Alan Watts — Spectrum Of Love (English逐字稿 & 中文翻譯)

Milo Chen
17 min readOct 13, 2019

I refer from this article but there still be a difference in the content, So I fit it and then translate it from English to Chinese. Anybody can help to improve the translation when you have free time. Just response your message here. 我目前把英文翻譯成第一版中文。如果大家有發現可以改善的部份,可以歡迎大家留言分享。

Begin 本文開始

I’m going to talk to you this evening on the subject of the spectrum of love. We know that from time to time there arise among human beings people who seem to exude love as naturally as the sun gives out heat. We would like to be like that and by and large man’s religions are attempts to cultivate that same power in ordinary people. But unfortunately, they normally go about this task as one would attempt to make the tail wag the dog. I remember that when I was a small boy in school, I was enormously interested in being able to do my schoolwork properly. Everyone told me that I did not work hard enough, that I ought to work. I had an intense desire to do this but when I asked, “How do you work?” everybody shut up like a clown.

我們知道,不時有人類出現,人們似乎像太陽散發出熱量一樣自然地散發出愛。這些人通常具有巨大的創造力,它們使我們所有人羨慕不已,並且從總體上講,人類的宗教正試圖在普通民眾中培養同樣的力量。不幸的是,他們經常去做這項任務,因為有人會試圖使狗搖尾巴。我記得當我還是個小男孩的時候,我對能夠正確地完成學業非常感興趣。每個人都告訴我,我沒有足夠努力地工作,應該更加努力地工作,但是當我問“你如何工作?”時,每個人都閉嘴。

So I was extremely puzzled. There were teachers who apparently knew how to work and who had attained considerable heights of scholarship and I admired them very much for their attainments and so I thought that maybe I could learn “the secret” by copying their mannerisms. I would imitate the style of handwriting that they used. I would use the same kind of pen. I would affect the same mannerisms of speech and gestures and, insofar as I could get around the school uniform. Even of clothing, I must assure you with this of course was a private school in England, not a public school in America.

我非常困惑。有些老師顯然懂得如何工作,並獲得了相當高的獎學金。我以為也許我可以復制他們的舉止來學習“秘密”。我會影響相同的語音和手勢,並且在我可以繞開校服甚至衣服的範圍內。 (這是英格蘭的一所私立學校,而不是美國的一所公立學校。)

But none of this revealed the secret. Because I was, as it were, copying the outward symptoms and knew nothing of the inner fountain of being able to work. And exactly the same thing is true in the case of people who love. When we study the behavior of people who have the power of love within them, we can catalogue how they behave in various situations, and out of this catalogue formulate some rules.

這些都沒有揭示秘密。我當時正照搬外在的症狀,卻不知道自己能夠工作的內在源泉。對於有愛的人來說,確實是一樣的。當我們研究其中具有愛的力量的人的行為時,我們可以對他們在各種情況下的行為進行分類,並根據該目錄製定某些規則。

One of the peculiar things, we notice about people who have this astonishing universal love, is that they are often apt to play it rather cool on sexual love. The reason for this is generally speaking unknown to preachers but it is because an erotic relationship with the external world operates so far as their concern between that world and every single nerve ending. Their whole organism in all its aspects — -physical, psychological, and spiritual — -is an erogenous zone. And therefore, their flow of love is not specialized or canalized so exclusively in the genital system as it is with most other people especially in a culture such as ours, where for so many centuries that particular expression of erotic love has been so marvelously repressed as to make it seem the most desirable kind of love that there is and so we have, as a result of two thousand years of Christianity sex on the brain. Because it’s not always the right place for it.

對於那些擁有這種驚人的普遍性愛的人們,我們注意到的一件奇特的事情是,他們往往傾向於在性愛上表現得相當酷。原因是對他們而言,與外部世界的色情關係在該世界與每個神經末梢之間起作用。它們的整個有機體-生理,心理和精神-是一個性感區。他們的愛之流不像大多數其他人那樣專門在生殖系統中傳播。在像我們這樣的文化中,尤其如此,在許多世紀以來,愛的特殊表達受到了極大的壓抑,以至於使它似乎是最令人嚮往的。由於兩千多年的壓抑,我們“在大腦上發生性行為”。它並不總是正確的位置。

00:04:10

Of course also people who exude love are apt to give things away. They are in every way like rivers they stream. And so when they collect possessions and things that they like, they are apt to give them to other people. Because when you if you ever noticed that when you start giving things away, you keep getting more. The same way as you empty out, you create a vacuum nature abhors a vacuum and more flows in. (Did you ever notice that when you give things away, you keep getting more? That, as you create a vacuum, more flows in?)

