新的一年做個(gè)嶄新的自己

Resolving to Create a New You

新的一年做個(gè)嶄新的自己

THE annual ritual of the New Year’s resolution — I’ll lose 10 pounds, get my finances in order, be more patient with my family, feel more grateful — misses the point. We try to steel our wills to do what we already know we should be doing. Kick-in-the-pants reminders, however stern, are missed opportunities for genuine self-renewal. (Not to mention that the shelf life of any motivational juice we generate in January tends to expire in February.)

制定新年規(guī)劃這個(gè)一年一度的常規(guī)動(dòng)作——我要減重10磅，要解決財(cái)務(wù)問題，要更耐心地對(duì)待家人，要更知道感恩——總是放錯(cuò)重點(diǎn)。我們竭力強(qiáng)化意志，去做已經(jīng)意識(shí)到自己該做的那些事情。但好似“催命符”的備忘錄不管多嚴(yán)苛，都無(wú)法激勵(lì)人們進(jìn)行真正的自我更新。(更別提1月份才成形的這些宏圖大志是多么容易過期，2月份一到，它們往往就宣告破產(chǎn)。)

The turning over of a new year is an opportunity to create ourselves anew. How? The key, I suggest, is in shifting our understanding of the choices we make. For many people, the most important choices in life are sources of agony, dread, paralysis — even depression or suicide. It doesn’t have to be like this.

新年來(lái)臨之際是重新塑造自我的良機(jī)。如何塑造呢?我認(rèn)為，關(guān)鍵在于換個(gè)角度來(lái)理解我們所做的選擇。對(duì)很多人而言，生命中最重要的一些選擇是痛苦、恐懼、無(wú)力的根源，甚至?xí)屓水a(chǎn)生抑郁和自殺傾向。但事情并不一定非是如此不可。

A hypothetical example: Eve works as a textbook editor at a Boston publishing house and was approached by a small but prestigious imprint on the West Coast that was looking for a fiction editor. The job would be a big promotion, with a significant raise, and Eve had always wanted to work in fiction.

比方說(shuō)，伊芙是波士頓某出版社的教科書編輯，西海岸一家正在尋找小說(shuō)編輯的出版公司找到了她。該公司規(guī)模雖小，但卻久負(fù)盛名。接受這份工作，伊芙的職位會(huì)大大提升，薪水會(huì)大幅提高，而且她一直都想在小說(shuō)領(lǐng)域發(fā)展。

But Eve is in crisis. Should she move her husband and young daughter from their cozy life in Boston, her home of 15 years, to the wilds of California? If she stays, will she be forsaking the opportunity of a lifetime? If she moves, will her new boss turn out to be a jerk? Will her child be bullied at school? What if her husband can’t find a good job? Will the family quarrel, the marriage dissolve, her boss fire her for being incompetent, and she and her child end up on food stamps in a homeless shelter?

但伊芙卻面臨著艱難的抉擇。她已經(jīng)在波士頓生活了15年，該讓丈夫和年幼的女兒拋開這里的愜意生活，與她一起搬走嗎?如果選擇留在波士頓，她能夠割舍一生中難得的機(jī)遇嗎?如果選擇搬去西海岸，要是發(fā)現(xiàn)新老板是個(gè)混球可怎么辦?要是她的孩子在學(xué)校挨欺負(fù)可怎么辦?要是她丈夫找不到好工作可怎么辦?家里是否會(huì)爭(zhēng)吵不斷，婚姻是否會(huì)解體，老板是否會(huì)因?yàn)樗裏o(wú)法勝任工作而炒她魷魚，她和孩子是否會(huì)落得在收容所靠食品券度日的田地?

Many people are like Eve and see their choices as, in essence, problems of computation. But choosing between jobs is not like computing the distance between Memphis and Mumbai. The view of choice as a matter of calculating maximal value is assumed in cost-benefit analysis, government policy making and much of economic theory. It’s even embedded in the apps you can download that purport to help you decide whether to buy a new car, get married or change jobs.

許多人都和伊芙差不多，他們其實(shí)把選擇看成了計(jì)算利害得失的問題。但在不同工作之間做出選擇，跟測(cè)量從孟菲斯到孟買的距離可不是一回事。把選擇看作對(duì)價(jià)值最大化的計(jì)算，是內(nèi)化于成本收益分析、政府決策過程以及許多經(jīng)濟(jì)理論之中的一種觀念。它甚至潛藏在可以從網(wǎng)上下載的某些旨在幫助你決定是否要買新車、是否要結(jié)婚、是否要換工作的應(yīng)用程序之中。

At the heart of this model is a simple assumption: that what you should choose is always determined by facts in the world about which option has more value — facts that, if only you were smart enough to discover, would make decision-making relatively easy.

