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  3. When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that I might become a part of a new international trend.

When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that I might become a part of a new international trend.

admin2012-03-23  81
问题     When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that I might become a part of a new international trend. A lateral move that hurt my pride and blocked my professional progress prompted me to abandon my relatively high profile career although, in the manner of a disgraced government minister, l covered my exit by claiming "I wanted to spend more time with my family".
    Curiously, some two-and-a-half years and two novels later, my experiment in what the Americans term "downshifting" has turned my tired excuse into an absolute reality. I have been transformed from a passionate advocate of the philosophy of "having it all", preached by Linda Kelsey for the past seven years in the page of She magazine, into a woman who is happy to settle for a bit of everything.
    I have discovered, as perhaps Kelsey will after her much-publicized resignation from the editorship of She after a build-up of stress, that abandoning the doctrine of "juggling your life", and making the alternative move into "downshifting" brings with it far greater rewards than financial success and social status. Nothing could persuade me to return to the kind of life Kelsey used to advocate and I once enjoyed: 12 hour working days, pressured deadlines, the fearful strain of office politics and the limitations of being a parent on "quality time" .
    In America, the move away from juggling to a simpler, less materialistic lifestyle is a well-established trend. Down shifting—also known in America as "voluntary simplicity" — has, ironically, even bred a new area of what might be termed anticonsumerism. There are a number of best-selling downshifting self-help books for people who want to simplify their lives; there am newsletters, such as The Tightwad Gazette, that give hundreds of thousands of Americans useful tips on anything from recycling their cling-film to making their own soap; there are even support groups for those who want to achieve the mid-90’s equivalent of dropping out.
    While in America the trend started as a reaction to the economic decline—after the mass redundancies caused by downsizing in the late 80’s—and is still linked to the politics of thrift, in Britain, at least among the middle-class downshifters of my acquaintance, we have different reasons for seeking to simplify our lives.
    For the women of my generation who were urged to keep juggling through the 80’s, downshifting in the mid-90’s is not so much a search for the mythical good life—growing your own organic vegetables, and risking turning into one—as a personal recognition of your limitations.  
"Juggling one’s life" probably means living a life characterized by______.
选项 A、non-materialistic lifestyle
B、a bit of everything
C、extreme stress
D、anti-consumerism
答案C
解析 细节判断题。第四段第一句指出，从“juggling”到一种更简朴的，不那么追求物质享受的生活方式的转变是一种新兴的趋势，由此可判断“juggling one’s life”定是与简朴、自在的生活相对应的。故选C。A不追求物质享受的生活方式。B随遇而安，这正是简朴生活的特点。D反消费主义。根据第四段第二句，“自愿过简朴生活”与“反消费主义”是一致的。
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