TED演講：寧靜的藝術(shù)，在靜止中冒險

　　I'm a lifelong traveler. Even as a little kid, I was actually working out that it would be cheaper to go to boarding school in England than just to the best school down the road from my parents' house in California.

　　我這輩子都是個旅行者。 即使還是一個小孩子的時候， 我便了解，事實上， 去讀英國寄宿學(xué)校會比 去加州父母家附近 最好的學(xué)校就讀還來得便宜。

　　So, from the time I was nine years old I was flying alone several times a year over the North Pole, just to go to school. And of course the more I flew the more I came to love to fly, so the very week after I graduated from high school, I got a job mopping tables so that I could spend every season of my 18th year on a different continent.

　　所以，當我 9 歲時， 我在一年中，會獨自飛行幾回， 穿越北極，就只是去上學(xué)。 當然，飛得越頻繁， 我越是愛上旅行， 所以就在我高中畢業(yè)后一周， 我找到一份清理桌子的工作， 為了讓自己可以在 18 歲那年， 在地球不同的大陸上， 分別待上一季。

　　And then, almost inevitably, I became a travel writer so my job and my joy could become one.

　　接著，幾乎不可避免地 我成了一個旅游作家， 使我的工作和志趣 可以結(jié)合在一塊兒。

　　And I really began to feel that if you were lucky enough to walk around the candlelit temples of Tibet or to wander along the seafronts in Havana with music passing all around you, you could bring those sounds and the high cobalt skies and the flash of the blue ocean back to your friends at home, and really bring some magic and clarity to your own life.

　　我真的開始發(fā)覺 如果你可以幸運地 漫步于西藏的燭光寺廟， 或者在音樂的繚繞間 悠然信步于哈瓦那海岸， 你便能將那聲音、天際 與靛藍海洋的閃爍光芒 帶給你家鄉(xiāng)的朋友， 真確地捎來些許神奇， 點亮自身生命。

　　Except, as you all know, one of the first things you learn when you travel is that nowhere is magical unless you can bring the right eyes to it.

　　除了，如你們所知， 當旅行時，你學(xué)到的第一件事情是 你必須以正確的視角看世界， 否則大地依然黯淡無光。

　　You take an angry man to the Himalayas, he just starts complaining about the food. And I found that the best way that I could develop more attentive and more appreciative eyes was, oddly, by going nowhere, just by sitting still.

　　你帶一個易怒的男人爬喜馬拉雅山， 他只會抱怨那兒的食物。 我發(fā)現(xiàn)，有點怪異的是， 最好的讓自己可以培養(yǎng) 更專注和更珍惜世界的視角的訣竅是 哪兒都不去，靜止于原處即可。

　　And of course sitting still is how many of us get what we most crave and need in our accelerated lives, a break. But it was also the only way that I could find to sift through the slideshow of my experience and make sense of the future and the past.

　　當然呆在原地正是我們許多人 尋常所得到的東西， 我們都渴望在快速的生活中獲得休息。 但那卻是我唯一的方法， 讓自己可以重歷自身的經(jīng)驗幻燈， 理解未來與過去。

　　And so, to my great surprise, I found that going nowhere was at least as exciting as going to Tibet or to Cuba.

　　如此，我驚異地發(fā)現(xiàn)， 我發(fā)現(xiàn)無所去處 和游覽西藏或古巴一樣，令人興奮。

　　And by going nowhere, I mean nothing more intimidating than taking a few minutes out of every day or a few days out of every season, or even, as some people do, a few years out of a life in order to sit still long enough to find out what moves you most, to recall where your truest happiness lies and to remember that sometimes making a living and making a life point in opposite directions.

　　無所去處，只不過意謂著 每天花幾分鐘， 或每季花幾天， 甚至，如同有些人所做的， 在生命中花上幾年 長久地靜思于某處， 尋找感動你最多的一瞬， 回憶你最真實的幸福時刻， 同時記住， 有時候，謀生與生活 彼此是處于光譜線上的兩端的。

　　And of course, this is what wise beings through the centuries from every tradition have been telling us.

