Self-Discipline
Self-Discipline Is My Top Concern
Good afternoon,ladies and gentlemen!
My speech begins with a little story:one day,Xu Heng,a great scholar in the Yuan Dynasty,was walking in the street,exhausted and thirsty to death because of the hot weather.There happened to be a pear tree by the roadside.All passers-by hurried for the pears except him.
“Why don’t you pick the pears to quench your thirst?”Someone asked.
“They are not mine.How can I pick them free?”He answered.
The man laughed,”The world is so unpeaceful now that no one would care the owner of the pears.”
“There may be no owner of those pears,but there is one in my mind.”
Xu Heng,the scholar in the story,is actually the master of his mind and exactly the spokesman of my topic:Self-Discipline.
Self-discipline is my top concern,because I need it to resist temptations,and to draw me to the right road whenever I’ve gone wrong.
My dear fellows,if you don’t have any classes in the morning,do you fail to get up before eight o’clock?Yes,I did.Because the moment I stepped into college,I found that all the rules in the middle school,such as,being late or even not attending classes,seem to make no difference any more.They are now like the pears in the street:any one can just pick it.So I did it.As a result,lack of self-discipline has wasted lots of my precious time and opportunities.I feel sorry about that,and I promptly call for self-discipline to spur me on to race against the clock.
Every citizen also needs self-discipline so that we can live in a society of order and harmony.From time to time we can see some people who cross the street even with the red light on.And more often than not,we rely on laws and regulations to maintain the social order.In my opinion,however,what we should highlight is self-discipline,the society will be in less need of restrictions.
Similarly,every country needs self-discipline,because it is the foundation of mutual respect and the cornerstone of peaceful coexistence.There is a traditional Chinese ethic called”caution alone”,meaning that a respected man with strict self-discipline behaves as careful when he is alone as he is with others.It is true for the countries.Rich or poor,developed or developing,once they exercise caution alone,they will be respected and honored for their strong self-discipline.
To conclude,I’d like to quote a sentence from my “spokesmen”:”There may be no owner of these pears,but there is one in my mind.”So self-discipline is my top concern,and it also needs to be the top concern of every citizen and every nation. Thank you!