散發著愛的人在各個方面都像河流一樣-他們溪流。當他們收集自己喜歡的財產和物品時,很容易將其贈予他人。 (您是否曾經註意到,當您捐贈東西時,您會不斷獲得更多收益嗎?那是在您產生真空時,更多的流入?)

00:04:40

So noticing this, the codifiers of loving behavior write that you should give so much money to tax deductible institutions and to the poor, and should be nice to people, that you should act towards your relatives and your friends and indeed even your enemies as if you love them (even if you don’t). And of course for Christians and Jews and believers in God, there is a peculiarly difficult task enjoined upon us; namely, that “thou shalt love the Lord thy God,” not only here going through the motions of it externally, but with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. And that is, of course, very demanding indeed.

注意到這一點後,熱愛行為的編纂者寫道,您應該給可抵稅的機構和窮人,並且應該對人友善,應該對親戚和朋友甚至是敵人採取行動,就好像您愛他們一樣(即使你沒有)。對於基督徒和猶太人以及對上帝的信徒,我們肩負著一項艱鉅的任務。就是說,“你要愛你的上帝”,不僅要從外部進行動作,而且要全心全意,全心全意地進行。當然,這確實非常苛刻。

00:05:30

But you see what is happening, It is as if, for example, we admired the music of a certain composer and, having studied his style very thoroughly, we drew up rules of musical composition based on the behavior of this composer. We then send our children to music school where they learn these rules in the hope that if they apply them, they also will turn into first-class musicians, which they usually fail to do. Because what might be called the technique of music — -as well as the technique of morals, as well as the technique of speech of language — -is very valuable because it gives you something to express. If, and I repeat if , If you have anything to express but you don’t if you don’t have anything to say, not even the greatest mastery of English will stand you in good stead unless you can manage to fool your listeners by talking beautiful nonsense and make it sound profound.

舉例來說,我們喜歡欣賞某位作曲家的音樂,並且在對他的風格進行了非常深入的研究之後,我們根據該作曲家的行為製定了音樂創作規則。然後,我們將孩子送到音樂學校,在那裡他們學習這些規則,希望他們應用這些規則,可以成為一流的音樂家,而他們通常是做不到的。因為所謂的音樂技術(例如道德技術以及語言的言語技術)非常有價值,因為它可以給您表達的東西。如果您無話可說,即使是最精通英語的人也不會長期以來對您有利。

00:06:36

Now so the question and the puzzle remain: You cannot imitate this thing . . . there is no way of “getting” it, and yet it is absolutely essential that we have it. Because obviously, the human race is not going to flourish harmoniously unless we are able to love each other. The question becomes: How do you get it? Is it something that you simply have to contract, like measles? Or is as theologians say, is it “a gift of divine grace” which somehow is dished out to some but not to others? And if there is no way of getting divine grace by anything you do, as the Calvinists aver, then hadn’t we better just sit around and wait until something happens although Calvinists never did that. They were all most depressingly energetic.

因此問題和困惑仍然存在:您不能模仿這個東西。 。 。沒有辦法“得到”它,但是擁有它絕對是必不可少的。顯然,除非我們能夠彼此相愛,否則人類將不會和諧發展。問題變成了:你如何得到它?您只是需要像麻疹一樣收縮嗎?還是如神學家所說,是“神聖恩典的禮物”以某種方式拋出給了某些人,而不是其他人?而且,如加爾文主義者所言,如果您無法通過任何事情獲得神聖的恩典,那麼我們是否最好只是坐在那裡等一件事發生呢?

