#800 - 800期节目的15个经验教训

大家好，欢迎回到节目。这是《现代智慧》的第八百期。按照传统，我将回顾过去100期中学到的一些最佳经验。其中部分内容来自我的通讯稿。

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the show. It is the eight hundredth episode of Modern Wisdom. And as is tradition, I'm going to go through some of the best lessons that I've learned over the last 100 episodes. Some of it is stuff from my newsletter.

有些是从节目嘉宾那里学到的，还有些是我在生活中偶然获得的见解。那么，让我们开始吧。第一条，生产力债务。我特别喜欢这个概念。当马修·赫西做客节目时，他引用了自己著作《爱情生活》中的一句话，谈到自己是个内心暴君。

Some of it things that I've learned from guests on the show, and other bits are just random insights I've encountered in life. So, yeah, let's get into it. The first one, productivity debt. I adore this idea. So when Matthew Hussey came on the show, he has this quote from his book, Love Life, where he's talking about how he is a internal tyrant.

他说：'我很难相信自己配得上片刻的快乐与平静，除非先让自己经历残酷的时间表，精确到分钟地监控生产力水平。也许有些人用这种‘挣得饼干’的心态取得了健康成就。但我不是。我的情况是变异版——快乐和自我同情经常被一个内心暴君禁止，由他决定我哪天被鞭打得够多了。就在我即将崩溃时，内心有个声音说：好吧。'

He says, I struggle to believe I'm worthy of moments of joy and peace without first putting myself through a brutal schedule, monitoring my productivity levels down to the minute. Perhaps some people apply this earn your cookie mindset in ways that lead to healthy achievements. Not me. Mine is a mutation whereby joy and self compassion are regularly outlawed by an internal tyrant who decides when I've been flogged enough for one day. Just when I'm about to collapse, a voice inside says, okay.

'让他睡前享受半小时安宁，但要确保他知道明天一早我们就会重新开始。'这个洞见刺痛了我的灵魂，因为我在自己身上看到了它。写过《四千周》的奥利弗·伯克曼给这个自我强加的无底洞效率期望起了个名字——生产力债务。他说许多人（其实就是指他自己）似乎觉得每天早晨都背负着这种债务，必须拼命偿还以期在傍晚达到收支平衡。他说没有什么比这种‘正在落后，需要拼命追回最低产出标准’的模糊感受更能代表他的成年体验了。

Give him half an hour of peace before bed, but make sure he knows we'll start again bright and early in the morning. And this insight hurts my soul largely because I see it in myself. And Oliver Berkman, who wrote four thousand weeks, has a name for this bottomless pit of self imposed expected efficiency productivity debt. He says that many people, by which he meant him, seem to feel as if they start each day off in the morning with a kind of productivity debt, they must struggle to pay off throughout the day in hopes of reaching a zero balance by the time the evening comes around. He said that few things felt more basic to his experience of adulthood than this vague sense that he's falling behind and need to claw his way back up to some minimum standard of output.

仿佛他需要通过掌控一切来证明自己存在的价值，从而避免某种模糊的灾难降临。这就是为什么他如此推崇‘已完成清单’——早晨从空白开始，逐渐填充当天的成就。他的观点是：每个条目都在欢呼提醒你本可以整天无所事事，但看看你实际做了什么。若陷入严重心理低谷，他说你可以降低‘成就’的标准。没人需要知道你清单上写着‘刷牙’或‘煮咖啡’。但这不只是自我安慰。

It's as if he needs to justify his existence by staying on top of things in order to stave off some ill defined catastrophe that might otherwise come crashing down upon his head, which is why he is such an enthusiastic proponent of keeping a done list, which starts empty first thing in the morning, and then you gradually fill it with whatever you accomplish throughout the day. And his argument is that each entry is a cheering reminder that you could have, after all, spent the day doing nothing constructive, yet look at what you did instead. And if you're in a serious psychological rut, he says you can just lower the bar for what gets to count as an accomplishment. Nobody ever needed to know that you added brushed teeth or made coffee to your done list. But a done list isn't just a way to feel better about yourself.

你需要放弃偿还生产力债务的不可能任务，转而把每天视为将少量有意义事项移入‘已完成清单’的机会。你会发现自己在专注事项上做出更好选择，因为通过减少被其他不可避免忽略事项带来的压力分心，你实际上能取得更多进展。换句话说，完全偿清这种想象的生产力债务（即通过拼命高效工作来消除落后感）根本不可能。这不仅痛苦——在现代职场中，你可能收到的邮件数量、老板的要求、职业野心都是无限的。

You need to give up the impossible quest to pay off your productivity debt and instead start thinking about each day as an opportunity to move a small but meaningful set of items over to your done list. You'll find that you make better choices about what to focus on and because you'll actually make more progress on them by wasting less time and energy being distracted by the stress about all of the other stuff that you're unavoidably neglecting. So paying off this imaginary productivity debt completely, in other words, working so hard and so efficiently that you no longer feel like you're falling behind, is literally impossible. It's not just grueling and unpleasant. And in the modern world of work, there is no limit to the number of emails that you might receive and the demands that your boss might make and the ambitions that you might have for your career.

因此没有理由相信你能处理完所有事。同时现代媒体（尤其是社交媒体）就像巨型机器，让你暴露在比阿西西的圣方济各所见更多苦难的无底信息流中。所以当奥利弗记住这就是世界本质——他想象中必须偿还的宇宙债务本质上是无法偿清时，他发现自己反而能在待办事项堆积时放松，而不是把放松条件设为先搞定一切（这永远做不到）。关键的是，他认为这样反而更能真正做好那些最初引发焦虑的、作为优秀公民该做的生产性事务。

So there's no reason to believe that you'll ever get to the end of them. Meanwhile, modern media, especially social media, is a giant machine for exposing you to a bottomless newsfeed of far more suffering than Saint Francis of Assisi himself was ever asked to care about. So whenever Oliver manages to remember that this is just the way things are, that the cosmic debt that he seems to imagine that he has to pay off is, in fact, inherently impossible to pay off, he finds that he is far better able to relax in the midst of having too much to do as opposed to making relaxation dependent on first getting on top of it all, which he never will. And, crucially, he thinks he's better placed to actually do things, the productive and good citizen things that were the focus of all of this angst in the first place. Look.

它们就在已完成事项清单上。或许数量不多，至少与需要完成的浩瀚银河般的事务相比是这样。但通常到下午六点时，清单上总会有那么几项而非空空如也。接着他说，六点时他通常会调一杯金汤力，但这往往不会被列入清单。总的来说，我认为'生产力负债'这个概念为我们许多人共有的感受命了名。

There they are on the done list. Not many of them, perhaps, at least by comparison to the immeasurable galaxy of things that need doing. Still, there are generally quite a few more than zero items there by the time that 6PM rolls around. And then I think he said at 6PM, he usually mixes a gin and tonic, but that tends to not get added to the list. Generally, this idea of productivity debt, I think, puts a name on a sensation that lots of us feel.

这种强迫自我屈从的怪异要求，这种总在落后的怪异感受。他有个绝妙的说法——之前怎么说的来着？他提到那种'正在落后的模糊感受'，就像无所不在的背景音。他需要通过掌控一切来证明自身存在的价值。

This odd requirement to sort of whip ourselves into submission, this odd sense that we are falling behind. He has this great term. What is it he says earlier on? He talks about this this vague sense that you are falling behind, and it's just this sort of ambient thing. He needs to justify his existence by staying on top of things.

这种隐约的落后感迫使我拼命挣扎，试图回归某种最低产出标准。要知道，这大概就是痴迷生产力带来的阴暗面——你为自己设下不可思议的高标准，同时对无数事物充满热情，可能还擅长多种领域。因此你面前的选择浩如烟海，你以严苛标准自我要求，渴望改变世界，想要在存在于黑暗两极之间的短暂光阴里最大化每一刻。这就是你的处境。

This vague sense he's falling behind and need to claw my way back up to some minimum standard of output. And, you know, this is kind of, I guess, the dark side of being interested in productivity and deficiency that you set yourself this unbelievable bar, and you're probably excited by lots of different things. You're probably good at lots of different things. So the options that you have in front of you are high, and you hold yourself to high standards, and you want to make an impact on the world, and you want to maximize your brief sliver of time whilst you're existing in this the two eternities of darkness. Here you are.

这是我的时代，我要物尽其用。最终这导致理想与现实的永久失衡，使得即便已完成的事也蒙上古怪的瑕疵感。我对此再熟悉不过——比如做现场演出时，那只是我职业生涯早期第三场演出，在伦敦莱斯特广场剧院周六夜场座无虚席，一切顺利，但我结束后只会盯着两处小失误，却忘记那近乎完美的一小时五十八分钟。

This is your time. I'm gonna get the most out of it. And what that ends up doing is this sort of permanent imbalance between the things you want to do and the things that you end up doing, which actually means that even the things you do do have this odd sort of tarnished sense to them. I I certainly know this, like, unbelievably well myself, you know, doing a a live show, and and it's the third show that I've ever done, and it's London, and it's sold out on a Saturday night at Leicester Square Theatre or wherever we were last year. And everything goes well, and it's, you know, it's still early on in my career.

我们固有的消极偏见，叠加'必须做得更多、更努力'的念头。若你曾经历高强度工作期，满脑子只想：'天啊，真想在家过个周末'，'不想再出差或早起'，'哪怕给我一天清闲'——可当真休息两天后，又会觉得'该重新投入战斗了，我变懒了'。看，短短四十八小时就自相矛盾。

And yet, when I finish up, I'll look back and focus on those two little sections that I didn't quite get right and forget the one hour and fifty eight minutes of pretty much perfect, exactly what I wanted and expected and would hope to get out of it, but I'll just focus on those other two things. And this sort of negativity bias that we have, plus this sense that we should always be doing more, always be working harder. You know, if you've ever gone through a period of really intense work, and all that you think about is, god, I just wish I could have, you know, one weekend at home. I just don't wanna be traveling again, or I don't wanna be working again, or, you know, I don't wanna have to get up on time. Just wish I could have one lion.

对于A型进取者，这就像常驻肩头的恶魔。马修提出的'不断鞭笞他的内在暴君'概念极具启发性——这是我最受触动的观点之一。'生产力负债'深刻影响着多数人的世界观。好了，下一个话题。

And then after two lions, you now think, I really need to get back on that grind. I'm feeling a little bit lazy. You're like, hang on a second. You just said only forty eight hours ago that you couldn't wait to get a little bit of a break. But, yeah, for the sort of type a go getter people, I think this is a like, just an ambient demon that sits on everybody's shoulder.

马修关于这个不断鞭策他的内在暴君的想法，我认为相当具有启发性。是的，这是我最喜欢的观点之一。生产力负债从根本上塑造了许多人看待世界的方式。好了，下一个。

And Matthew's idea of this internal tyrant that's constantly whipping him, I think, is is pretty illuminating. So, yeah, that's one of my favorites. Productivity debt is just so fundamental to how lots of people see the world. Alright. Next one.

能力的诅咒。这是我思考了一段时间的问题。如果你在听这个播客，很可能你相当有能力。你能做事，也愿意尝试新事物。当你尝试新事物时，表现不会太糟，而且似乎比大多数人进步得更快。

The curse of competence. This is something I've been thinking about for a little while. You probably are pretty competent if you're listening to this podcast. You can do things and you're prepared to try new stuff. And when you try new stuff, you don't suck that much, and you seem to probably make progress more quickly than most people.