　　當然，這是明智的眾生歷經(jīng)幾百年 從每個傳統(tǒng)中所告訴我們的。

　　It's an old idea. More than 2,000 years ago, the Stoics were reminding us it's not our experience that makes our lives, it's what we do with it.

　　這是一個古老的概念。 早在兩千多年前， 斯多葛學(xué)派提醒我們 并不是我們的經(jīng)驗 成就了我們的生命， 而是我們用那經(jīng)驗做了什么。

　　Imagine a hurricane suddenly sweeps through your town and reduces every last thing to rubble. One man is traumatized for life.

　　想象一下，一陣颶風 迅速撲向你的城市， 將所有一切化為廢墟。 某個人身心遭受終身頓挫

　　But another, maybe even his brother, almost feels liberated, and decides this is a great chance to start his life anew. It's exactly the same event, but radically different responses. There is nothing either good or bad, as Shakespeare told us in "Hamlet," but thinking makes it so.

　　但另一個人，也許甚至是他的兄弟， 卻幾乎感覺釋懷， 并認定，這是一個可以 使自己重獲新生的重要機會。 這是同樣的事件， 截然不同的回應(yīng)。 沒有什么是絕對的好壞， 正如莎士比亞 在《哈姆雷特》中所告訴我們的， 好壞由思維決定。

　　And this has certainly been my experience as a traveler. Twenty-four years ago I took the most mind-bending trip across North Korea. But the trip lasted a few days.

　　這無疑就是我 作為一個旅者的經(jīng)驗。 24 年前，我完成了一次 最不可思議的旅程： 橫跨朝鮮。 但這次旅行只持續(xù)了幾天。

　　What I've done with it sitting still, going back to it in my head, trying to understand it, finding a place for it in my thinking, that's lasted 24 years already and will probably last a lifetime.

　　這經(jīng)驗對于無所去處的我來說， 允許我可以在心思中回朔， 試著了解它，讓它在我的思維中 尋得一個位置， 在那兒，它已存留了 24 年， 而且很可能會在我這生中， 一直持續(xù)下去。

　　The trip, in other words, gave me some amazing sights, but it's only sitting still that allows me to turn those into lasting insights.

　　換句話說， 這次旅行， 帶給我一些驚人的景致， 但唯有處于靜止的狀態(tài) 才讓我得以將這些風景線 化為更長的見識。

　　And I sometimes think that so much of our life takes place inside our heads, in memory or imagination or interpretation or speculation, that if I really want to change my life I might best begin by changing my mind.

　　我有時會想，我們的生活 有太多東西發(fā)生在 我們自己的腦袋里， 在回憶中，在想象里， 透過詮釋，或是猜測， 如果我真想改變我的生命， 我可能最好從 改變我的思維開始。

　　Again, none of this is new; that's why Shakespeare and the Stoics were telling us this centuries ago, but Shakespeare never had to face 200 emails in a day.

　　同樣，這一切都不是新想法; 這就是為什么莎士比亞和斯多葛學(xué)派 在幾個世紀前就告訴我們， 然而，莎士比亞從未面對過 一天收到兩百多封電郵的日子。

　　(Laughter) The Stoics, as far as I know, were not on Facebook. We all know that in our on-demand lives, one of the things that's most on demand is ourselves.

　　(笑聲) 據(jù)我所知，斯多葛派的學(xué)者們 也沒待在臉書上。 我們都知道，在我們的按需生活中， 一種最迫切需要之物 就是自己。

　　Wherever we are, any time of night or day, our bosses, junk-mailers, our parents can get to us. Sociologists have actually found that in recent years Americans are working fewer hours than 50 years ago, but we feel as if we're working more.

　　無論我們處于何處，處于何時， 無論是夜晚或白天中的任何時刻， 我們的老板，垃圾郵件， 我們的父母都能找到我們。 社會學(xué)家近年來所發(fā)現(xiàn)的是， 當今美國人的工作時間 竟然比 50 年前還少， 但我們卻覺得自己的工時更長。

　　We have more and more time-saving devices, but sometimes, it seems, less and less time. We can more and more easily make contact with people on the furthest corners of the planet, but sometimes in that process we lose contact with ourselves.