00:07:35

But surely, we can’t be left in that sort of hopeless situation. There must be some way of getting “grace” or “divine charity” or “divine love” — -some sort of way in which we can, as it were, open ourselves so as to become conduit pipes for the flow. And so the more subtle preachers try to see if we can open ourselves and teach methods of meditation and spiritual discipline in hope that we can contact this power. The less subtle preachers say ‘you don’t have enough faith, you don’t have enough guts, you don’t have enough willpower…” If you only put your shoulder to the wheel and shoved you would be of course an exemplar and a saint. Actually, you will only be an extremely clever hypocrite.

當然,我們不會陷入那種絕望的境地。必須有某種方式獲得“恩典”或“神聖的慈善”或“神聖的愛”-某種方式,我們可以這樣打開自己,成為流動的管道。因此,更精明的傳教士試圖看看我們是否可以敞開自己的胸懷,傳授冥想和屬靈訓練的方法,以期希望我們能夠接觸到這種力量。不太那麼精明的傳道者說:“你沒有足夠的信心,你沒有足夠的膽量,你沒有足夠的意志力……”如果你只將肩膀放在輪子上推,那你當然會是一個榜樣。聖人。實際上,您只會是一個非常聰明的偽君子。

The whole history of religion is the history of the failure of preaching. Preaching is moral violence. When you deal with the so-called practical world, and people don’t behave the way you wish they would, you get out the army or police force or “the big stick.” And if those strike you as somewhat crude, you resort to giving lectures — -“lectures” in the sense of solemn adjuration and exhortation to “behave better next time.”

整個宗教史就是傳教失敗的歷史。講道是道德暴力。當您面對所謂的實際世界,並且人們沒有按照自己的意願行事時,您就會脫離軍隊或警察部隊或“大棒”。如果這些人打給您的時候有些粗魯,您會求助於在嚴肅的審判和勸勉意義上講“講”,“下次再做”。

Many a parent says to the child, “Nice children love their mothers. And I’m sure you’re a nice child. You ought to love your mother, not because I, your mother, say so, but because you really want to do so.“ One of the difficulties here is that none of us, in our heart of hearts, respects love which is not freely given. For example, you have an ailing parent, and you are a son or daughter who feels dutifully that he should look after his parents because they’ve done so much for him. But somehow, your living with your father or mother prevents you from having a home and a life of your own, and naturally you resent it. Your parents are well aware that you resent this, even if they pretend to ignore it. They therefore feel guilty that they have imposed upon your loyalty. You in turn can’t really admit the fact that you resent them for getting sick, even though they couldn’t help it. And therefore no one enjoys the relationship. It becomes a painful duty to be carried out.

許多父母對孩子說:“好孩子愛他們的母親。而且我確定你是個好孩子。您應該愛您的母親,不是因為我(您的母親)這麼說,而是因為您真的想這樣做。“這裡的困難之一是,我們內心深處沒有一個人尊重不能自由給予的愛。 。例如,您有一個生病的父母,而您是一個兒子或女兒,他忠實地認為他應該照顧他的父母,因為他們為他做了很多事情。但是以某種方式,您與父親或母親的生活使您無法擁有自己的住房和生活,自然會感到不滿。即使他們假裝無視,您的父母也很清楚您對此表示不滿。因此,他們對自己的忠誠度感到內gui。反過來,即使他們無能為力,您也不能真正承認您對他們生病感到不滿。因此,沒有人喜歡這種關係。開展這項工作成為一項痛苦的任務。

The same thing would naturally happen if, a number of years after having (at the altar) made a solemn and terrible promise that you would love your wife or husband come what may forever and ever “until death do you part,” suddenly you find that you really haven’t the heart to do it any more. Then you feel guilty, that you ought to love your wife and family.

如果(在祭壇前)莊嚴而可怕地許諾你愛你的妻子或丈夫幾年後,可能永遠到永遠的“直到死亡讓你分手”,突然間,你會發現同樣的事情自然會發生。您真的不願意再這樣做了。然後您感到內,應該愛您的妻子和家人。

The difficulty is this: You cannot, by any means, teach a selfish person to be unselfish. Whatever a selfish person does, whether it be giving his body to be burned, or giving all that he possesses to the poor, he will still do it in a selfish way of feeling, and with extreme cunning, marvelous self-deception, and deception of others. But the consequences of fake love are almost invariably destructive, because they build up resentment on the part of the person who does the fake loving, as well as on the part of those who are its recipients. (This may be why our foreign-aid program has been such a dismal failure.)

