思行 | 清華iTalk演講全文:Changing by Choosing

　　Dear Grandma：

　　Last friday, invited by by Tsinghua Graduate Union(清華iTalk), I shared our story about readingclub and morning jogging team during the iTalk. This is my first speach in English, tough but meaningful, so I decide to share my draft here as a mark for this beautiful experience.

　　Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,

　　Right after I received the invitation from iTalk,I told my wife and teammates, “Hi guys, the iTalk team invited me to share ourstories with friends who want to make a change, so we have a chance to attractmore beautiful girls (also of course handsome boys) to join our morning joggingteam!”

　　However, when I read the message again, OMG, this is an English talk?! Then the ship of friendship turnedover within one second.

　　As you may not know,even I am from the Tsinghua SEM, School of English and Mathematics, I never tooka TOEFL test before. Even I have studied in National University of Singaporefor more than half a year, yet I am still struggling with the fight against English.

　　However, I choose to stand here tonight, not because I am somebody, but because I believe thatstanding here tonight is exactly what Steve Jobs described as “Stay foolish,Stay hungry”, which is also the right step towards change.

　　Inother words, “Learning by doing, Changingby Choosing” is what I am trying to discuss with you tonight.

　　From the view of economy, our life is full of choices. Every day we have to makechoice, whether to eat at Tingtao or Zijing, whether to stay home or come hereto iTalk with your friends. I also have to choose, or be chosen by others.

　　Ihave been dreaming balancing running and studying. However, changing by choosing is not an easy thing, especially when you haven’tobtained the power to make choice. When I was an undergraduate student, I wasalways worried about falling behind others either in study or social works. Itis difficult for us to be a nobody at Tsinghua because of high expectation andpeer pressure. So I was so busy dealing with tough lectures, massive homework,busy with fighting against the endless meetings at night. I always tell myselfthat I am so busy and I will do exercise when I am free. However, as we allknow, time is always not enough.

　　As a matter of fact, it is you don’t change bychoosing that causes your lack of time. For example, I used to believe that I am the busiestboy in the world and I don’t even have time to fall in love with a girl. SometimesI just spend time on WeChat moment or Weibo, without knowing that time isflying and middle night is coming. So I hate to stay-up late with doing nothingor doing things inefficiently, or only playing games, and then complain myselffor wasting time. And stay-up again and again.

　　Changing by choosing doesn’t mean you have to give upsomething you love. When you choose to change, you will find yourself back. Until the end of year 2014, before I was 22 years old, I set my mind to make a change, that is, say no to stay-up at night aswell as say yes to morning jog. As the winter morning then was cold and dark, Icould not get up early even after I set 3 alarm clocks, so I made up my mind torun at 7:00 a.m. and asked my roommate for help. One week later, I was able toget up when the first alarm clock went off. Gradually I found more time to dowhat I like in the early morning without being disturbed by the others.Finally, I formed the habit of sleeping early at 11:00p.m. and get up at 6:00a.m.

　　One thing I find out is that when I choose to change,I am not alone. At thebeginning, four of my friends supported me and chose to jog with me together，one of which was my girlfriend, Xinyu, who used tocall me up at the morning, I was afraid of missing her call and risked losingher and my friends’ faith and trust. It waslove, friendship and delicious fruit that wake me up in the morning.

　　To my surprise, when Ichoose to change, then everything changes gradually. To go to bed earlier, I force myself to dothings quickly and spend limited time on wechat at night. As many of my friendsknow from my morning jogging pictures in wechat moment that I will get up early, theydon’t send me messages after 10 pm. Also, I have more time to accompany with mygirlfriend for breakfast to improve our relationship. Day after day, more of myfriends also changed from “like the picture” into join us in the morning. Alsoto my surprise, they not only choose to stay and keep running, but also sharetheir happy morning jogging experiences with their friends, thus deliver happiness to others.

　　Our morning jogging team start with 4 members one yearago, now we have more than 280 members, and every day you can meet more than 20of us jogging and laughing around campus. All of Our teammates share a common belief that everyrunning man has his own stories—— no matter you are boy or girl, no matter youare young or old.

　　One story isabout a beautiful girl, Summer, who changed herself by choosing. She is amaster from the School of Journalism and Communication, I met her during a conference. Oneday after I posted morning pictures in my Wechat moment, she sent a message tome:“Hello Xiaoming, I see that all of you areso happy in the picture, can I have a try and jog with you tomorrow?” I said yes, why not try? As you can see, “why not try” is a best answer to otherswhen they ask for your advice. After 3 kilometers, she said,‘I am so tired that I have no energy to die’, I wassurprised when I knew she had never run for more than 1500m before. However,after one week, she became the fastest girl in our team, and keep bringing surprisesto our team. One day when we read her jogging diary, she said that she lived a massive life before, afterjoining the morning jogging team, she finds herself back, and that’s what makesher staying and becoming a more positive girl.

　　I started joggingby hoping it can distract my mind from leaving someone. However it ended upbringing me a whole new world . A world where I see people trying to changethemselves and where I can gain the energy to deal with all the bad feelings.We came to this team with different reasons .We have seen each other strugglingagainst our physical and psychological limits .And we all survived . The onlyway out ,is through . That's the most important thing I learn from jogging.——From Summer

　　Sometimes, changing by choosing not onlychange yourself, but will change the world around. This is what we learned from our teammate, DuDu:

　　Thanks for xiaoming’sinviting, I am so happy to share with you my expierence. When I first joined inthe morning jogging team, it was last summer. And I am troubled by the blackdog of depression. First,I wanna run in the morning just to have a good mood. Icould still remember the first day. When we ran to Zhulou, I was exhausted anddidn’t have the energy to finish the running. I wanna give up but xiaomingaccompanied me all through and encouraged me”dudu, you can!” With xiaoming’ssupport, I finished my first 5km in my life. And ever since that, I deliveredphotos in the wechat moments everyday to keep record of my running. A lot offriends of mine saw it and joined the morning jogging. Since then the runningteam becomes a chuanxiao organization. I love our jogging team because it’sfull of love. We run together to embrace the sunlight of the dawn. We are afamily, you are not alone. If you run slowly, it doesn’t matter, there’s alwayssomeone accompany you to finish the journey.

　　From DuDu, we find the meaning of life, that is live for happiness and bringhappiness to others.

　　Another story is about Monkey, one of our new but impressed member, she is a freshman, busy with adapting to the new environment, while she keep on jogging with us almost every morning. She also shared her story about jogging and changing story, if you want to know more about her, you can join us at 5:50 am. at Zijing playground.

　　Another good news,many friends in our team choose to push their friendship one step forward, orin other words, by now we have about six couples in our team and a new coupleon the way.

　　By sharing thesestories, what I REALLY want to share is,there are so many stories about changing by choosing, merely in our smallmorning jogging team, let alone the big world around you and me.

　　It’s difficult to make a big difference by one step,but everyone has the power to make small changes by choosing every day. Life is a marathon full of love, we mustfind ourselves by trying, then, from 0 to 1, from 1 to a big difference.

　　That’s it, thanksfor your listening.

　　YIN Ximing, 20160422

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　　本文作者：西明-爺爺

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