　　我們有越來越多的 可以用來節(jié)省時間的設(shè)備， 但有時，時間似乎越來越少。 我們比以前更容易與 身處地球另一端的人們聯(lián)系， 但有時候，在那過程中， 我們與自己斷了線。

　　And one of my biggest surprises as a traveler has been to find that often it's exactly the people who have most enabled us to get anywhere who are intent on going nowhere.

　　作為一個旅行者， 讓我最為詫異的事情之一就是 我發(fā)現(xiàn)，時常，往往那些 最使我們能夠走向世界各地的人 卻最希望身居原處。

　　In other words, precisely those beings who have created the technologies that override so many of the limits of old, are the ones wisest about the need for limits, even when it comes to technology.

　　換句話說，正是那些 創(chuàng)造了打破舊時的 限制人出游的科技的人們 才是最具智慧的個體， 他們理解限制的必須， 甚至在面對科技本身時，亦是如此。

　　I once went to the Google headquarters and I saw all the things many of you have heard about; the indoor tree houses, the trampolines, workers at that time enjoying 20 percent of their paid time free so that they could just let their imaginations go wandering.

　　有一次我造訪谷歌總部， 我見到了所有你們聽說過的事; 室內(nèi)樹屋，蹦床， 擁有 20% 屬于自己付費工時的員工， 允許他們的想象自由漫游。

　　But what impressed me even more was that as I was waiting for my digital I.D., one Googler was telling me about the program that he was about to start to teach the many, many Googlers who practice yoga to become trainers in it, and the other Googler was telling me about the book that he was about to write on the inner search engine, and the ways in which science has empirically shown that sitting still, or meditation, can lead not just to better health or to clearer thinking, but even to emotional intelligence.

　　但更讓我感到印象深刻的是， 當我正在等待我的數(shù)字身份證時， 有位谷歌員工告訴我一個項目， 說他正打算教許許多多的谷歌員工 來練習(xí)瑜伽，并成為訓(xùn)練師， 而另外一個谷歌員工 向我闡述了一本他正想寫的書， 一本關(guān)于內(nèi)在尋索的書， 以及科學(xué)如何經(jīng)驗性地證明 打坐，或冥想 不僅能促進健康，明晰思維， 甚至也能增加情緒智慧。

　　I have another friend in Silicon Valley who is really one of the most eloquent spokesmen for the latest technologies, and in fact was one of the founders of Wired magazine, Kevin Kelly. And Kevin wrote his last book on fresh technologies without a smartphone or a laptop or a TV in his home.

　　我有另一個在硅谷工作的朋友， 他的確是當前最前沿科技的 最有說服力的代言人，事實上， 他是《連線》雜志的 創(chuàng)始人之一，凱文·凱利。 凱文當時正在寫一本有關(guān)最新技術(shù)的書， 但他家里卻沒有智能手機， 筆記本電腦，或者電視.

　　And like many in Silicon Valley, he tries really hard to observe what they call an Internet sabbath, whereby for 24 or 48 hours every week they go completely offline in order to gather the sense of direction and proportion they'll need when they go online again.

　　如同許多住在硅谷的人們， 他非常努力地觀察 那個稱為互聯(lián)網(wǎng)安息日的東西， 在每個星期，有 24 或 48 小時， 他們會徹底地下線， 以尋求一點方向感， 用來重新調(diào)整，并汲取 他們重新上線時之所需。

　　The one thing perhaps that technology hasn't always given us is a sense of how to make the wisest use of technology. And when you speak of the sabbath, look at the Ten Commandments -- there's only one word there for which the adjective "holy" is used, and that's the Sabbath. I pick up the Jewish holy book of the Torah -- its longest chapter, it's on the Sabbath.