困難在於:您不能以任何方式教導自私的人無私。無論一個自私的人做什麼,無論是要焚燒他的屍體,還是將自己擁有的一切交給窮人,他仍然會以自私的態度行事,並且極其狡猾,奇妙的自我欺騙和欺騙。其他。但是,假愛的後果幾乎總是具有破壞性,因為它們對做假愛的人以及對接受愛的人都產生了怨恨。 (這可能就是我們的對外援助計劃如此慘敗的原因。)

Now, of course, you may say that I am being impractical and might ask, “Well, do we just have to sit around and wait until we become inwardly converted to learn, through the grace of God or some other magic, how to love? In the meantime, do we do nothing about it, and conduct ourselves as selfishly as we feel?”

現在,當然,您可能會說我是不切實際的,並可能會問:“好吧,我們是否只需要坐在那裡等一等,就可以通過神的恩典或其他魔術魔法使我們內心converted依地學習如何去愛?同時,我們對此不採取任何行動,並按照自己的感覺自私地開展工作嗎?”

The first problem raised here is honesty. The Lord God says, at the beginning of things, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” What appears to be a commandment is actually a challenge, or what in Zen Buddhism is called a koan, a spiritual problem. If you exercise yourself resolutely, and try to love God or your neighbor, you will find that you get more tangled up. You will realize increasingly that the reason you are attempting to obey this as a commandment is that you want to be the right kind of person.

這裡提出的第一個問題是誠實。上帝在開始之時說:“你要盡心,盡性,盡意愛主你的上帝。”看來一條誡命實際上是一種挑戰,或者是什麼?禪宗佛教被稱為koan,屬精神問題。如果您堅決地鍛煉自己,並嘗試去愛上帝或鄰居,您會發現自己更加糾結了。您會越來越意識到,您試圖遵守這條誡命的原因是您想成為合適的人。

But love is not a sort of rare commodity — -everybody has it. Existence is love. Everybody has the force running. Perhaps the way in which you find the force of love operating in you is as a passionate like for booze or ice cream or automobiles or good-looking members of the opposite sex, or even of the same sex. But love is operating there. People, of course, tend to distinguish between various kinds of love. There are “good” kinds, such as divine charity, and there are allegedly “bad” kinds, such as “animal lust.” But they are all forms of the same thing. They relate in much the same way as the colors of the spectrum produced by the passing light through a prism. We might say that the red end of the spectrum of love is Dr. Freud’s libido, and the violet end of the spectrum of love is agape, the divine love or divine charity. In the middle, the various yellows, blues, and greens are as friendship, human endearment, and consideration.

但是,愛不是一種稀有商品,每個人都擁有。存在就是愛。每個人都有力量在奔跑。也許您發現愛的力量在您心中發揮作用,就像對酒,冰淇淋或汽車或異性,甚至同性的好看的成員那樣充滿熱情。但是愛在那裡運作。人們當然傾向於區分各種愛。有“善”的種類,例如神聖的慈善,有所謂的“壞”種類,例如“動物的慾望”。但是它們都是同一事物的形式。它們的關係與通過棱鏡的光線產生的光譜的顏色幾乎相同。我們可以說,愛的光譜的紅色末端是弗洛伊德博士的性慾,而愛的光譜的紫色末端是agape,神聖的愛或神聖的慈善。在中間,各種黃色,藍色和綠色代表著友誼,人類的愛戴和關懷。

Now it’s said that selfish people “love themselves.” I would say that that belies a misunderstanding of the whole thing: “yourself” is really something that is impossible to love. One obvious reason for this is that one’s self, when you try to focus on it to love it or to know it, it is oddly elusive.