这就是能力的诅咒——你的人生方向选择较少受能力限制，更多受制于你的抉择。这听起来像是一种恩赐，也确实可能比另一种情况要好。但这是一类独特的问题，当人们告诉你处理它是多么幸运时，问题就出现了。巴里·施瓦茨在《选择的悖论》中谈到六十年前买牛仔裤的过程：你去牛仔裤店，只有一种款式、一种颜色、一种剪裁。

And this is the curse of competence because your options for life direction are less constrained by your abilities and more constrained by your choices. And this sounds like a blessing, and indeed, it probably is better than the alternative. But it's a unique category of problem which occurs while people tell you how fortunate you are to deal with it. So Barry Schwartz in the paradox of choice talks about the process of buying jeans sixty years ago. And you go to the jeans store, and there is one type, one color, one cut.

你找到腰围尺寸，付钱，然后离开。那时你可能想要稍微不同的牛仔裤风格、长度或颜色等，但除了给你的选择外别无选择。因此，牛仔裤带给你的总效用可能没有最大化，但你对决定的满意度相当高，因为你知道在现有情况下已经得到了最好的。如果将这与今天相比，你去牛仔裤店环顾四周，想要紧身裤还是靴型裤？直筒裤还是九分裤？

You find your waist size, you pay, and you walk out. Now you may have wanted a slightly different style of jeans or length or color or whatever, but you had no choice other than what was given to you. So your total utility from the jeans may not be maximized, but your satisfaction with the decision is pretty high knowing that you got the best that you could given the circumstances. And if you compare that to today and you go to the jeans store and look around, do you want skinny or boot cut? Straight leg cropped?

破洞的、蓝色的、灰色的、酸洗的、有对比缝线还是无的？选择无穷无尽。欢呼吧，这意味着你终于可以选择你正在寻找的那条牛仔裤。这也意味着任何次优决定完全是你的错。如果你在1960年对牛仔裤不满意，那是糟糕的牛仔裤店的错。

Ripped, blue, grey, acid wash, with contrast stitching or without. The options are endless. And hooray, this means that you can finally select the exact pair of jeans you are looking for. It also means that any suboptimal decision is entirely your fault. If you were unhappy with your jeans in 1960, it's the fault of the crappy jeans store.

如果你在2024年对牛仔裤不满意，那是你调研的错。以前，你的体验很大程度上超出你的掌控，受限于世界。今天，它只受限于你的选择。这就是选项的限制如何使决策过程更容易，而能力的诅咒也与此有关。如果你只擅长一类事情，你可能会因为不能做其他事情而不开心，这确实是一个糟糕的情况，但这种限制有助于缩小你的选择范围。

If you're unhappy with your jeans in 2024, it's the fault of your research. Previously, your experience was largely out of your hands and limited by the world. Today, it's only limited by your choices. And this is how a constraint of options makes the decision making process easier, and the curse of competence plays into this as well. So if you're only good at one category of things, you sure might be unhappy that you can't do something else, and that indeed is a rubbish situation, but the constraint helps to narrow your choices down.

另一方面，如果你擅长很多事情，许多道路向你敞开，这很解放，但也可能让你感到害怕、困惑和停滞不前。我们可以称之为泰坦尼克号式的问题——每个人都说你处于处理这种问题的特权位置。亚当·马斯特里亚尼说这是一种特别类型的悲剧，一种在每个人欢呼时展开的悲剧，就像泰坦尼克号撞上冰山后，水漫到下巴，而每个人都在告诉你，能在有史以来最伟大的蒸汽船上多么幸运。泰坦尼克号确实如此巨大和美妙，你不得不认同，但此刻你也感到有点冷和湿，不知道为什么。生活中拥有许多可以追随的能力令人兴奋，但也同样令人恐惧和麻痹。

On the other hand, if you're good at lots of things, there are many paths open to you, which is liberating, but can also cause you to be scared and confused and frozen in place. And we could call this a titanic problem, which is an issue everyone says you're in such a privileged position to deal with. Adam Mastriani says this is an extra special type of tragedy, a tragedy that unfolds while everyone cheers, like being on the Titanic after the iceberg hits, water up to your chin, with everybody telling you that you're so lucky to be on the greatest steamship of all time. And the Titanic is indeed so huge and wonderful that you can't help but agree, but you're also feeling a bit cold and wet at the moment, and you're not sure why. Having lots of competencies that you could follow in your life is exciting, but it's also terrifying and paralyzing too.

此外，你还有额外的挑战：尽管世界在你脚下，你却因看似不知感恩而感到内疚。因此，这是一种非常奇怪的分析瘫痪、众多人生选择、众多你可以选择的不同方向的结合，这种羞耻和内疚围绕着——当表面上没有任何问题时，我有什么资格抱怨？我有所有这些不同的选择。难道我不应该为此感到感激吗？然而，我不禁觉得，我不知道。

Plus, you have the added challenge of feeling guilty for your seeming ungratefulness even though the world is at your feet. So it's this very odd sort of concatenation of of paralysis of analysis, lots of life choices, lots of different directions that you could go in with things, this sort of shame and guilt around who am I to complain when there's ostensibly nothing wrong? I have all of these different options. Should I not feel grateful for this? And yet, I can't help but feel like, I don't know.

做决定这件事，必须选择自己要做什么，光是想想就让我感到精疲力尽。我认为这是能力出众者面临的挑战。就像泰坦尼克号的问题一样，这类问题永远不会获得同情。哦，可怜的天才啊，看看你人生有多少条路可选。

The the decision making, having to choose what it is that I'm going to do just feels exhausting to me and and and tiring. And, I I think that this is a challenge that people who are, competent face. And it's with the titanic problem thing, it is exactly the sort of problem no one is ever going to give you sympathy for. Oh, poor talented person. Look at how many different directions you could go in life.

你可以做销售，或进入营销领域，或接手家族生意，或从事任何职业。也许你想成为母亲或父亲，也许你想当老师。面前所有这些选择你都能胜任。但没人会同情选择过多的人，而当事人的真实体验往往充满痛苦。

You could go into sales, or you could go into marketing, or you could go into the family business, or you could do whatever. Maybe you wanna be a mom or a dad. Maybe you wanna be a teacher. You'd be great at all of these different options in front of you. No one is going to ever give sympathy to the person who has too many choices, and yet the felt experience of that person is always going to be painful a lot of the time.

因此限制选择范围，选定要做的事并划分阶段是个好方法。与其说'我面前有无数条路，选这条必须正确'，不如设定'满足型'而非'最大化'决策标准——足够好就行而非追求完美。如果达到'足够好'并认定这个决定可逆，比如尝试某项目九十天或一年，不喜欢随时可以转向。

So constraining down your choices, picking the thing that you're going to do, periodizing it, is a good solution. You know, instead of saying, I have all of these roads open in front of me, and this one that I choose has to be the right one. If you set yourself a maximizing decision criteria as opposed to a satisfying one, like good enough or perfect, if you get to good enough and say, well, I'm going to do this, but it's probably a reversible decision. You know, maybe I can try x project for ninety days or a year or something like that. And if I don't like it, then I can pivot into something else.

最妙的是：如果你有能力，总有其他退路。所以将'追求终身完美承诺'转变为'满足于实验性承诺'是个好思路。不妨试试看？尝试你考虑的事情，若行不通就转向。

And here's the brilliant thing. If you are competent, there are other things that you can pivot out of. So I think changing from a maximizing lifelong commitment to a satisfying experimental commitment is probably a good reframe. Look, just give it a crack. Give the thing that you're thinking about a try, and if it doesn't work, you can pivot out of it.

但'能力诅咒'确实很重要。我最近还学到个词——几周前我把Oliver Berkman的节目发给William Costello时，他说发现Oliver非常sanguine（乐天）。我见过这个词却不知其意。

But, yeah, the curse of competence, something pretty important, I think. I learned this word as well, actually. William Costello, mentioned it to me when I sent him the Oliver Berkman episode a couple of weeks ago. And he said, how sanguine he found Oliver. And I'd seen this word written down.

sanguine意为乐观积极，尤指在困境中。比如'他对全球经济前景很乐观''委员会持更乐观看法'。中世纪医学指多血质体质，表现为红润面色和乐观性情——英国那些面色红润被戏称'火腿族'的人，其实就是这种乐观体质。

I can pronounce it, but I had no idea what it meant. So sanguine means optimistic or positive, especially in apparently bad or difficult situations. He is sanguine about prospects for the global economy. The committee takes a more sanguine view. In medieval science and medicine, of of or having the constitution associated with the predominance of blood among the bodily humors supposedly marked a ruddy complexion and an optimistic disposition.

我太爱这个词了。它完美形容Oliver Berkman和Alain de Botton的处世态度：谦逊承认'事情很难，我有缺陷，生活不易，可能搞砸很多事'，但同时怀着考虑所有缺陷后'我能克服'的希望视角。

So, like, everybody that's florid or ruddy in The UK that gets accused of being gammon is actually just, yeah, having a a a optimistic disposition. But, yeah, sanguine, I really love that as a word. And what it describes, I think, is Oliver Berkman and Alain de Botton's approach. This sort of very self effacing, things are difficult, and I am flawed, and life is hard, and I'm probably sucked quite a lot. But here is a a hopeful view of how I can get past it, taking into account all of my flaws.

而乐观，正是那种面对生活挑战时的欢快态度，很酷。我发现自己越来越被创作这类内容的人吸引。我认为这以一种有趣的方式洞察了人类的处境。所以，就当是给你的一点小词典时刻吧。好了。

And being sanguine, just that kind of joviality in the face of life's challenges is, is cool. And I'm finding myself gravitating more toward people who create content like that. I think it really sees the human condition in a an interesting way. So just, I don't know, a little dictionary moment for you there. Alright.

下一个。这是自卑的力量。1893年9月，丘吉尔第三次尝试后被桑德赫斯特军事学院录取。他写信给父亲：“周四能向您报告这个好消息，我非常高兴。”他的父亲，曾任财政大臣和下议院领袖，一周后回信。

Next one. This is the power of low self esteem. In September 1893, Churchill was admitted on his third attempt to the Sandhurst Military College. He wrote to his father, I was so glad to be able to send you the good news on Thursday. His father, a former chancellor of the exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, wrote back a week later.

你应当为自己散漫、随遇而安的哈伦·斯卡拉姆式工作作风感到羞耻。我从未从任何校长或导师那里收到过关于你行为的正面评价，只有无休止的抱怨和你对工作完全缺乏投入。你未能加入第六十步枪团——军队中最优秀的兵团。你每年还额外增加了我200英镑的负担。别以为我会在你每次失败后都费心给你写长信。

You should be ashamed of your slovenly happy go lucky harem scaram style of work. Never have I received really any good report from your conduct from any headmaster or tutor, always behind incessant complaints and a total want of application to your work. You have failed to get into the sixtieth rifles, the finest regiment in the army. You have imposed on me some extra charge of £200 a year. Do not think that I'm going to take the trouble of writing you long letters after every failure you commit and undergo.

我已不再对你可能说的任何话给予丝毫重视。如果你不能阻止自己过上学生时代那种懒散、无用、无益的生活，你将沦为纯粹的社会废物，成为众多公学失败者之一，并堕落至一种寒酸、不幸且徒劳的生存状态。你必须承担这一切不幸的责任。你母亲问候你。丘吉尔写这封信时19岁。

I no longer attach the slightest weight to anything you may say. If you cannot prevent yourself from leading the idle, useless, unprofitable life you have had during your school days, you will become a mere social wastrel, one of the hundreds of public school failures, and you will degenerate into a shabby, unhappy, and futile existence. You will have to bear all the blame for such misfortunes. Your mother sends her love. Churchill was 19 when he sent that.