該模型的核心假設(shè)非常簡(jiǎn)單：你的選擇總是取決于世界上的某些與哪個(gè)選項(xiàng)會(huì)帶來(lái)更大價(jià)值有關(guān)的事實(shí)——你只要聰明到足以發(fā)現(xiàn)這些事實(shí)，就能夠相對(duì)容易地做出決策。

But the assumption is false. When we compute distances, there are only three possibilities: one distance is more than, less than or equal to another. Similarly, when we compute value, there are only three possibilities: one thing is better than, worse than or just as good as another. But we shouldn’t assume that goodness is like distance. Values don’t have the same structure as facts.

但這個(gè)假設(shè)是錯(cuò)誤的。我們測(cè)算距離的時(shí)候，所面對(duì)的可能性只有三種：一段距離比另一段長(zhǎng)，比另一段短，或者跟另一段相等。同樣，我們計(jì)算價(jià)值的時(shí)候，所面對(duì)的可能性也只有三種：一個(gè)事物比另一個(gè)好，比另一個(gè)糟，或者跟另一個(gè)差不多。但我們不該把事物的好壞和距離的長(zhǎng)短等同起來(lái)。價(jià)值的體系和事實(shí)的體系是截然不同的。

Options can be “on a par” — different in value while being in the same overall neighborhood. If your alternatives are on a par, you can’t make a mistake of reason in choosing one instead of the other. Since one isn’t better than the other, you can’t choose wrongly. But nor are they equally good. When alternatives are on a par, when the world doesn’t determine a single right thing to do, that doesn’t mean that value writ large has been exhausted. Instead of looking outward to find the value that determines what you should do, you can look inward to what you can stand behind, commit to, resolve to throw yourself behind. By committing to an option, you can confer value on it.

各種選項(xiàng)可能會(huì)“平分秋色”——雖然價(jià)值不完全相同，但也相差無(wú)幾。如果你有一些平分秋色的選項(xiàng)，你無(wú)論選擇哪個(gè)，都不會(huì)犯判斷上的錯(cuò)誤。因?yàn)閮煞N選擇沒有優(yōu)劣之分，你不可能做出錯(cuò)誤的選擇。不過，它們也并非一樣好。當(dāng)選項(xiàng)平分秋色時(shí)，當(dāng)世界上并非只有唯一正確的答案時(shí)，那并不意味著真正的價(jià)值已經(jīng)枯竭。與其從外部尋找價(jià)值來(lái)判斷自己應(yīng)該做些什么，你可以向內(nèi)心來(lái)詢問自己能夠支持、承諾，以及決心投身于什么。只要篤定于一個(gè)選項(xiàng)，你就為它賦予了價(jià)值。

Of course, this isn’t to say that you should commit to being a first-class jerk, pedophile or murderer. That’s because being a jerk is not on a par with being a good person.

當(dāng)然了，這并不是說(shuō)你應(yīng)該篤定于成為一個(gè)頭號(hào)混蛋、戀童癖，或者殺人犯。這是因?yàn)?，做一個(gè)混蛋和做一個(gè)好人可不是平分秋色的選項(xiàng)。

When we choose between options that are on a par, we make ourselves the authors of our own lives. Instead of being led by the nose by what we imagine to be facts of the world, we should instead recognize that sometimes the world is silent about what we should do. In those cases, we can create value for ourselves by committing to an option. By doing so, we not only create value for ourselves but we also (re)create ourselves. Eve might resolve to make her life in Boston. Someone else, in her shoes, might resolve to start a new life in California. There is no error here, only different resolutions that create different sorts of people.

當(dāng)我們?cè)谄椒智锷倪x項(xiàng)中做選擇時(shí)，我們就成了自己人生的創(chuàng)造者。我們不應(yīng)該被我們想象中的世界現(xiàn)實(shí)牽著鼻子走，而是應(yīng)該認(rèn)識(shí)到，有時(shí)，這個(gè)世界不會(huì)告訴我們應(yīng)該做什么。在這種情況下，我們應(yīng)該篤定一種選項(xiàng)，創(chuàng)造我們自己的價(jià)值。這樣做的話，我們不僅為自己創(chuàng)造了的價(jià)值，我們也(重新)創(chuàng)造了自己。伊芙可能決心在波士頓生活。而面臨同樣的境遇，另一個(gè)人可能會(huì)決定在加州開始新的生活。這無(wú)所謂對(duì)錯(cuò)，只是不同的解決方案造就不同類型的人罷了。

So Eve, faced with her choice, should reflect on what kind of person she can be. Can she be someone who abandons a contented life for a new adventure? A choice between alternatives that are on a par is a precious opportunity to create the sort of person she can commit to being, by committing to being that sort of person.

因此，伊芙在做出選擇時(shí)，應(yīng)該考慮的是，她能成為什么樣的人。她能為了新的冒險(xiǎn)而放棄舒適的生活嗎?在平分秋色的選項(xiàng)中做決定是一個(gè)寶貴的機(jī)會(huì)，可以創(chuàng)造出一個(gè)自己能夠決心成為的人，方法就是下決心成為那種類型的人。