　　有件科技可能尚未給予我們的是 如何可以更聰明地使用科技。 談到休息日， 讓我們看看十戒吧， 其中只有一個字的形容詞涉及“神圣”， 而那就是安息日。 我拿起猶太圣典《托拉》， 它最長的章節(jié)，就是關(guān)于安息日。

　　And we all know that it's really one of our greatest luxuries, the empty space. In many a piece of music, it's the pause or the rest that gives the piece its beauty and its shape. And I know I as a writer will often try to include a lot of empty space on the page so that the reader can complete my thoughts and sentences and so that her imagination has room to breathe.

　　我們都知道，這真是 我們所擁有的最大奢侈之一： 空。 在許多音樂作品中，停頓或靜默 賦予了這作品美麗形貌。 我知道，作為一個作家， 我時常會在頁面中留下空白， 讓讀者可以完整地 領(lǐng)會我的思維與句法， 以留給想象呼吸的空間。

　　Now, in the physical domain, of course, many people, if they have the resources, will try to get a place in the country, a second home. I've never begun to have those resources, but I sometimes remember that any time I want, I can get a second home in time, if not in space, just by taking a day off.

　　現(xiàn)在，在實際的領(lǐng)域中， 當然有很多人， 倘若他們稍微富余的話， 會試著在國內(nèi)擁有第二個家。 我從未有過那些資源， 但我有時記得 任何時候，若我想的話， 我可以給自己放一天假， 來適時地，獲得第二個家。

　　And it's never easy because, of course, whenever I do I spend much of it worried about all the extra stuff that's going to crash down on me the following day. I sometimes think I'd rather give up meat or sex or wine than the chance to check on my emails.

　　當然，這從來就不容易， 每次我這么做， 對于所有多出來的 會壓垮我隔日工作天的憂慮就會出現(xiàn)。 有時我會覺得，我寧愿 放棄吃肉，性生活，或紅酒， 也不愿失去任何一丁點查郵箱的機會。

　　(Laughter)

　　(笑聲)

　　And every season I do try to take three days off on retreat but a part of me still feels guilty to be leaving my poor wife behind and to be ignoring all those seemingly urgent emails from my bosses and maybe to be missing a friend's birthday party.

　　每一季，我的確給自己三天假期， 但關(guān)于丟下我妻子 以及忽略那些 老板寄來的看似緊急的郵件， 以及錯過一個朋友的派對， 我內(nèi)心某處仍然覺得有負罪感。

　　But as soon as I get to a place of real quiet, I realize that it's only by going there that I'll have anything fresh or creative or joyful to share with my wife or bosses or friends. Otherwise, really, I'm just foisting on them my exhaustion or my distractedness, which is no blessing at all.

　　但一旦來到某個真正安靜的地方， 我才了解，只有去那兒， 我才能擁有全新的， 有創(chuàng)意的，或快意之事 和我妻子，上司和朋友分享。 否則，老天， 我能夠加諸于他們的 僅僅是我的疲憊或分神狀態(tài)， 實在無?？裳?。

　　And so when I was 29, I decided to remake my entire life in the light of going nowhere. One evening I was coming back from the office, it was after midnight, I was in a taxi driving through Times Square, and I suddenly realized that I was racing around so much I could never catch up with my life.

　　所以當我 29 歲時， 我決定要重整自己全部的生活， 為了獲得那無所去處的體驗。 有天晚上，我從辦公室回家， 當時午夜時分，我正在出租車上， 經(jīng)過了時代廣場， 我突然驚覺，自己倉皇度日 以至于永遠無法趕上自己的生活。

　　And my life then, as it happened, was pretty much the one I might have dreamed of as a little boy. I had really interesting friends and colleagues, I had a nice apartment on Park Avenue and 20th Street. I had, to me, a fascinating job writing about world affairs, but I could never separate myself enough from them to hear myself think -- or really, to understand if I was truly happy.