这个故事读来令人心痛，至少对我如此，因为我不了解丘吉尔内心的真实感受。但我敢打赌，即便在击败纳粹德国、赢得二战胜利后，他可能仍觉得自己不够好。你知道吗？胜利日，不管是1945年6月30日还是哪天。那种被认可和满足感在丘吉尔心中持续了多久？毕竟他刚刚击败了长久以来面临的最大威胁。

And that story hurts to read, hurts me to read, because I don't know the inner texture of Churchill's mind. But I would bet that even after defeating Nazi Germany and winning World War two, he probably still didn't feel good enough. You know? V day, whenever it was 06/30/1945 or something. How long did that sense of validation and enoughness linger with Churchill having the greatest threat that had been faced for a very long time was just defeated.

两天？或许不到一天？他的思绪多快又回到了用那个声音——他父亲这个内在暴君——谴责自己的状态？这不禁让人想问：如果成功本身不能带来满足感，那么成功的意义何在？这就是为什么你应该非常警惕对成功人士的嫉妒，因为要成为你所仰慕的人，所需付出的代价往往是你不愿承担的。

Two days? Less than a day, maybe? Like, how quickly did his mind get back to castigating himself with that voice, that internal tyrant that was his father. And, you know, it sort of begs the question, what is the point of success if there is no satisfaction in the succeeding? Which is why you should be very aware of envying successful humans because the price that you would need to pay pay to be the people that you admire is often one that you wouldn't foot the bill for.

我曾与尼尔·斯特劳斯讨论过这个观点，他写过《把妹达人》，后来写了里克·鲁宾的书，还有《真相》。他大概有七本《纽约时报》畅销书，现在正在写新书。他告诉我新书的标题后，我根据这个标题总结出一条规律：判断一个点子有多好，就看当你听说它时，有多嫉妒自己没想到它。他告诉我书名时，我心想：靠，这太绝了。

And I spoke about this idea to Neil Strauss, the guy that wrote The Game, and he wrote Rick Rubin's book, and then he wrote The Truth. He's got, like, seven New York Times bestsellers, I think, and he's writing a new book. And he told me the title of this new book, and I came up with a rule off the back of his title, which is you can tell how good an idea is by how envious you are of not coming up with it yourself when you hear about it. And he told me the title of this book, and I was like, fuck. That's so good.

我怎么没想到这一点？他新书的标题就叫《低自尊的力量》。这正是我长期痴迷的观点——看看那些你崇拜的、众人景仰的、我们高度尊敬的极其成功卓越之人，观察他们内心的思维质地是怎样的。他们的日常生存状态感受如何？这意味着什么？他们究竟被何种驱动力推动去完成那些惊人、伟大、不可思议的成就？

Why didn't I think of that? And the title of his new book is the power of low self esteem. And it's this same idea that I've been obsessed with for a long time, which is look at the very successful, very impressive people that you admire, that lots of people look up to, that we all hold in high esteem, and look at what the internal texture of their mind's like. Look at what the day to day existence for them feels like, and what does it mean? How how driven to do amazing, great, fantastical things are they?

但现实中，你真的想成为那样的人吗？你愿意付出必要代价成为你所仰慕的那些人吗？《低自尊的力量》这标题简直绝妙。判断一个点子有多好的标准，就是看你对没能自己想出它有多嫉妒。好了，下一条。

And yet, in reality, do you want to be that person? Like, do you want to pay the price that you need to to be the people that you admire and the power of low self esteem? Just what a awesome title. And you can tell how good an idea is by how envious you are of not having come up with it yourself. So, yeah, next one.

这个有点意思。我是说，骇人听闻但也有点酷。《柳叶刀》最新研究发现，肥胖现已超越饥饿成为全球健康更大威胁。全球超过八分之一人口达到临床肥胖标准，人数首次突破十亿，成为营养不良的主要形式，而体重不足人数已降至不足五亿五千万。

This is, kinda cool. I I mean, terrifying, but also kinda cool. Obesity is now a greater threat to global health than hunger. A new Lancet study has found that more than one in eight people in the world are clinically obese. The number passed one billion for the first time, and it is now the leading form of malnutrition, with the number of people considered underweight falling below five hundred and fifty million.

肥胖与体重不足都属于营养不良，因为两者都意味着人们无法获取保持健康所需的正确营养素、维生素和热量类型。专家警告称，全球领导者对肥胖问题的无所作为正由儿童买单——18岁以下肥胖人群达1.59亿。如今全球肥胖人数是体重不足者的近两倍，成为营养不良的首要形式。另一项研究显示人们日均屏幕使用时间达8小时，而睡眠时间仅6.5小时。现代健康现状令人忧心。

Being obese or underweight are both forms of malnutrition because in both cases, people are not getting the right nutrients and vitamins and the types of calories that they need in order to be healthy. And experts have basically warned that children were paying the price for inaction on obesity by global leaders, with under eighteens accounting for a hundred and fifty nine million of those who are obese. So nearly twice as many people who are obese than are underweight, and it is the leading form of malnutrition in the world. And then I saw a study that showed people spend eight hours a day on screens on average and six and a half hours a day asleep on average. So we are now more more people are dealing with malnutrition due to obesity than due to being underweight, and people spend more time per day on their screens than they do asleep.

这揭示了现代健康状况的恐怖真相。好了，下一条。这个很有意思，我喜欢。

And that is a terrifying insight about the state of modern health. Alright. Next one. This is this is cool. I like this one.

詹姆斯·克利尔说：若已生活舒适，却选择赚更多钱而过更糟的日常生活，这是笔糟糕的交易。但我们总这样自我说服——接受高薪晋升却吞噬自由时间，生意已成功却拼命追求更大成功。过度关注财富，却忽视生活方式。

So stop trading things that matter for ones that don't. This is from James Clear. If you already live a comfortable life, then choosing to make more money but live a worse daily life is a bad trade. And yet we talk ourselves into it all the time. We take promotions that pay more but swallow our free time.

这又回到我和乔治·麦克常讨论的显性与隐性指标问题：某个指标越可量化、越受社会奖励、带来越高声望地位，人们就越会倾向追求它。而生活质量这种指标——你真实的日常生存状态如何？你有多快乐？——却常被忽视。

We already have a successful business, but break ourselves trying to make it even more successful. Too much focus on wealth, not enough focus on lifestyle. And this is kind of goes back to the hidden and observable metrics thing that me and George Mac talk about, whereby the more observable and quantifiable, and socially rewarded a particular metric is, the more, acclaim that it gives you, the more status that it affords, the more that you're going to lean into that. And, you know, quality of lifestyle, you know, like, real what is the day to day existence of you like? How happy are you?

你有多少空闲时间来做你关心的事情？这很难灵活调整，也很难衡量。但你的银行账户、房产价值、卧室数量、公司增长或职位头衔，这些都极易量化。过度关注财富而忽视生活方式是一种需要重新审视的倾向。它提醒我们，积累财富的初衷是什么？想必是为了获得自己向往的生活方式。

How much spare time do you have to do the things that you care about? That is very hard to flex, and it's very hard to measure as well. But your bank account, it's pretty easy to measure, or the value of your house or the number of bedrooms that it's got, or the growth of your company or your job title. All of these things, super easy games, and too much focus on wealth, not enough focus on lifestyle is a just a nice reframe. You know, it reminds us what are you trying to accumulate this wealth for, presumably to afford yourself the kind of lifestyle that you enjoy.

如果你已拥有令自己满意的生活方式，却为赚更多钱而降低生活质量，这就本末倒置了。你在用目标换取手段。正如奥利弗·伯克曼所言：位居高位不等于享受人生。企业高层充斥着缺乏安全感的工作狂，他们被深刻的不足感驱使，即便赢得了激烈竞争也毫无乐趣。那些你仰慕的、处于社会顶层的人，你真的想要那种生活吗？

If you've already achieved the kind of lifestyle where you are happy and you then worsen that in an attempt to make more money, the the barstool is upside down. You're sacrificing the thing you want for the thing that's supposed to get it. And then Oliver Berkman, again, says, just because you're at the top does not mean that you're enjoying life. The upper ranks of corporate life are dominated by insecure overachievers, people who are driven by a deep sense of inadequacy and are not having any fun even though they've supposedly won this very competitive race. So, again, the people that you admire, the people at the top of the totem pole, do you really want that life?

他们真的快乐吗？还是被焦虑的奋斗者主导？这些被生产力负债缠身的人，真是你想要的榜样吗？我联想到纳西姆·塔勒布的名言（稍作改动）：世上两种人，一种不知如何赚钱，一种不知何时收手。我将其改写为自我提升的马太效应：世上两种人，一种不知如何改善生活，一种不知何时停止改善。

Are they having fun, or are they dominated by insecure overachievers? These inadequate the productivity debt riddled people. Is that really who you want? And then I kind of tied this to I I molested a quote from, Nassim Taleb, where he says there's two types of people in the world, those who don't know how to make money and those who don't know when to stop. And I changed this to the Matthew principle of self improvement, which is there are two types of people in the world, those who don't know how to improve their lives and those who don't know when to stop.

善于提升生活品质的人总会难以与不善此道者相处。个人成长虽能带来解放感、满足感与兴奋感，但也是个陷阱——它让你误以为自己仍是未完成的作品，还没到享受生活的阶段。你会把快乐推迟到掌握新冥想技巧、体脂率个位数、年入六位数、购置新房、频道百万订阅等任意目标达成之后。像你这样的成长追求者可能已习惯牺牲-奖励模式。

And people who can improve their lives will always struggle to be around people who can't. Personal growth and self improvement is liberating, and it's fulfilling, and it's exciting, But it is also a trap, I think, that convinces you that you're an unfinished article who doesn't need to start enjoying life yet. And you can defer happiness until you've reached a certain level of development. You say to yourself, I'll really start living when I finally mastered this new meditation technique or got to single digit body fat or hit 6 figures a year income or bought that new house read $100, or grown my channel to a million subscribers, or whatever. And personal growthers, like you, have probably learned that a sacrifice reward dynamic is useful.

这种模式短期有效，长期却有害。我们教导自己先苦后甜：健身完才能看YouTube视频，这无可厚非。但若将享受生活建立在完成任意数量的生活改善之后，就大错特错了。成长者永恒的难题，就是在存在与成为之间寻找平衡。

And it is useful in the micro, but it's malignant in the macro. We teach ourselves that we need to do the tough things first so that we can enjoy the fun things later. And if that's go to the gym before watch some YouTube, I think that's fine. But if it's complete and arbitrary amount of life improving before actually feel like we can let ourselves enjoy life, it's not fine. And the perennially difficult balance of the personal growther is between being and becoming.

在知足与进取之间，在渴望更多与珍惜已有之间。你希望全力以赴，又意识到若永远被欲望驱使，就难以享受奋斗过程。坦白说，这就是个人成长的悖论——去年我的现场演出和问答环节中，最常被问到的正是这个问题。

It's between feeling enough and wanting to be better, between a desire for more and a satisfaction for what you already have. You want to leave it all out on the field of play, but you realize if you're constantly driven by desiring more, it's difficult to take time to enjoy the process of playing the game. And it's tough. I think, to be honest, this is the personal growth problem. It's the most common question that was asked at the live shows that I did last year and the q and a's.

如何判断自己是否足够努力？我总觉得在为成功（手段）牺牲幸福（目标）。我正经历孤独的奋斗期，相信长期会有回报，但又不愿二十年后回首发现虚掷了青春、活力与所有时光。这种焦虑令人不适，没人喜欢这种感觉。

How do I know if I'm working hard enough? I I I feel like I'm sacrificing the thing I want, which is happiness for the thing which is supposed to get it, which is success. I'm in this sort of lonely chapter thing, and I'm grinding away, and I have faith that this is gonna be good for me in the long term, but I also don't want to look back in twenty years and realize that I basically just sacrificed my youth and my virility and all of the time that I had. It's anxiety inducing. People don't like it.

