Passage 1

The 2013 word of the year, according to the Oxford Dictionaries, was ''selfie,"which Oxford defines as “a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone and uploaded to a social media website." The first use of the term, according to Oxford, occurred when a young Australian got drunk at a friend’s birthday party and fell down the stairs. He hit lip first and his front teeth punched a hole in his bottom lip. His response was to take a photo of himself and post it online for his friends to see. “Sorry about the focus,” he wrote, “It was a selfie.”That was more than a decade ago. The word remained in relative obscurity until two years ago, when “selfie” began its climb to digital star. With smartphone in hand, we can now share with others how our narcissism (自恋)looks to us. This is not just the year of the selfie; this is the age of the selfie.Although their self-view may look good to people who post a lot of selfies, it turns out that their friends often aren’t amused. Recent research conducted by Heriot-Walt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, concluded that increased sharing of selfies leads to decreased feelings of connection and closeness. In other words, your friends will stay closer if you keep your selfies to yourself.The problem with selfie culture isn’t only what we look at; it's also how we love and how we live. In a culture defined by the selfie, nothing has lasting value but the self, which means everyone and everything can be disposed of whenever something better shows up. For example, online dating services make it easy to find a mate with the click of a mouse, why not keep looking and looking and looking? When the going gets tough in one relationship, why not get going and find someone better?Our things become disposable as well. In the case of the phone, something better shows up about every six months. Obviously, an astonishing 99 percent of the stuff we buy winds up in a landfill or recycling plant within six months of purchase. It's hard to believe, but six months after purchase, only one percent of everything we buy remains in use. It takes disposing of a lot of stuff to ensure that we each have “something better.”Here’s the irony: Selfie culture doesn’t enhance the self but degrades it. When we turn the lens of life on ourselves, we create the illusion that we should focus only on what’s best for us. We continually focus and refocus, constantly revisit options and reevaluate decisions. In doing so, we deprive ourselves of being surrounded by people whom we deeply value because of their long presence and things we deeply value because of their long use.Make no mistake. Sometimes we make bad decisions, and we need to get out and start over. If you’re in a job that’s ethically compromising or a relationship that’s emotionally or physically abusive, head for the door. But if your life has turned into a slideshow of short-term commitments and temporary relationships, then it’s time to refocus. Life isn’t a selfie. Rather，it’s a complex interweaving (交织)of relationships that unite us to the world around us. And while those relationships must fully engage who we are as individuals, they must also fully engage to whom and to what we are related, which ultimately is everything.

What is a typical selfie according to the Oxford Dictionaries?