現在有人說自私的人“愛自己”。我想說這掩蓋了對整個事情的誤解:“你自己”實際上是不可能愛的東西。造成這種情況的一個明顯原因是,當您嘗試專注於自己去愛或認識它時,它本身就難以捉摸。

Let me illustrate why. Once there was a fish who lived in the great ocean, and because the water was transparent, and always conveniently got out of the way of his nose when he moved along, he didn’t know he was in the ocean. Well, one day the fish did a very dangerous thing, he began to think: “Surely I am a most remarkable being, since I can move around like this in the middle of empty space.” Then the fish became confused because of thinking about moving and swimming, and he suddenly had an anxiety paroxysm and thought he had forgotten how. At that moment he looked down and saw the yawning chasm of the ocean depths, and he was terrified that he would drop. Then he thought: “If I could catch hold of my tail in my mouth, I could hold myself up.” And so he curled himself up and snapped at his tail. Unfortunately, his spine wasn’t quite supple enough, so he missed. As he went on trying to catch hold of his tail, the yawning black abyss below became ever more terrible, and he was brought to the edge of total nervous breakdown.

讓我說明一下原因。曾經有一條魚生活在大洋中,而且由於水是透明的,並且在走動時總是很方便地從鼻子中移開,所以他不知道自己在海洋中。好吧,有一天,這條魚做了一件非常危險的事情,他開始思考:“我當然是最傑出的,因為我可以像這樣在空曠的地方四處走動。”然後,這條魚因思考而變得困惑移動和游泳,他突然感到焦慮發作,以為他忘記了怎麼做。在那一刻,他低頭看了看大海深處打哈欠的鴻溝,他害怕跌落。然後他想:“如果我能抓住嘴巴的尾巴,我就能站起來。”於是他ed縮起來,snap住了尾巴。不幸的是,他的脊椎不夠柔軟,所以他錯過了。當他繼續試圖抓住自己的尾巴時,下面打哈欠的黑色深淵變得越來越可怕,他被帶到了徹底的神經衰弱的邊緣。

The fish was about to give up, when the ocean, who had been watching with mixed feelings of pity and amusement, said, “What are you doing?” “Oh,” said the fish, “I’m terrified of falling into the deep dark abyss, and I’m trying to catch hold of my tail in my mouth to hold myself up.” So the ocean said, “Well, you’ve been trying that for a long time now, and still you haven’t fallen down. How come?” “Oh, of course, I haven’t fallen down yet,” said the fish, “because, because — I’m swimming!” “Well,” came the reply, “I am the Great Ocean, in which you live and move and are able to be a fish, and I have given all of myself to you in which to swim, and I support you all the time you swim. Instead of exploring the length, breadth, depth, and height of my expanse, you are wasting your time pursuing your own end.” From then on, the fish put his own end behind him (where it belonged) and set out to explore the ocean.

魚正要放棄,正看著憐憫與娛樂混合的海洋在說:“你在做什麼?”“哦,”魚說,“我很害怕掉進魚缸裡。深深的深淵,我試圖抓住嘴巴的尾巴來舉起自己。”海洋說:“好吧,您已經嘗試了很久了,但是您仍然沒有嘗試過倒下了。怎麼會這樣?”“哦,當然,我還沒有倒下,”魚說,“因為,因為-我在游泳!”“好吧,”回答是:“我是大洋,你們生活和遷徙,能夠成為一條魚,我將自己全都獻給了您可以在其中游泳,並且我一直在支持您。而不是探索我的浩瀚的長度,廣度,深度和高度,您是在浪費時間追求自己的終點。”從那時起,這條魚將自己的末端放在他身後(屬於它)並著手探索海洋。

Well, that shows one of the reasons it’s difficult to love yourself: Your “spine isn’t quite supple enough.”

好吧,這說明了愛自己難的原因之一:您的“脊椎不夠柔軟”。

Another reason is that “oneself,” in the ordinary sense of one’s ego, doesn’t exist. It seems to exist, in a way, in the sense that the equator exists as an abstraction. The ego is not a psychological or physical organ; it’s a social convention, like the equator, like the clock or the calendar, or like the dollar bill. These social conventions are abstractions which we agree to treat as if they did exist. We live in relation to the external world in just exactly the same way that one end of the stick exists in relation to the other end. The ends are indeed different, but they’re of the same stick.