这很难。要彻底放下对更多、对最大化的渴望非常非常困难。但我从萨姆·哈里斯那里学到的一个解决方案我很喜欢，去年他建议试着在日常生活中串联起一些平静与感恩的时刻。每天五次，每次只需三十秒，真正让思绪停留在当下。深呼吸，让注意力集中在视野边缘的事物上。

And it's tough. It is very, very tough to basically let go of that desire for more, for maximizing. But one solution that I quite like that I got from Sam Harris, last year was to basically try and string together some moments of peace and gratitude wherever you can. So just thirty seconds, five times a day, really putting your mind where your feet are. So taking a deep breath in and allowing your mind to focus on the peripherals of your vision.

然后想想让你快乐的事。想想你现在拥有的东西，曾经只是你梦想拥有的。想象五年前的你如果看到现在思维质量的提升、生活品质的改善、思路的清晰，会多么难以置信，意识到所有的奋斗、努力和坚持确实带来了满足。但如果你现在不能享受乐趣，你将永远不会享受。你必须现在就开始享受。

And think about something that makes you happy. Think about how how the things that you have now are only once things that you dreamed of having. Think about how insane it would be if you, from five years ago, could see this newly improved texture of your mind, or quality of your life, and clarity of your thoughts, and realise that all of the striving and pushing and grinding is indeed satisfying. But if you can't have fun now, you're never going to have fun. You have to start having fun now.

你必须现在就开始享受生活，因为生活永远只有当下。你不能一直把这件事推到未来。我喜欢萨姆这个想法的原因是，我认为他最初称之为‘通往觉悟的现实路径’，就是这些像拖把一样的平静时刻。而我发现最好的方法——顺便说，我在这方面很糟糕，所以我才经常思考它——我在家里贴满了便利贴。

You must begin enjoying life right now, because it is only ever going to be right now. You cannot continue to push this thing down the road. And the reason that I like that idea from Sam, I I think originally called it a realistic path to enlightenment, which are these moments of peace, like mops. And the best way that I found to do that I'm so bad at this, by the way, which is why it's, you know, is why I think about it a lot. I have post it notes around the house.

后门旁边贴了一些，电脑前的窗户上也贴了一些。它们只是问我一些小问题，比如‘你现在能完全活在当下吗？’‘今天有什么顺利的事？’每次看到这些便利贴，我都会花十五到三十秒的时间，让思绪停留在脚所在的地方。

So there's some next to the back door. There's some on the window in front of where my sort of computer sits. And, it just asks me little questions like, are you as present as you could be right now? What went well today? And each time that I see one of those Post it notes, I try to take between sort of fifteen and thirty seconds to have, k, mind is resting where feet are.

我的意思是，我没有分心。我没有纠结昨天的事，也没有思考明天。我不担心即将发生什么，也不为已经发生的事烦恼。

And what I mean by that is I'm not distracted. I'm not ruminating about yesterday. I'm not thinking about tomorrow. I'm not concerned about what's going to come. I'm not fretting about what's happened.

我只是想，好吧，我能坚持十五秒或三十秒吗？当我回顾一天时，这些时刻常常出现在当天发生的五件最重要的事情中。真的只是花一点时间。这很奇怪，就像在一天结束时对白天的感恩感到感恩，这非常美好，因为这是一种自我强化的循环。

And I just think, okay, like, can I do just fifteen seconds or thirty seconds? And when I look back on the day, those moments often appear in the top five, things that's happened. Like, really just taking a moment. So that's weird. That's like gratitude at the end of the day for being grateful during the day, which is very nice because that's a sort of self reinforcing cycle.

你感恩得越多，就越容易找到感恩的理由，你也越会为你的感恩之心感到感恩。所以，也许可以用便利贴，或者用手机提醒功能，每天每隔几小时触发一次，但对我来说这很有效。另外要补充的是，这种平衡很难把握。如果你是一个努力自我提升、怀揣大梦想和大目标的人，接受这是做事的代价，这不是某种降临在你身上的个人诅咒，让你不得不忍受。天啊，我多么脆弱、多么恶毒、多么破碎啊？

The more gratitude you do, the more easy it is to find, and the more grateful you are for your gratitude. So, yeah, maybe the Post it note or maybe you wanna use reminders on your phone to sort of, trigger you every few hours or something throughout the day, but that seems to work for me. And this balance the the other thing as well to say is that this is a very hard thing to strike a balance of. So if you are someone that is trying to improve yourself, that has big dreams and big goals and all the rest of it, accepting this is the cost of doing business, this isn't some personal curse that's been bestowed on you that you I'm having to suffer with this thing. God, how feeble and and and malignant and broken am I?

我的处境究竟有多么独特的不幸？不，其实每个人都这样。每个渴望有所作为、既想享受生活又想在人生赛场上全力以赴的人，都会经历这种感受。这只是必经之路的一部分。

How how uniquely cursed is my particular setup? No. This is how everybody feels. This is every single person that wants to do a lot, that wants to know that they should enjoy life, but also wants to leave it all out there on the field of play. This is just part of the course.

希望这个认知能让事情显得稍微容易应对些。如果我找到真正的解决方法，我会告诉你的。好了，下一个话题。这个很有意思，还被埃隆转推过。

Hopefully, that makes it seem a little bit easier to deal with. I'll I'll I'll tell you if I find out a proper solution. Alright. Next one. This is cool, and this one got retweeted by Elon.

所以这算是得到了他的认可——虽然不知道这意味什么。文化战争中的闪光玩具循环：第一步，某些'觉醒'新闻登上头条，比如猫遭受种族歧视，或者拧灯泡需要被认可为合法性癖之类的。第二步，右翼抗体反应激活——看看这些人有多疯狂。

So it's got his seal of approval, whatever that means. The culture wars shiny object cycle. Number one, some woke news story hits the press, like cats suffer from racial discrimination or screwing in light bulbs need to be recognized as a valid sexual kink or something. Number two, the right wing antibody response activates. Look at how insane these people are.

马特·沃尔什发推引用文章并称其令人作呕，说'这就是我们便利而堕落的TikTok社会的问题'。第三步，这种反应使事件获得远超原本边缘场景的关注度，将小事炒作成大事。第四步，左翼反击启动——右翼人士竟为一只特别黑猫发狂。

Matt Walsh, quote, tweets the article and calls it obnoxious. This is the problem with our convenient, decadent TikTok society. Number three, this reaction causes the story to gain infinitely more traction than it ever would have done by signal boosting the original fringe scenario into a much bigger event. Number four, the left wing counter response activates. Right wingers lose their mind over one woman with a particularly dark cat.

《每日电讯》为篇无足轻重的钓鱼文章崩溃。当原事件没那么离谱时，还可能包括对原文的辩护：'猫确实会遭受心理创伤，忽视这点才是真正问题'。第五步，右翼再反击机制启动——

The Daily Wire has a meltdown over an insignificant troll article. In times when the original story is actually less insane, this can include a defense of the original article too. Cats actually can experience trauma. Minimizing this is the real problem. Number five, the right wing rereaction kicks into gear.

'反对猫创伤论的我反而成了疯子？看吧，这就是问题所在。如果我们不坚守阵地，这些蓝发白痴就要接管国家了。'第六步，最后是'接地气'的元反动派吐槽：'真正问题是人们还在讨论这个'。

Apparently, I'm insane for pushing back against cat trauma. See, this is the problem. If we don't stand our ground, these blue haired idiots will take over the country. Number six, finally, the touch grass meta reactionaries steaming. The real issue is people talking about this issue.

'整件事多可笑啊，该退出文化战争了。我们该重拾真正重要的事：搬到莱茵河畔的牧场度假，余生只管钉篱笆桩。'这种模式我已目睹无数次了。

Look at how silly this whole thing is. It's time to check out of the culture war. We should reconnect with what really matters. You should move on to the ranch next Rhine holiday and hammer fence post into the ground for the rest of time. And this is something I noticed over and over and over again.

这种文化战争的闪光点循环，这种六阶段模式，可能始于左翼对右翼某些言论的放大，也可能反向发生。但这个过程既平庸又极度重复。我不禁思考，如果每次讨论都遵循相同套路，为何它还能持续吸引我们注意力？我意识到原因在于——每个故事都被撒上恰到好处的新奇元素，制造出‘这是全新事件’的假象，从而使反击显得合理。跨性别旗帜就是绝佳例证。

This culture wars shiny object cycle, this sort of six stage process, and it can go begin with the left, signal boosting something from the right, and then it can happen in reverse. But the cycle is banal, and it's excruciatingly repetitive. So I wondered why it sustains our attention if, basically, the discussion follows the same format every single time. And the reason I realized that is my my idea is that it's because each story is sprinkled with just enough novelty to give it the illusion that this is a new different event, which legitimates the pushback. So you see this perfect example with the trans flag.

每年都有新群体被加入跨性别旗帜，尽管本质上是完全相同的文化洗牌循环，依然会经历那六个步骤。但人们会这样辩解批评的合理性：看啊，我们从未见过包含麸质不耐受者的跨性别旗，或是马蹄足患者，或是恐飞人士。这就像《迷失》第二十季，当角色第七次回到岛上需要逃脱时——只不过这次是冬天。那点新奇感足以让人总说：嗯，这次批评似乎确实有理，我以前真没见过这种版本。

So each year, some new group gets added to the trans flag, and then that even though it's basically the same exactly the same, culture washer on your object cycle, it still goes through the same six steps. But people will justify the criticism of it by saying, see, we haven't seen this trans flag with people who suffer from a gluten intolerance included in it before or someone with a clubfoot or or, you know, a person who's afraid of flying. And it's like the twentieth season of Lost when they're back on the island for the seventh time and they need to escape, but this time it's winter. And it just sprinkles sufficient novelty so that people are always, oh, well, you know, this does seem to be legitimate. I haven't quite seen this one before.

这种闪光点循环让我头疼不已，主要因为我总会被它捕获。当我看到银行把经典童话改写成‘霸道公主为自己而战’的《更公平童话》时，我心想：这他妈太蠢了。道格拉斯·默里在哪？

And the shiny object cycle does my head in. It does my head in largely because I get captured by it. And I see a bank rewriting a classic fairy tale into a boss bitch remake and calling it fairer tales, princesses doing it for themselves. And I think, this is fucking dumb. Where's Douglas Murray?

我需要他和我一起粉碎这个想法。这种宣泄让人愉悦——摧毁愚蠢概念总会带来快感。揭穿白痴写的疯癫见解是如此诱人、有趣又轻松，就像可卡因成瘾者住在巴勃罗·埃斯科瓦尔隔壁。这里有无限供应， meme生产机全速运转，而我们全都陷在这个漩涡里。

I need him to decimate this idea with me. And it's cathartic. It makes you feel good to tear this sort of stupid idea down. Calling out insane insights written by idiots is so compelling and fun and easy to do that it's like being a cocaine addict with Pablo Escobar as a next door neighbor. There is an unlimited supply, and the memes of production are just whirring at maximum RPM, and we're all caught in the vortex.

