.50]I have been transformed from a passionate [00:53.42]advocate of the philosophy of "having it all", [00:56.64]preached by Linda Kelsey for the past seven years [00:59.87]in the pages of She magazine, [01:02.29]into a woman who is happy to settle for [01:04.81]a bit of everything. [01:07.03]I have discovered, as perhaps Kelsey [01:09.75]will after her much-publicized resignation [01:13.28]from the editorship of She after a build-up of stress, [01:17.03]that abandoning the doctrine of "juggling your life", [01:20.85]and making the alternative move into "downshifting" brings [01:24.89]with it far greater rewards [01:26.98]than financial success and social status. [01:31.12]Nothing could persuade me to return [01:33.54]to the kind of life Kelsey used to advocate [01:36.46]and I once enjoyed: [01:38.58]12-hour working days, pressured deadlines, [01:42.11]the fearful strain of office politics [01:44.84]and the limitations of being a parent on "quality time". [01:49.78]In America, the move away from juggling to a simpler, [01:54.11]less materialistic lifestyle is a well-established trend. [01:58.75]Downshifting--also known in America [02:01.58]as "voluntary simplicity"--has, ironically, [02:05.31]even bred a new area of [02:07.32]what might be termed anti-consumerism. [02:11.56]There are a number of bestselling downshifting [02:14.09]self-help books for people [02:16.20]who want to simplify their lives; [02:18.62]there are newsletters, such as The Tightwad Gazette, [02:22.34]that give hundreds of thousands of Americans [02:24.75]useful tips on anything [02:26.98]from recycling their cling-film to making their own soap; [02:31.41]there are even support groups for those [02:33.90]who want to achieve the mid-'90s equivalent of [02:36.83]dropping out. [02:38.64]While in America the trend started as a reaction to [02:41.55]the economic decline--after the mass redundancies [02:45.07]caused by downsizing in the late '80s [02:48.41]--and is still linked to the politics of thrift, in Britain, [02:52.62]at least among the middle-class downshifters of my acquaintance, [02:56.95]we have different reasons for seeking to simplify our lives. [03:01.79]For the women of my generation [03:03.71]who were urged to keep juggling through the '80s, [03:06.83]downshifting in the mid-'90s [03:09.25]is not so much a search for the mythical good life [03:13.08]--growing your own organic vegetables, [03:15.30]and risking turning into one [03:18.02]--as a personal recognition of your limitations.

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