另一個原因是,在自我的一般意義上,“自己”不存在。從某種意義上說,它的存在是指赤道作為抽象存在。自我不是心理或身體器官;這是一種社會習俗,例如赤道,時鐘或日曆或美金。這些社會慣例是抽象的,我們同意將其視為確實存在。我們與外部世界的關係與桿的一端相對於另一端的存在完全相同。兩端確實不同,但是它們是同一根棍子。

Likewise, there is a polar relationship between what you call your “self” and what you call “other.” You couldn’t experience “other” unless you also had the experience of “self.” We might say that we feel that one’s “self” and the “other” are poles apart. Oddly, we use that phrase, “poles apart,” to express extreme difference. But things that are “poles apart” are poles of something, as of a magnet, or a globe, and so are actually inseparable. What happens if you saw the south pole off a magnet with a hacksaw? The new end, opposite the original north pole, becomes the south pole, and the piece that was chopped off develops its own north pole. The poles are inseparable and generate each other.

同樣,在您所謂的“自我”與所謂的“其他”之間也存在著一種極端的關係。除非您也具有“自我”的經驗,否則您將無法體驗“其他”。我們可能會說,我們覺得一個人的“自我”與“其他”相距甚遠。奇怪的是,我們使用“兩極分化”來表達極端差異。但是,“兩極分開”的東西是某種東西的極點,例如磁鐵或地球儀,因此實際上是不可分割的。如果您用鋼鋸看到南極從磁鐵上掉了怎麼辦?與原始北極相對的新末端變成了南極,被切下的棋子發展了自己的北極。兩極是不可分割的,彼此產生。

So it is in the relationship between the “self” and the “other.” Now if you explore what you mean when you say you “love your self,” you will make the startling discovery that everything that you love is something that you thought was other than yourself, even if it be very ordinary things such as ice cream or booze. In the conventional sense, booze is not you. Nor is ice cream. It becomes “you,” in a manner of speaking, when you consume it, but then you don’t “have it” anymore, so you look around for more in order to love it once again. But so long as you love it, it’s never you. When you love people, however selfishly you love them (because of the pleasant sensations they give you), still, it is somebody else that you love. And as you inquire into this and follow honestly your own selfishness, many interesting transformations begin to occur in you.

在“自我”和“他人”之間的關係中也是如此。現在,如果您探索說“愛自己”時的意思,您將發現一個驚人的發現,即您所愛的一切都是您認為與眾不同的東西。比你自己,即使是非常普通的東西,例如冰淇淋或酒。從傳統意義上講,酒不是你。冰淇淋也不是。從某種意義上說,當您食用它時,它就變成了“您”,但是您再也沒有“擁有它”了,因此您四處尋找以便再次愛上它。但是,只要您喜歡它,它就不會存在。當您愛人們時,無論您多麼自私地愛他們(由於他們給您帶來的愉悅感),您仍然愛著其他人。當您對此進行調查並誠實地遵循自己的自私時,許多有趣的轉變開始在您體內發生。

One of the most interesting of these transformations is being directly and honestly “selfish.” You stop deceiving people. A great deal of damage is done in practical human relations by saying that you love people, when what you mean is that you ought to (and don’t). You give the impression, and people begin to expect things of you which you are never going to come though with.

這些轉換中最有趣的一種是直接和誠實地“自私”。您不再欺騙別人。在實際的人際關係中,如果說你愛人,而你的意思是你應該(不應該),那麼會給人們造成很大的傷害。您給人的印像是,人們開始期望您永遠不會擁有的東西。

You know of people to whom you say, “I like so-and-so, because with him or her, you always know where you are.” It’s impossible to impose on people like that. On the other hand, if you say, “Can I come and stay over night with you?” and they don’t want you, they’ll reply, “I’m, sorry, but I’m tired this weekend, and I’d rather not have you.” Or “Some other time.” Well, that’s very refreshing. If I feel the person hasn’t been quite honest with me, and I accept their hospitality, I’m always wondering if they would really prefer that I wasn’t there.