正是道格拉斯提醒我为何对这个循环如此愤怒——它是干扰源。它让我们无法聚焦真正重要的事物。不仅是‘临终时会记得’的那种重要，更是‘有其他更紧迫议题’的重要。比如美国整座城市陷入芬太尼危机，18-24岁自杀者中80%是男性。我想听乔丹·彼得森谈论在失去所有护栏的世界寻找意义，期待纳西姆·塔勒布撰写如何用复杂数学解决生活难题。

And it was Douglas, actually, who reminded me why I'm getting so exasperated with this cycle, because it's a distraction. It's a distraction from our attention being focused on things which are actually meaningful. And not just meaningful in a you will remember this when you're dead way, but in a there's other issues to talk about that are more important way. Like, there's entire American cities with fentanyl epidemics, and eighty percent of suicides of people aged 18 to 24 are men. Like, I want to hear Jordan Peterson talk about dealing with finding meaning in a world stripped of all of its guardrails, and I want Nassim Taleb to be writing about applying complex maths to simple life problems.

过去几年，地球上最聪明的一批人都在争论‘男人是不是男人/女人是不是女人’，更不用说那些不太聪明的大众。我们的思维被这个无限循环劫持，它激怒双方并使其因坚守立场而自认正义。我认为这是无底洞，它不会停止。虽然我未来可能仍会提及此类话题，但会努力更关注五十年后仍有价值的事物，而非五十分钟的热度。

Many of the smartest people on the planet have had their attention captured arguing about whether men are men and women are women or not over the last few years and even more of the less smart ones as well. And all of our minds are held hostage by an endless cycle of shiny objects that aggravates both sides, and it makes them feel righteous for standing their ground. And I think this is a bottomless pit. I don't think that it's going to stop. I will almost certainly bring up stories like this in the future, but I'm really going to try hard to focus more on stuff that matters in fifty years, not just in fifty minutes.

或许你也该如此。讽刺的是，当下你只觉得摧毁愚蠢想法很有趣——它值得传播、易于理解，充满虚伪等爆点。但当你事后回想：讨论这些让你感受如何？让自己卷入纷争、情绪激动，甚至仅是占据心智——这些精力本可用于思考什么？

And I think probably so should you. It's it's so it's so funny because in the moment, all that you're doing is tearing down the stupid idea and, you know, it's it's hilarious, and it's worthy of communication, and it's easy for people to understand. It's got hypocrisy, and it's got all the rest of it. And yet when you think about, in retrospect, how does it make you feel? How did talking about this thing and embroiling yourself, getting agitated, even just the mind share, what else could you have been thinking about?

而且这些事并不需要是你临终时会回忆起的——因为标准已经低到尘埃里了。但我可以保证，那些特别阴暗的猫片或拧灯泡的性癖既不会出现在人生走马灯里，也根本无关紧要。所以它既不有趣，也不令人安心，更无意义可言。完全不符合任何值得你在意的事物标准。没错，这就是文化战争里那些吸引眼球的循环把戏。

And it doesn't need to be stuff that would you you're going to recall at the end of your life because the bar is set so low. But I can promise you that the particularly dark cat or the light bulb screwing in sexual kink is not going to appear there, and it's not going to matter either. So it's neither it's neither entertaining nor reassuring nor meaningful. It's like none of the things that you should care about. So, yeah, that's a culture wars shiny object cycle.

不过有件事倒是挺有意思：当你发现某种事物发展模式后，如果能提前预判，等它再次发生时就会显得尤为荒谬。因为随着事态演进，你会突然醒悟——这根本不是新鲜事，只是同一套剧本在反复上演。我很喜欢罗伯·亨德森提出的'亨德森新闻周期论'，每次都能完美印证这个规律。

Here's one thing though that that's kind of, I guess, interesting about it. When you see a format, a structure that things tend to move through, if you can call it out in advance, it makes whenever it happens again, it makes it seem so much more ridiculous. Because as you start to see this thing unfold, you realize, oh, this isn't novel. This is just the same playbook going through again and again. And I quite like, Rob Henderson had something called the Hendersonian news cycle, which every single time, the same thing happens.

当你识破这个模式后，就像从看到矩阵变成了看到代码。你能清晰观察到事件如何严丝合缝地落入既定框架。希望至少能让你们对某些花哨把戏免疫了吧？好了，下一条。

And when you see it, you go, oh, like, I'm you it's like seeing code instead of seeing matrix. You observe what's going on, and it just falls into the existing format. So, hopefully, I've disabused you of, at least some shiny objects. Alright. Next one.

这是马克·曼森的观点，关于他为何讨厌消极人群：'做混蛋是弱者对力量的想象，抱怨是他们维系存在感的方式。别让他人的恐惧束缚你。人们批判的正是自己不敢做的事，因为勇敢行动会映照出他们的怯懦。'

This is from Mark Manson, and it's why he hates being around negative people. Being an asshole is a weak person's idea of strength. Complaining is their connection. Never let yourself be held back by other people's fears. People criticize what they're afraid to do themselves because bold action reminds them of their own inaction.

'如果你害怕被批评，又何必在意那些连尝试都不敢的人的意见？如果你是批判者，诋毁拥有你所缺勇气的人能让你好受吗？'这段话深得我心。要知道我一直在全力抨击犬儒主义。这也是我喜欢待在美国的原因之一，这里的热忱与激情或许会让某些人疲倦，但至今仍让我乐在其中。

If you're afraid to be criticized, why do you care about the opinions of those who are too timid to do it themselves? If you are the criticizer, does tearing someone who has the courage you lack make you feel better? And I love that. Like, you know, I've been railing against cynicism as hard as I can. One of the reasons that I really enjoy being out here in The US, the enthusiasm and the excitability probably can get tiring to some people, but as of yet, it hasn't got tiring to me.

我就是喜欢这种氛围，比起英国好太多了。乔治发过一篇文章给我...作者是谁来着？不是Spotify创始人。

And I just like it. I I I prefer it to The UK. There was this article George sent me. Who is it by? Not by the founder of Spotify.

是Monzo银行创始人写的。Monzo算是家网络银行，但规模非常庞大。那位创始人直言英国文化与美国梦精神根本背道而驰——我觉得这话一针见血。

By the founder of Monzo, the bank. It's like a Internet bank thing, but it's it's huge. It's massive. And the founder basically said that the British culture is antithetical to the American dream. And I think it's so true.

我认为它如此刻薄、充满怀疑，不支持宏大梦想和人们尝试不同的事物。而且，你知道，这是一个有着2000年历史、僵化、社会等级森严、近乎停滞的文化。另一方面，它是世界第六大经济体。英国是世界第六大经济体，但这并非指整个英国，而是伦敦。

I think that it is so cutting and skeptical and unsupportive of big dreams and people doing something different. And it's, you know, this 2,000 year old, ossified, very hierarchical in terms of social class, like, just stagnant culture. And the other side of it is it's the sixth biggest economy in the world. The UK is the sixth biggest economy in the world, but it's not The UK. It's London.

伦敦是世界第六大经济体，而英国其他地区则是一个依附于这座富裕城市的贫困国家。是的，如果你身处伦敦金融城或某些合适的伦敦行政区，生活质量可能非常优越。但一旦离开那些区域，有个乔治推荐的YouTube频道叫《Bold and Bankrupt》，内容相当精彩。这家伙体验了各种英国人的生活，甚至从墨西哥偷渡到美国。他付钱给那些所谓的‘豺狼’还是什么来着？

London is the sixth biggest economy in the world, and what we have in The UK is a very poor country attached to a very rich city. And, yeah, if you're in city of London or the right boroughs of London, maybe the quality of life and everything is great. As soon as you get outside of that, there's this YouTube channel called Bold and Bankrupt that George sent, and it's so good. This dude has done every British guy, he's been, smuggled across the border from Mexico into The US. He's paid the what do they call jackals or something?

就是那些偷渡客的蛇头。他付钱给他们，去过战区，到过俄罗斯还被关进监狱。而现在他终极挑战的目标是探访随机选中的英国北部海滨小镇——这些被他称为世界上最恐怖的地方。

Coyotes, that smuggle people, smugglers. He's paid them. He's been in war zones. He's been in Russia, he got taken into jail. And now his final boss of the scariest place in the world is to go and visit random northern British seaside towns.

这景象实在令人心碎。你会看到那些商业街上满是钉着木板的破败店铺，所有店面不是变成了‘Eclair饰品店’，就是赛百味、塔可钟之类的连锁店。

And it's just so sad. You know, you see these high streets that are full of boarded up windows, and and they're in disrepair. And fucking everything is Eclair's accessories. Everything. Every store's been turned into Eclair's accessories or a Subway or a Taco Bell or something.

如果这些店铺还没被烧毁或用木板封起来的话。这真切展现了富裕城市与贫困乡村的畸形结合，英国的财富根本没有得到均衡分配。我认为这种现状不仅被反映出来，更影响了人们对这个国家的认知。

And that's if it's not burned down or or boarded up. And it just shows. It really does show that you have rich city with a poor country attached to it. It it it the wealth, really, of The UK is not distributed evenly. And I think that that is reflected, and and contributes to the way that people see the country.

好了，关于英国的吐槽到此为止。倒不是说我在刻意贬低——我真心希望英国能变得更好。只是我曾试图从内部推动改革，结果失败了。言归正传，下一条：不要等待。

So anyway, enough enough sort of UK bashing. Not that it is. Like, I want I would love for The UK to improve, but, you know, I tried to mine my way out from the inside and make changes, that was a failure. Anyway, next one. Don't wait.

生命正在此刻发生。我越来越确信那种‘等生活琐事都处理完就能真正开始想做之事’的想法是种执念。这类似于认为达到某个个人成长阶段后就能如何，但前者更基础——因为它适用于更多人：即便你不追求个人成长，也存在这种延迟满足的心理。我认为‘有朝一日生活责任会消失，届时才能全心投入理想生活’根本是个神话。

Life is happening right now. And I've become pretty obsessed with the belief that life's duties will one day be out of the way, that you can then finally start doing the thing that you want and live your life fully. It's similar to that idea that when you've reached a particular level of personal development, you'll be able to but this is even more ground floor than that. This is more applicable to more people because even if you're not doing personal growth, there is this sense that you're just going to delay gratification. And I think that the idea that one day life's duties will be out of the way and that you can finally start doing the thing you want and living your life fully is a myth.

我认为这是个谎言。玛丽·路易丝·冯·法兰兹曾谈到临时生活。他说，人们有种奇怪的感觉，觉得自己还未真正开始生活。目前所做的种种不过是权宜之计，内心总幻想着未来某天真正的生命才会展开。这与格温达博格尔提出的‘延迟幸福综合征’概念颇为相似。

I think it's a lie. And Marie Louise von Franz talks about the provisional life. He says, there is a strange feeling that one is not yet in real life. For the time being, one is doing this or that, but there is always the fantasy that sometime in future, the real thing will come about. And it's similar to another idea from Gwyndabogle called deferred happiness syndrome.

那种普遍的感受——你的生活尚未真正开始，当下现实不过是未来田园诗般生活的序章。这田园诗实为海市蜃楼，当你靠近便会消散，揭示出你匆匆掠过的序章其实通向死亡。奇怪的是，我常怀有这种时间流逝的预感式愧疚，觉得自己未能充分把握每一天。尤其当我回顾一周时，明知自己曾投入事业努力工作，却无法清晰记起时间究竟如何度过。于是担忧这一周会成为我回顾整个人生的缩影。

The common feeling that your life has not begun, that your present reality is a mere prelude to some idyllic future. This idyll is a mirage that'll fade as you approach, revealing that the prelude you rushed through was in fact the one to your death. And it's strange because I regularly have this sort of sense of foreboding kind of guilt about time slipping away, that I'm not making enough of my days. And especially when I look back on a week, and I know I've done things and dedicated myself to pursuits and working hard, but I can't really fully recall how I actually spent my time. So I worry that this is just a one week microcosm of how I look back on my entire life.

