I was painfully shy as a child. In high school I would avoid participating in class discussions. I was too afraid to talk to anyone but my closest friends~ I would think about being less shy, wanting the courage not only to ask a girl out, but to speak up in class and say what I was thinking. Yet, it never happened. Fears showed themselves in such self-conscious questions as, " What will other people think?  What if she says no?" I felt a dark presence in my mind holding me back.

This shyness continued into college. One day, the question occurred to me: Is life shy?

The thought surprised me ! Think of the leaves bursting out in the spring time, the bird singing at dawn, the sheer number of different forms of life, all expressing the wideness and scope of divine life. There's nothing shy about it. Life is everywhere and attention-grabbing (引人注意的). So, if my creator isn't shy about all the life that needs expressing, I don't need to be either.

I realized that if I wanted to overcome fear and shyness, I would have to put this law of life into practice~ Shyness, fear, and loneliness were hindering me from living my life as life: God wanted me to live it. Therefore, I decided to live how life saw me.

One example: I wrote a note to a girl, asking her out on a date. Even as I was writing it, the fears of disaffirmation and unworthiness came to me. This time however, instead of shrinking back and hiding from the fear, I put the note in the campus mail in spite of myself. I thought: whether she says yes or no, it's still right for me not to be shy. I can live with the confidence sent from the source of my life. The girl saw me in class the next day and told me that she would love to go out with me. I should not have been so surprised!

Bit by bit, I was proving that the limited view of myself no longer had control over me.  After college, I worked as a newspaper reporter, earned an advanced degree in theater, became a productive writer (a lifelong dream), met a special woman whom I married, and even got a job teaching at a university.

小题1:The writer was shy as a child because of______.

A．awareness that life is shy

B．lack of courage to speak out in public

C．fear of others' attitude and reaction

D．failure in his participation in class discussion小题2:"The law" in Paragraph 4 refers to the fact that______.

A．life is attention-grabbing and divine

B．God treats everything and everyone fairly

C．everything in nature is in the favour of God

D．the creator of life which needs expressing isn't shy小题3:It can be learnt from Paragraph 5 that the writer______.

A．didn't hesitate before sending the note

B．wouldn't regret sending the note despite the result

C．was not surprised when the girl agreed to go out

D．believed in God and felt encouraged by the wideness of life小题4:The underlined word "disaffirmation" in Paragraph 5 probably means______.

A．rejection

B．laughter

C．regret

D．horror小题5:The purpose of writing the text is to______.

A．blame those who are shy and unconfident

B．persuade people to have confidence in their career

C．share the personal experience with the readers

D．prove that the overcome of shyness helps achieve success