您認識的人對您說:“我喜歡某某某人,因為與他或她在一起,您總是知道自己在哪裡。”不可能對這樣的人強加於人。另一方面,如果您說:“我可以和您一起過夜嗎?”,他們不想要您,他們會回答:“對不起,但這個週末我很累,我寧願沒有你。”或“另一些時間。”嗯,這令人耳目一新。如果我覺得這個人對我不太誠實,並且我接受他們的款待,我總是想知道他們是否真的希望我不在那兒。

But one doesn’t always listen to one’s inner voice: we often pretend that it’s not there. That’s unfortunate, because if you don’t listen to your inner voice, you are not listening to your own wisdom and to your own love. You are becoming insensitive to it just as your hosts are trying to suppress the fact that, for the time being, they don’t want your presence. Likewise, let’s suppose that you are married and have an unwanted baby. It is profoundly disturbing to a child to have false love pretended to it. To begin with, the milk tastes wrong. The smell isn’t’ right. The outward gesture is “Darling, I love you,” but the smell is “You’re a little bastard and a nuisance.”

但是,人們並不總是會聽到自己內心的聲音:我們經常假裝自己不在。不幸的是,如果您不聽內心的聲音,就不會聽自己的智慧和愛。您正變得對它不敏感,就像您的主機試圖抑制一個事實,即它們暫時不希望您的存在。同樣,假設您已婚並且有不想要的孩子。假裝愛會給孩子帶來極大的困擾。首先,牛奶的味道不好。氣味不對。外向的手勢是“親愛的,我愛你”,但氣味是“你有點混蛋和令人討厭”。

Very few of us can accept the idea that we don’t love our children, because it seems to be unnatural. We say that mother-love is the most beautiful an natural thing in the world. But it isn’t. It’s relatively rare, and if you don’t love your child, you confuse him or her. The child will respect you much more if you say, “Darling, you’re a perfect nuisance, but I will look after you because I have to.” Well, at least then everything is quite clear!

我們中很少有人會接受我們不愛孩子的想法,因為這似乎是不自然的。我們說母愛是世界上最美麗的自然事物。但事實並非如此。這種情況相對罕見,如果您不愛孩子,就會使他或她感到困惑。如果您說:“親愛的,您真是個令人討厭的孩子,但我會照顧您,因為我必須這樣做。”孩子會更加尊重您。

I found in personal relations of this kind a very wonderful rule: that you never, never show false emotions. You don’t have to tell people exactly what you think “in no uncertain terms,” as they say. But to fake emotions is destructive, especially in family matters and between husbands and wives or between lovers.

我在這種人際關係中發現了一個非常妙的規則:永遠不要表現出虛假的情緒。您不必像人們所說的那樣“準確地告訴人們”您的想法。但是假冒情緒是有害的,尤其是在家庭事務中,夫妻之間或戀人之間。

It always comes to a bad end. This, on the occasions when, for personal friends, I perform marriage ceremonies, instead of saying, “I require and charge you both that you shall answer in the dreadful Day of Judgment, etc., “I say, “I require and charge you both that you shall never pretend to love one another when you don’t.” This is a gamble. It is likewise a gamble to trust yourself to come though with love.

它總是結局不好。在這種情況下,我有時會為個人朋友執行結婚典禮,而不是說:“我要求並要求你們雙方在可怕的審判日等時回答,”我說:“我要求並要求您向您收費。兩者都讓你永遠都不會假裝彼此相愛。”這是一場賭博。同樣,相信自己能與愛同在也是一種賭博。

But there is really no alternative.

但是,實際上別無選擇。

Now to trust oneself to be capable of love or to bring up love — -in other words, to function in a sociable way and in a creative way — -is to take a risk, a gamble. You may not come though with it. In the same way, when you fall in love with somebody else, or form an association with someone else, and you trust them, they may as a matter of fact not fulfill your expectations. But that risk has to be taken. The alternative to taking that risk is much worse than trusting and being deceived.