时光流逝我却未曾真正觉察，存在持续发生，而生活实则从未启程。于是我思考答案何在？是像丹·比尔泽里安那样纵情享乐当个超级花花公子？还是抛却世俗责任成为环游世界的浪人？或是全情投入最艰难最有价值的事业？老实说我不知道。但我确信此刻正是黄金年华。

And as time having passed, but me not really noticing it of existence occurring, but living not actually having got going. And then I think, what's the answer? Like, just go full hedonic Dan Bilzerian hyper playboy mode or or cast off all worldly obligations and become a nomad traveling the world or commit fully to the hardest, most worthwhile pursuits that I can. And I don't know, frankly. But I'm pretty sure that these right now are the golden years.

我认为当你回首往事时，很可能会发现眼下这段时光正是你最珍视的岁月。因此你应当以应有的喜悦、专注和临在之心对待它们。最重要的是，别理会那些愤世嫉俗的扫兴者。帕基·麦科马克有个观点：魔鬼最厉害的伎俩就是让你相信悲观者才是好人。简而言之——别等待。

I think that it's quite likely when you look back that these times right now will be the ones that you cherish. So you should approach them with joy and care and presence, the requisite joy and care and presence. And I think most importantly, ignoring the cynics and the buzzkills There's this idea from Paki McCormack, and he says, the greatest trick the devil ever played was making you believe that the pessimists are the good guys. Basically, just don't like. Don't wait.

生活正在此刻发生。它就在那里等你享受。极端化的延迟满足最终导致零满足。你习惯的牺牲-回报模式在微观层面很棒，在宏观层面却很糟糕。这不是要等待个人成长完成。

Like, life is happening right now. It is there for you to enjoy. It is there for you to take delayed gratification in the extreme just results in no gratification. The sacrifice reward dynamic that you are used to is great in the micro and awful in the macro. It's not about waiting for personal growth to be over.

这不是在等待某事发生。生活不在未来，它正在此刻展开，这是我需要每分钟不断提醒自己的事。下一个话题：影子语句。想象你正与某人约会，他们已一周未见你。

It's not about waiting for something. Life is not happening in future. It is happening right now, and this is something that I need to permanently remind myself of on a, minute by minute basis. Next one, shadow sentences. So imagine that you've been dating someone, and they haven't seen you for a week.

当你询问他们今晚安排时，对方说要和朋友聚会。你内心想说的是：我真的很想尽快见到你，你和朋友而非我共度时光让我担忧，因为这表明你其实不愿和我在一起。但实际出口的却是：哦，这周又见朋友肯定是很重要的约会吧？真高兴你有这么多空闲时间和他们相聚。或是共进晚餐时伴侣不停看手机，你本想说的是：嘿...

And you ask what they're doing tonight, and they tell you that they're hanging out with some of their friends. What you want to say is, I really would like to see you soon, and it makes me worried when you spend time with your friends, but not with me, and that it's because you don't actually want to be with me. But what you say instead is, oh, must be a very important night to see your friends again this week, is it? Glad that you've got so much spare time to catch up with them. Or you're out for dinner and your partner is on their phone a lot, and what you want to say is, hey.

我很想和你说话，我知道你很忙，但晚餐时你能专注听我说话会让我很开心。你能否把手机的事放一放？可你实际说的是‘这个时间点收到的信息肯定非常重要’。除非特别紧急，否则你不会在晚餐时回复信息。或者我们可以从字面语言和隐含语言的角度来思考这个问题。

I'd love to speak, and I know that you're busy, but it makes me feel really good when you focus on me during dinner. Can your phone stuff wait until later? But what you actually say is that's a very important message to be taking at this time. It's gotta be really urgent for you to be answering it over dinner. Or another way to think about this is in terms of literal language or implied language.

所以直言不讳的人属于字面型表达者，使用潜台词的人则是隐含型表达者。假设有个朋友来你家叙旧，他其实想吃点东西。隐含型表达者会用潜台词说‘哎，我今天真该多吃点的’，希望你能领会暗示主动提供食物。

So people speaking directly are literal speakers. People using shadow sentences are implied speakers. So let's say that a friend comes around to your house to catch up. They would like something to eat. An implied speaker, using shadow sentences, would say, man, I should have eaten more today, hoping that you pick up on the queue and offer food.

而字面型表达者则会直接说‘嘿兄弟，虽然不好意思开口，但我来之前没时间吃饭。你这儿有什么能垫肚子的吗？下次我请你’。潜台词的特点是不直接表明需求，而是说些希望对方能领悟弦外之音的话——如果对方没反应过来，自己反而会生气。

A literal speaker would say, hey, man. Sorry to ask, but I didn't have time to eat before I arrived. Have you got something that I can snack on? And I'll get you next time. So shadow sentences are not stating what you want or need, but instead saying a thing that you hope will cause the other person to realize what you want or need and then getting upset if they don't.

这种方式就像是对你想要的东西做出模糊暗示而非直接请求。我认为当感觉对方有些小过失时，这种表达能避免你展现 openness 和脆弱感。通过不真正提出要求来规避被拒绝的风险，本质上是在表达‘如果你在乎我，就该知道问题所在’。所以潜台词本质上是用密码语言期待被理解，这会催生未被言明的期待落空，进而导致关系中不必要的紧张和怨恨。

So you kind of gesture in the direction of the thing that you want without asking for it directly. And I think it prevents you from having to be open and vulnerable when it feels like someone else has done something slightly wrong. It protects you from rejection by not actually asking for anything. It's the ultimate expression of if you love me, you'd know what was wrong. So shadow senses are essentially speaking in code hoping to be understood, and they cause unvocalized unmet expectations, which drive unnecessary tension and resentment in relationships.

尼尔·施特劳斯有句名言：'未说出口的期待就是预谋的怨恨。'影子句子的毒性在于，它们会削弱双方以脆弱和反馈姿态进行开放诚实沟通的意愿，从而形成恶性循环。因为当一方说出被动攻击性的话时，另一方很难再选择展现脆弱与坦诚。这就像我认为最令人反感的行为莫过于居高临下的说教——那简直是史上最强的兴致杀手。

And there's that Neil Strauss quote of unspoken expectations are premeditated resentments. And the reason that shadow sentences are so toxic are because they reduce both parties' desire to communicate openly and honestly with vulnerability and feedback, which becomes a vicious cycle. Because if one person says something passive aggressive, it's so hard to be the person on the other side that decides to be vulnerable and open. It's why, like, I actually think the number one turn off that anybody can do is being patronizing. Like, if you're being patronizing, that is the biggest erection killer in history.

这可能只是我的感受，但它确实触发了所有那些负面的、挖苦的、间接排他性的联想，没人愿意卷入其中。不过值得庆幸的是，这种影子句子的动态其实很容易打破——只要有一方开始谨慎而坦率地表达。因为当这个人这么做时，就为对方提供了效仿的许可。

It's just so it hits this may just be me, but it hits on all of the different, like, negative, snide, indirect exclusionary associations that nobody wants to be a part of. So yeah. I am. I think that, thankfully, this sort of shadow sentence dynamic is actually quite easy to break by one person just starting to speak openly and carefully. Because when that person does it, it gives the other person license to do the same thing.

但反之亦然。如果一方总是拐弯抹角、被动攻击，就会形成让对方开始模仿其行为的互动模式。所以如果你的关系中充满影子句子或间接沟通，你需要主动打破这个循环。这就像代际创伤的传递，但又不完全是——它更像是持续性的、暂时性的创伤，从你们关系的后端沿着时间轴不断延续。

But the reverse is true too. If one person is speaking indirectly, passive aggressively, that creates a dynamic where the other person starts to mirror the way that they behave. So if you're in a relationship that has a lot of shadow sentences in it or it has a lot of indirect communication, you need to take it upon yourself to break that cycle. It's like a like a a generational trauma being passed down, but it's not. It's just sort of durational durational trauma, temporal trauma that's being passed along, historically from the back end of your relationship.

但这其实很容易改变。或许你甚至可以直接指出来。你可以说，听着，我注意到我们不再那么直率地交流了，有时我会因为自己说话阴阳怪气而感到非常糟糕，我讨厌那样的自己。我确信这不是最好的我，而我想成为你眼中那个更好的人。

But it is quite easy to change. And maybe you can even call it out. You could say, look. I've noticed that we're not really speaking that directly anymore, and and sometimes I I feel really bad because I I say things passive aggressively, and I I hate when I'm like that. And I'm sure that, you know, it's not the best version of me, and I want to be that person for you.

无论对方是朋友、伴侣、父母还是任何人。我真的很想更直接一些。我认为如果我们都能带着关怀和注意去做这件事——我们需要温柔些，过程可能会艰难——但如果我们做到了，或许我们的沟通会改善，事情也会显得更轻松。真正的目标应该是走出阴影。

And this can be a friend or a partner or a parent or fucking whoever. I really want to be more direct. I I think that if we both do that with care and attention, we need to be gentle, and it's gonna be tough. But if we did that, maybe our communication would be better, and maybe maybe things would seem easier. The goal really should just be to come out of the shadows.

言为心声，言行一致。我相信这会极大改善沟通质量。这基本就是我18岁到30岁期间每段恋爱关系的写照。

Say what you mean. Mean what you say. And I I I think that that would improve an awful lot of communication. I this is basically every relationship I had, like, every couple relationships I was in from, like, 18 until 30. It was this.

全是拐弯抹角的话，间接的交流，因为害怕被拒绝而不敢坦诚相待，或者对方也做着同样的事。这就是个自我延续、不断升级的恶性循环。

It was just shadow sentences. It was indirect communication. It was a fear of being open and honest in case I was rejected, or they they did exactly the same thing. It was this sort of self perpetuating, ever increasing escalating problem. And, yeah.

很高兴我至少稍微走出了这个怪圈。另一件我意识到的事：几周前在迈阿密和朋友聊到情绪，特别是嫉妒、沮丧和愤怒。奇怪的是这些情绪连最理性、认知最成熟的人也会中招。这非常恼人——你努力做个理性自主的人，某件事却突然打乱情绪，让你变成个任性的小孩。

Glad glad that I'm at least slightly out the other side of that. Another thing that I realized, I had a conversation a couple of weeks ago in Miami with a friend about emotions, and specifically jealousy, frustration, and anger. And it's strange because those emotions hijack even the most cerebral, cognitively sophisticated person. It's highly annoying. You spend all of this time trying to be a rational, agentic beast, and then a thing happens that disrupts your emotional state, and you turn into a petulant toddler.

我朋友分享说，当他发现自己被嫉妒、沮丧或愤怒裹挟时，会问几个问题。第一个是：在所有可能的情绪中，为什么偏偏选择了这个？你本有丰富的情感选项，为何这个被触发？是你的哪些欲望、对世界的预设和思维模式导致它如此迅速地浮现？

And my friend explained that when he finds himself getting carried away by jealousy or frustration or anger, he asks a few questions. So first one that he asks is, out of all of the emotions you could have chosen, why did you choose that one? Have this huge library of emotions to tap into. Why did that one get activated? What is it about you, your desires, your assumptions about the world, and your patterns that caused that emotion to rise to the surface so quickly.

严格来说并非你选择了它，是你的身心将其呈现给你并作出反应。但我喜欢这种重新掌控情绪的话术框架——在所有可能的情绪中，为什么偏偏选择了这个？他问的第二个问题是：这个情绪对你有什么好处呢？

And it's not strictly true that you chose it. Your mind and body just delivered it to you, and you reacted. But I love this language and framing for retaking agency over our emotions. Out of all of the emotions you could have chosen, why did you choose that one? And second question he asks is, and how's that working out for you?