　　而我當時的生活，事實上 已差不多就和我小時夢想的一般。 我有非常有趣的朋友和同事， 我在公園大道和第 20 街交口 有個非常棒的公寓。 我有個對我來說絕佳的工作， 這工作讓我得以撰寫世界事務(wù)， 但我從來未能將自己和它清楚分開， 讓自己傾聽自己的思緒， 或，去理解是否我真的處于喜樂之中。

　　And so, I abandoned my dream life for a single room on the backstreets of Kyoto, Japan, which was the place that had long exerted a strong, really mysterious gravitational pull on me.

　　因此，我放棄我夢想中的工作， 就為了待在一個位于日本京都 某后街里的單間房內(nèi)， 這地方長久以來產(chǎn)生了一種強烈的 對我來說極為神秘的吸引力。

　　Even as a child I would just look at a painting of Kyoto and feel I recognized it; I knew it before I ever laid eyes on it. But it's also, as you all know, a beautiful city encircled by hills, filled with more than 2,000 temples and shrines, where people have been sitting still for 800 years or more.

　　甚至在我孩提時代， 我會看著一幅京都的畫作 并感覺，我認出它來了， 在定睛審視它之前，我便知如此。 但它也是，如同大家所知， 是一個群山環(huán)繞的美麗城市， 充滿了 2000 多座寺廟和神社， 人們在那兒靜默了 800 年以上之久。

　　And quite soon after I moved there, I ended up where I still am with my wife, formerly our kids, in a two-room apartment in the middle of nowhere where we have no bicycle, no car, no TV I can understand, and I still have to support my loved ones as a travel writer and a journalist, so clearly this is not ideal for job advancement or for cultural excitement or for social diversion.

　　就在我搬到那兒不久， 我與現(xiàn)在的妻兒， 擠在一個有兩間房的公寓里， 在一個不毛之地， 我們沒有自行車，沒有車， 沒有可以理解的電視節(jié)目， 我還得以作家和記者的身份， 撫養(yǎng)我的至親家人， 因此很明顯地，這對職業(yè)生涯， 對文化探索， 或?qū)w驗社會文化紛繁來說， 都不是一個理想的規(guī)劃。

　　But I realized that it gives me what I prize most, which is days and hours. I have never once had to use a cell phone there. I almost never have to look at the time, and every morning when I wake up, really the day stretches in front of me like an open meadow.

　　但我理解，這賦予了我那些 我最珍愛的日子， 與時刻。 我在那兒從未需要使用手機。 我基本上幾乎無須看時間， 每天早上我醒來時， 在我眼前展開來的一天 是一片敞開的草地。

　　And when life throws up one of its nasty surprises, as it will, more than once, when a doctor comes into my room wearing a grave expression, or a car suddenly veers in front of mine on the freeway, I know, in my bones, that it's the time I've spent going nowhere that is going to sustain me much more than all the time I've spent racing around to Bhutan or Easter Island.

　　當生活向你拋出某個重大驚喜時， 它不只會出現(xiàn)一次， 當一個醫(yī)生來到我房里， 臉上帶著肅穆的表情， 或一輛汽車在高速公路上突然改道， 漂移到我車子前方， 我知道，在我骨子里， 正是那無所去處的時光 幫助我持續(xù)保持平靜， 那比起我在不丹和復(fù)活節(jié)島 所度之日都要有幫助。

　　I'll always be a traveler -- my livelihood depends on it -- but one of the beauties of travel is that it allows you to bring stillness into the motion and the commotion of the world. I once got on a plane in Frankfurt, Germany, and a young German woman came down and sat next to me and engaged me in a very friendly conversation for about 30 minutes, and then she just turned around and sat still for 12 hours.

　　我永遠都會是個旅者， 那是我生活之所系， 然而旅行的美好之處在于， 它讓你保有沉靜之心， 在這莽撞與躁動的世界之中。 有一次，我在德國的法蘭克福搭機， 一位年輕的德國女子坐到我身旁， 與我展開非常友善的對談， 近 30 分鐘， 接著，她就轉(zhuǎn)過身去， 靜靜地坐在那兒 12 有個小時之久。

　　She didn't once turn on her video monitor, she never pulled out a book, she didn't even go to sleep, she just sat still, and something of her clarity and calm really imparted itself to me. I've noticed more and more people taking conscious measures these days to try to open up a space inside their lives.