那种情绪产生的结果是什么？它让你的生活、人际关系、心理状态变得更好还是更糟？我再次喜欢这种表达方式，因为它在你和你的感受之间创造了距离。此外，它假设是你选择了这种情绪，赋予你一种掌控感。然后他问自己的第三个问题是：你是想证明自己正确，还是想被爱？

What has been the outcome of that emotion arising? Has it made your life, relationships, quality of mind better or worse? And I love this language again because it creates distance between you and your feelings. Plus, it assumes that you chose it, giving you a sense of power. And then the third question that he asks himself is, do you want to be right, or do you want to be loved?

通常，当我们感到嫉妒、沮丧或愤怒时，是因为我们觉得边界被侵犯了。这实际上正是愤怒在进化过程中存在的根本原因。在没有法律之前，你需要内在的是非观念，这样如果有人越界，你就可以通过足够不愉快的反应让他们知道其行为越界了。正是这种边界被跨越的感觉引发了这些情绪。我们觉得对方本应知道，如果他们做了那件事我们会这样感受——但他们却没有意识到。

Often, when we feel emotions like jealousy or frustration and anger, it's because we feel like a boundary has been crossed. That's actually the reason that anger exists evolutionarily at all. Before you have laws, you need a sense of right and wrong internally so that if somebody crosses that, you can let them know with a sufficiently unhappy response to their transgression. And this is this crossing of boundary is exactly why these emotions arise. We we feel like someone should have known that we would have felt this way if they did that thing, and they didn't.

所以我们需要让他们意识到自己的过失。在我们不够宽容的时刻，我们希望通过冷暴力、被动攻击、刻薄言论或疏远来达成目的。而在我们更宽容的时刻，则是通过平静、诚实且坦率地解释某事为何让我们产生这样的感受——而不是指责对方故意为之。我认为最好以最大的善意揣度他人：假设朋友或伴侣并非有意让我们难过，他们的行为对我们心理造成的影响是出于无知，而非疏忽或恶意。

So we need to get them to realize their transgression. And in our less gracious moments, we hope to achieve this through mistreatment or passive aggression or mean comments or distancing. And in our more gracious moments, it's done through a calm and honest and open explanation of why something made us feel the way that it did without accusing the other person of doing it on purpose. I think it's best to assume the best of others. We we assume that our friend or partner didn't mean to make us upset, that the impact that their actions had on our psyche was done through ignorance, not negligence or malice.

也许他们的行为确实值得你冷眼相待。也许我们的愤慨是正当的。也许他们本应更懂事。你甚至有权做出这样的反应。但问题是：你是想证明自己正确，还是想被爱？

And maybe their behaviour does warrant the silent treatment. Maybe we are righteous in our indignation. Maybe they should have known better. You may even be in the right for reacting this way. But do you want to be right, or do you want to be loved?

因为你对不愿发生之事的任性回应，不太可能催生更多爱意。而如果你的伴侣或朋友连你温和坦诚解释为何感到难受都听不进去，那么这很好地表明问题出在对话者本身而非其行为。我越来越意识到，这并非所谓的'废物测试'（因为废物测试显得像是你故意刁难或考验对方对你的承诺），而是——如果你的表达是你真实感受的自然流露，是你冷静、诚实且公开地陈述你认为的真相，无论对象是朋友、伴侣还是网约车司机，而对方对此有意见，那么问题不在你，而在他们。

Because your petulance in response to a situation you wish hadn't happened is unlikely to create more love. And if your partner or friend is incapable of hearing you gently and frankly explaining why you feel bad, then you have a good indicator that your interlocutor is a bigger problem than just their behavior. Increasingly, I'm starting to see kind of not not shit tests, because shit tests make it seem like you are, purposefully being awkward or or or doing something to test someone else's, commitment to you in one form or another. Not that, but just that if it is a natural outgrowth of you, if it is you calmly, honestly, and openly telling something that you feel is the truth, saying it to a friend or a partner or a a fucking Uber driver or whatever it is, and that person has a problem with it, the problem isn't you. The problem is them.

唯一能让问题归咎于你的情况，是你说了不实之言。如果你在合适时机以足够冷静的方式说出真相，对方却因此愤怒，那本质上是在说'你的不适让我不舒服'。但要知道，我的不适才是最初的原动力。我们能不能先处理这个，而不是因为你感到恼火就否定我表达感受的权利？是的，我认为如果我们都能更直接地沟通，最终会收获更优质的友谊。

The only reason that the problem is you is if you say something which wasn't true. What someone is basically getting angry at if you say the truth in a sufficiently calm manner at the right time is your discomfort is making me uncomfortable. It's like, well, but I my discomfort is the first mover here. Can we not treat that as opposed to you simply telling me how you feel because I'm upset? And, yeah, I think if we were all a bit more direct with our communication, we would end up with much better friendships, I think.

我认为这将是个不错的进步方向。这与迈阿密周末活动中被问到的另一个问题类似：谁是你最好的朋友？当被问到这个问题时，这位男士说不太确定，毕竟过了12岁后这问题就有点奇怪。于是问题被换了个说法：你和谁在一起时最不需要过滤自己的言辞？

I think that that would be a good a good way to move forward. This is kind of similar to something else that was asked at that Miami weekend, which was, who is your best friend? So this guy was asked who his best friend was, and he said, I'm not sure. That's a bit of a strange question after age 12. So the question was asked differently, which was, who do you have the least amount of filter with when you're around them?

我认为这是一个极好的视角转换。你和谁在一起时最不需要伪装自己？另一个好问题是，你能和谁安静共处而不必刻意找话题？即便没有一个人完全符合，这些就是你该优先共度时光的人，因为我们总忍不住改变自己去迎合他人。我们会调整行为、言辞、本性乃至一切，只为被喜欢、认可和接纳。

And I think that is such a good reframe. Who do you have the least amount of filter with when you're around them? And another good question is who can you sit in silence with and not have to fill it? Even if there isn't a single person that wins, these are the people that you should prioritize spending your time with because we all feel the compulsion to change ourselves to fit in. We adjust our behaviors and our words and our nature and everything in an attempt to be liked and validated and accepted.

越多人让你感到做真实的自己是安全的，你越能每天自信地展现真我。你会逐渐适应所处环境。就像去健身房做渐进式负重训练，是为了让曾经沉重的感觉变轻。这道理也类似。若你想活出自我，就需要待在允许你真性情流露的人群中。

And the more people who make it feel safe for you to truly be yourself around them, the more confidence that you have to be that person every day. It's you become acclimatized to the conditions that you're in. The reason that you go to the gym and do progressive overload is to make what used to be heavy feel light. And this is kind of the same. If you want you to be you, you need to be around people that allow that you to come out.

如果你想成为别人——这种倾向可能积极也可能消极。我们为融入群体而妥协自我，但积极层面也存在。比如周围人都抽烟而你不想抽时，你更容易屈服。但从更本质的社会角度来说，关键问题是：你能和谁静默相伴而不焦虑？和谁相处时最无需设防？

If you want you to be somebody else, if you want you to not be you and this can be both positive and negative. You know, I'm saying that, you know, we compromise ourselves in order to fit in, but that can be done in a positive skew also. You know, if you're around a bunch of people that smoke and you don't want to smoke, you're gonna be more likely to smoke. But from a more, you know, like, existential social standpoint, which is what this is talking about, like, who can you sit in silence with and not feel like you need to fill it? Who do you have the least amount of filter around when you're with them?

这些问题绝妙地促使那个毫无伪装的真实自我自然流露。能找到无需寒暄也不必过滤言辞的人，确实是筛选值得相处者的绝佳标准。这让我想起朋友克莱给我看的蒂莫西·利里的话——说实话我不了解这位作家，但这句话实在精彩。

Those questions just superbly encourage this sort of frictionless version of you to flow out. And, yeah, I I I think that that's a finding people that you can sit in silence with and you don't have filter around is just what a great heuristic for people that you should spend your time with. And this is a bit similar to a quote that Clay, my friend, showed me from Timothy Leary. So I wasn't knew who Timothy Leary was, but I've never read any of his stuff, to be honest. But he sent me this, which is fucking fantastic.

这句话是：找到同类。承认吧，你和他们不一样，甚至截然不同。你或许偶尔打扮成他们的样子，看同样的无脑电视节目，甚至有时吃同样的快餐。

This is find the others. Admit it. You aren't like them. You're not even close. You may occasionally dress yourself up as one of them, watch the same mindless television shows as they do, maybe even eat the same fast food sometimes.

但你越试图融入，就越像个旁观者看着普通人过着机械的生活。每次你说着"祝愉快"或"天气真糟"这类客套话时，内心渴望谈论禁忌话题，比如"说说让你流泪的事"或"你认为既视感的意义是什么"。直面内心吧——你甚至想和电梯里那个女孩搭讪，说不定她和那个路过你工位的地中海大叔，正怀着同样的念头。

But it seems that the more you try to fit in, the more you feel like an outsider watching the normal people as they go about their automatic existences. For every time you say club passwords like have a nice day and weather's awful today, You yearn inside to say forbidden things like tell me something that makes you cry or what do you think deja vu is for? Face it. You even want to talk to that girl in the elevator. But what if that girl in the elevator and the balding man who walks past your cubicle at work are thinking the same thing.

谁能预料与陌生人的一次偶然交谈会带来什么？每个人都掌握着拼图的一块。没有人会无缘无故出现在你生命里。相信你的直觉，去做些出乎意料的事吧。

Who knows what you might learn from taking a chance on a conversation with a stranger? Everybody carries a piece of the puzzle. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence. Trust your instincts. Do the unexpected.

寻找同类。我太喜欢这个说法了。我觉得这非常酷。而且我认为这确实解释了我们对自己心智的洞察与通过他人言行对其心智的理解之间那种奇怪的失衡。你对自己的了解深度可能是对他人的百万分之一甚至十亿分之一——即便是与你共度一生的双胞胎兄弟，或是16岁相识、将成为终身伴侣的挚友。

Find the others. I love that. I think that's so cool. And I think it really explains this odd asymmetry that we have between our insight about our own mind and what we see of everybody else's minds in the words and the actions that they take. So you have a million to one, maybe a billion to one, level of resolution insight about you versus even the twin that you've lived with your entire life, even your partner that you met when you were 16 and is your best friend, and you're gonna be together until you die.

没有人能像你洞察自己那样被你看透，这让我们相信自己的内心状态是独一无二的。它是如此特异、古怪、与众不同，以至于他人无法理解；我们想做的事是如此离经叛道，以至于会招致嘲笑、排斥、被视为怪异、震惊他人，甚至可能涉嫌违法而入狱。不，绝非如此。我认为很多人——尤其是在寻找同类时（那些渴望深度对话、追求精神共鸣而非寒暄、向往冒险、愿意尝试新事物的人）——都陷入了这种认知误区。

There is no one that you can even begin to glimpse as deeply as you can glimpse yourself, and this causes us to believe that our own internal state is unique. It is so idiosyncratic and and odd and different that nobody else would be able to understand and that the things that we want to do are such huge outliers that we're going to be mocked or ostracized, or it's gonna be strange, or it's gonna shock people, or it's gonna be abusive, and maybe we'll go to jail. No. No. I think so many people, especially when it comes to finding the others, the people that want to have interesting conversations, that want to connect over deep things, that don't just want to do the small talk, that wanna go on an adventure, you know, that want to say yes to new things.