　　她未曾打開屏幕， 她也沒有拿出書本， 甚至從未睡去， 就只是靜靜地坐著， 她那明晰和沉靜已真正傳授于我。近來我注意到 有越來越多人刻意地 試圖在他們的生活中打開一片空間。

　　Some people go to black-hole resorts where they'll spend hundreds of dollars a night in order to hand over their cell phone and their laptop to the front desk on arrival.

　　有些人參加黑洞之旅 他們會一晚花上幾百美元 只為了將自己的手機與電腦 上繳給度假接待處。

　　Some people I know, just before they go to sleep, instead of scrolling through their messages or checking out YouTube, just turn out the lights and listen to some music, and notice that they sleep much better and wake up much refreshed.

　　有些我認識的人 并不會在睡前刷屏看信息， 或觀看 YouTube 視頻， 反而就只是關(guān)燈，聽音樂， 他們知道，這樣會有更好的睡眠， 在隔天一早將更神清氣爽。

　　I was once fortunate enough to drive into the high, dark mountains behind Los Angeles, where the great poet and singer and international heartthrob Leonard Cohen was living and working for many years as a full-time monk in the Mount Baldy Zen Center.

　　我曾經(jīng)有幸地 駕駛于洛杉磯旁的 高聳黯黑的群山之中， 那兒曾經(jīng)住了偉大的詩人樂手 -- 舉世皆知的萊納德·科恩。 他曾在那兒附近作了好幾年的僧人， 就在博帝山禪學(xué)中心。

　　And I wasn't entirely surprised when the record that he released at the age of 77, to which he gave the deliberately unsexy title of "Old Ideas," went to number one in the charts in 17 nations in the world, hit the top five in nine others. Something in us, I think, is crying out for the sense of intimacy and depth that we get from people like that. who take the time and trouble to sit still.

　　當他在 77 歲發(fā)表了 自己的唱片專輯， 他故意給這個專輯取了 一個非常不性感的名稱 “舊思維”， 然而這專輯在全球 17 個國家沖上排行榜首位， 在另外 9 個國家沖上前 5 名。 它觸動了我們內(nèi)心里某種東西， 觸動了躁動的人們 一種親密、深刻與沉靜的思緒。

　　And I think many of us have the sensation, I certainly do, that we're standing about two inches away from a huge screen, and it's noisy and it's crowded and it's changing with every second, and that screen is our lives. And it's only by stepping back, and then further back, and holding still, that we can begin to see what the canvas means and to catch the larger picture. And a few people do that for us by going nowhere.

　　我想許多人擁有這種感覺，我當然也是， 我們站在一個巨大的屏幕前， 距離大約兩英寸， 人聲鼎沸，摩肩接踵， 每一刻都在變動著， 而那屏幕即為我們自己的人生。 唯有向后退一步，再回頭一步， 靜靜地屏住氣， 我們才能開始了解那畫布上描繪之物， 并以更寬廣的眼界洞察世界。 有些人已如此做了，他們無須來去。

　　So, in an age of acceleration, nothing can be more exhilarating than going slow. And in an age of distraction, nothing is so luxurious as paying attention.

　　因此，在這個快速轉(zhuǎn)變的時代， 沒有什么比慢下來還要振奮人心。 在這個失焦的時代， 沒有什么比凝神專注來得奢侈。

　　And in an age of constant movement, nothing is so urgent as sitting still. So you can go on your next vacation to Paris or Hawaii, or New Orleans; I bet you'll have a wonderful time. But, if you want to come back home alive and full of fresh hope, in love with the world, I think you might want to try considering going nowhere. Thank you. (Applause)

　　在這個不斷變動的時代， 沒有什么比靜思來得急迫了。 所以，下一次當你們 去巴黎，夏威夷或新奧爾良度假時， 我保證你們會有一段美好時光， 但如果你們想回家， 期待滿懷全新希望， 愛這個世界， 我想，也許你們應(yīng)該試著哪兒都別去。 謝謝各位。 (掌聲)