我认为渴望这些的人远比意识到的要多。或者说，渴望这些的人远比你以为的要多。他们心知肚明，只是你尚未察觉。区别在于：多数人向往这种体验，但极少人愿意做第一个行动者。所以，不妨成为那个破冰之人。

I think that so many more people want that than realize it. Or so many more people want that than you realize. They they know it, but you don't. And the difference is most people want that kind of an experience, but few people are prepared to be the first mover. So just be the first mover.

做那个推动变革的人。即使找错了倾诉对象，天也不会塌下来。但大多数时候，你其实能嗅出谁是同类。至少我的识别准确率正在提高...我们还剩多少时间？

Be the person that pushes it across the line, and the world's not gonna come crashing down on you if you say to the wrong person. But for the most part, you can kind of tell, I think, like, who the others are. You can usually tell. At least my strike rate with it is is improving. What do we got left?

再来一条吧，这次是四合一。这是我多年前关于人生问题与压力的思考。积累作品或投入时间学习成长时，最尴尬的莫过于遇到某个问题后突然发现：你早已找到解决方案并实践过，却像戒毒失败复吸的人那样故态复萌。比如你曾戒掉晚间玩手机的习惯，搬家后充电器位置变了，忘记执行原方案，转眼六年前战胜的问题又卷土重来。

Let's do let's do one more, but this is four in one. This is something that I came up with ages ago about problems and stress in life. And one of the most embarrassing things about building up a body of work or or spending any time really doing learning and personal development is encountering a problem and realizing that you already found a solution to that problem and implemented it in your life previously, and that you've relapsed out the other side like a like a secret drug addict that's tumbled out of AA and back into using. You know, you you've, found the solution for not using your phone in an evening time, and then you move house, and and the charge is in a different place, you forgot to do it this way. And before you know it, the same thing that you thought you'd defeated six years ago has come back around.

没错，发现自己正在面对的问题其实早有答案，这种尴尬堪称独特。但我要分享四个本该纹在眼皮内侧的认知：关于问题与压力，最重要的领悟如下——第一，问题是人生的功能而非故障。

And, yeah, realizing that you have already learned the answer to a problem that you're dealing with right now is a special really special kind of embarrassment. But this is kind of a list of four things, that I feel like I should have tattooed on the inside of my fucking eyelids. Alright. Here are some of the most important things I've realized about problems and stress. Number one, problems are a feature of life, not a bug.

永远不会有毫无问题的时刻。难道你以为某天醒来就会像通关游戏后进入空荡地图那样再无难题？这永远不会发生。你面临的问题只会不断更迭。

There will never come a time when you have no problems. What? Did you think that you would just wake up one day and you're going to cease having problems, like completing a video game and leveling up to a map where there's nothing there? That is never going to happen. Your problems will change.

当然。但纠结问题本身毫无意义。解决问题是人类生存的必然代价，并非专属于你的个人诅咒。第二点：任何吞噬你思想的负面情绪，三个月后很可能都无关紧要。

Sure. But having problems is going nowhere. Dealing with problems is the cost of doing business as a human. It's not a personal curse on you. Number two: Whatever negativity is consuming your thoughts probably won't matter in three months' time.

三个月后，你不会记得那些侵蚀心灵的焦灼感，不会记得那些重复出现的无聊念头，甚至可能忘记当时担忧的事情。但你为忧虑所耗费的时间却已永远流逝。你正在用当下的快乐与存在感，换取一个未来根本记不起的烦恼。唯有在永生假设中，这般挥霍生命的日子才算合理。第三点。

In three months' time, you won't remember the corrosive texture of your mind, or the boring, repetitive things that you thought, or maybe even what you were worried about. But all of that time you spent worrying will have still passed. So you are sacrificing your joy and presence in the moment for a problem which you won't even be able to recall in the future. So immortality is literally the only life where such flippancy with the days that you're alive for is acceptable. Number three.

成长源于临界点。改变必然伴随不适，没有压力的蜕变几乎不存在。你生命中那些重大转折，往往源自当时面临的严峻挑战。若用昔日困苦能换取今日的智慧，你愿意支付这份代价吗？如果愿意，请相信此刻的压力正在塑造未来更强大的你。

Learning comes from the edges. Change is uncomfortable, and it rarely happens without a lot of stress. And many of the periods of radical and important change in your life happen because of the severe challenges that you faced. Would you pay the price back then for the insights and developments you have now? If so, have faith that whatever stresses you're facing right now will lead to a greater version of you in the future.

你面临的挑战是份礼物，要像主动邀请它进门般拥抱不适，并说：感谢这学习与反思的机会，因为它正让你变得更好。每次跨越障碍时，我们的反脆弱性就在蓬勃生长。第四点，别太较真。毕竟没人能活着离开这场游戏——字面意义上的。三代之后，甚至没人记得你的名字。

The challenge that you're facing is a gift, and leaning into the discomfort as if you invited it through the door, saying Thank you for the opportunity to learn and reflect, because it's making you better. Antifragility is alive and well every single time that we overcome these obstacles. Number four, stop taking things so seriously. No one is getting out of this game alive, literally. In three generations, no one will even remember your name.

如果这都不能让你放下操蛋的烦恼去追寻快乐，我真不知还有什么能。生命本质荒诞且注定终结，何不好好享受这段旅程？这些洞见让我明白：问题是生命的标配而非故障；当下的负面情绪三个月后就会消散；

And if that doesn't give you liberation to just drop your fucking problems and find some joy, I don't know what will. Life is inherently ridiculous and guaranteed to end sooner or later. So you might as well enjoy the ride. And I think that that series of insights: Problems are a feature of life, not a bug. Whatever negativity is consuming your thoughts probably won't matter in three months' time.

成长源于临界点，凡事不必太认真——这些理念让我释然。它们减轻了我对完美主义的执念。既然人们终将遗忘我的所作所为，连我自己也会忘记，那完美与否还重要吗？尽情享受过程不好吗？

Learning comes from the edges, and stop taking things so seriously, to me, is reassuring. It makes me feel less pressure for getting things perfectly right. If people aren't gonna really remember any of the things that I do, and I'm not probably gonna remember them either, what does it matter if it's perfect? What does it matter if I should just enjoy it? Should just have fun?

'成长源于临界点'的精妙在于：我们总渴望一帆风顺，抗拒直面挑战，不愿身处困境，幻想问题自动消失——但正是这些我们抗拒的东西塑造着我们。

The learning comes from the edges is so great because you think, well, I want I want things to be smooth. I don't want to face these these challenges. I don't want to be in this difficulty. I I wish that I didn't have this problem. I wish that this stress wasn't here.

你继续，好吧。回想一下，你所关心的任何成长是否来自一个与你当前困境并不完全相同的时期？你可能会说，那是我人生中变化最迅速的阶段。而回首往事，我真的很庆幸自己将这个问题转化成了美好的事物。你继续，好吧。

You go, okay. Looking back, did any of the development that you care about come from a period where you didn't have problems exactly the same as this, completely akin to whatever it is that you're going through? You go, well, you know, it was the most rapid change I actually had in my life. And in retrospect, I'm really, really glad for the way that I alchemized this problem into something that was beautiful. You go, okay.

那么，你是否能从过去汲取这种能量，带到当下并告诉自己：我知道我正在经历困境，我知道这很糟糕，我也知道试图用精炼的语言重新诠释这个糟糕透顶的当下——比如安慰自己未来会变好。是的，那段日子确实很糟。但只需领悟这一点：你正在经历的挑战是给未来自己的礼物。未来的你会带着无比自豪与荣耀回望此刻——这种奇特又平凡的荣耀。你并非赢得了一场战役。

So is there any of that energy that you can take from the past and bring to the present and say, I'm I know that I'm going through it, and I know that it sucks, and I know that trying to be pithy and reframing the present moment that is total ass into, oh, well, you know, in the future, I'll be great. Like, yes, that sucked. But just that tiny little bit of insight that this challenge that you're going through is a gift to your future self. It is something that in future you will look back on with so much pride and and and glory, this odd sort of very normal version of glory. You didn't win a battle.

你没有——没有打完一场战争。没有征服什么新大陆。但你战胜了自己的一部分，征服了一个可能以某种形式终结你的挑战。它或许会埋葬你或他人，埋葬那个无法应对困境的旧日自我。如果你此刻纠结的负面情绪三个月后根本记不起来，为何要浪费这珍贵生命中的分秒？我们不过是存在于两个永恒虚无之间的短暂存在。

You didn't you didn't complete a war. You didn't, you know, conquer some new land, But you overcame you conquered a part of yourself. You conquered a challenge that may have ended you in one form or another. It may have buried you or buried somebody else, buried a past version of you that wouldn't have been able to deal with it. And if your negativity that you're thinking about now doesn't matter in three months' time, you can't recall it, why waste the moments that you've got this sort of precious life, this brief sliver of existence in between two eternities of nothing?

问题是生活的特性而非缺陷。它们会持续出现。你不可能拥有毫无阻碍的平静海洋——那样的人生反而乏味。尽管眼前困难重重，甚至挑战会越来越大，但你应对它们的能力也将同步增长。反脆弱性始终存在且生机勃勃。

And problems are a feature of life, not a bug. They are just going to continue coming. You're not going to have a purpose, perfectly smooth ocean where nothing gets in your way. And it would be boring if you did. And despite the fact that you have these things in front of you and that the challenges may even increase in size, your capacity to deal with them is going to go in increase in kind, and antifragility is alive and well.

所以，是的，希望这些能帮助正在应对压力与问题的你。总之，这是一个小时十五分钟里对我意义深刻的经验分享。谢谢你们。800期节目，六年半时光。简直不可思议。

So, yeah, I hope that that helps you if you're dealing with some stresses and problems. Anyway, that is an hour and fifteen minutes of some lessons that have been meaningful to me. And, thank you. 800 episodes, six and a half years. It's crazy.

当下正经历诸多变化。站在时代前沿的此刻很有趣，但也确实感受到压力倍增和各方审视。但这是好事。鉴于我刚谈过问题与压力，我想未来回望时，我会非常庆幸自己度过了这段时期。

Going through a lot of changes at the moment. It's an interesting time, I guess, to be at the forefront of what's going on. Definitely feeling the pressure, the increased scrutiny, all of that stuff. But it's good. I think this is going to be given that I've just spoken about problems and stresses and stuff like that, I think this is going to be one of those times that I look back on and go, I'm really, really glad that I got through that.

这段路并不轻松，但感谢你坚持走了过来。我由衷期待带着这些新领悟开启下一段进化之旅。此刻，我深深感激你们——感谢收听、分享、支持节目，这一切对我意义非凡。

That wasn't particularly easy, but well done for for making it work. And I'm really looking forward to sort of the next evolution with all of these new learnings. But for now, I really appreciate you. Thank you so much for tuning in, sharing, supporting the episodes. It really does mean so much.

这令人无比欣喜、着迷且安心，让我感到快乐。所以感谢你们的到来。下次再见。如果你在寻找新的阅读推荐，现代智慧阅读清单就是你的不二之选。这份清单列出了人生必读的100本书。

It's incredibly flattering and charming and reassuring, and it makes me it makes me happy. So thank you for being here. I'll see you next time. If you are looking for new reading suggestions, look no further than the modern wisdom reading list. It is 100 books that you should read before you die.

这些是我读过的最有趣、改变人生且影响深远的书籍，附有我喜欢它们的理由描述及购买链接。现在访问chriswillx.com/books即可免费获取。网址是chriswillx.com/books。

The most interesting, life changing, and impactful books I've ever read with descriptions about why I like them and links to go and buy them. And you can get it right now for free by going to chriswillx.com/books. That's chriswillx.com/books.