現在,相信自己有愛的能力或養育愛的能力(換句話說,以一種善於交際的方式和創造性的方式運作)是冒險,一場賭博。您可能不喜歡它。同樣,當您愛上別人或與他人建立聯繫並信任他們時,他們實際上可能無法滿足您的期望。但是必須冒險。承擔這種風險的替代方法比信任和被欺騙要糟糕得多。

When you say, “I will not trust other people, and I will not trust myself,” what course remains? You have to resort to force. You have to employ stacks of policemen to protect you, and have to hold a club over yourself all the time, and say, “No, no. My nature is wayward, animal, perverse, fallen, grounded in sin.” What then happens? When you refuse to take the gamble of trusting yourself to be capable of love, you become, if you will excuse this extremely graphic but nevertheless relevant simile, like a person who cannot trust himself to have bowel movements. Many children learn this from parents who do not trust them, and think they ought to have these movements in rhythm with the clock, which is a different kind of rhythm from that of the organism. People who cannot trust themselves to do even this take laxatives endlessly, as a result of which their whole system gets fouled up.

當您說“我不信任別人,我不信任自己”時,還剩下什麼?您必須訴諸武力。您必須僱用成堆的警察來保護您,還必須一直在自己上方保管俱樂部,然後說:“不,不。我的天性是任性的,動物的,邪惡的,墮落的,因罪而紮根的。”然後發生了什麼?當您拒絕冒險相信自己有愛的能力時,您就會變成,如果您能原諒這個極具圖形但又相關的比喻,就像一個不能相信自己排便的人。許多孩子從不信任他們的父母那裡學到了這些,並認為他們應該隨著時鐘的節奏而運動,這與生物體的節奏不同。那些甚至不相信自己這樣做的人會無休止地服用瀉藥,其結果是整個系統都被污染了。

Exactly the same thing happens with people who can’t trust themselves to go to sleep. They have to take all kinds of pills. And so also with people who can’t trust themselves to love, and have to take all sorts of artificial and surgical measures to produce the effect of love for saving face. They become progressively more incapable of loving at all, and they create turmoil and misunderstanding and chaos in themselves and others and society.

完全不相信自己去睡覺的人也會發生同樣的事情。他們必須服用各種藥丸。因此,對於那些無法相信自己愛的人,他們不得不採取各種人工和外科手段來產生愛的效果,以挽救面子。他們變得越來越無能為力,並且在自己,他人和社會中造成動盪,誤解和混亂。

In other words, to live, and to love, you have to take risks. There will be disappointments and failures and disasters as a result of taking these risks. But in the long run it will work out.

換句話說,要生活,要去愛,就必須冒險。承擔這些風險會導致失望,失敗和災難。但從長遠來看,它將解決。

My point is that if you don’t take these risks the results will be much worse than any imaginable kind of anarchy.

我的觀點是,如果您不承擔這些風險,其結果將比任何可想像的無政府狀態都要糟糕得多。

In tying up love in knots or in becoming incapable of it, you can’t destroy this energy. When you won’t love, or won’t let it out, it emerges anyway in the form of self-destruction. The alternative to self-love, in other words, is self-destruction. Because you won’t take the risk of loving yourself properly, you will be compelled instead to destroy yourself.

結成束縛或無能為力時,您無法摧毀這種能量。當您不愛或不讓它散發出來時,它會以自我毀滅的形式出現。換句話說,自愛的替代方法是自我毀滅。因為您不會冒險適當地愛自己,所以您將被迫摧毀自己。

So, which would you rather have? Would you rather have a human race which isn’t always very well controlled, and sometimes runs amok a little bit, but on the whole continues to exist, with a good deal of honesty and delight, when delight is available? Or would you rather have the whole human race blown to pieces and cleaned off the planet, reducing the whole thing to a nice, sterile rock with no dirty disease on it called life?

那麼,您寧願擁有哪一個? 您是否寧願有一個人類的種族,這個種族並不總是受到很好的控制,有時會有點無聊,但總的來說,只要有歡樂就可以保持誠實和喜悅的存在? 還是您寧願將整個人類都炸成碎片並清理掉地球,將整個物體還原成一塊漂亮的無菌岩石,上面沒有骯髒的疾病,稱為生命?

The essential point is to consider love as a spectrum. There is not, as it were just nice love and nasty love, spiritual love and material love, mature affection on the one hand and infatuation on the other. These are all forms of the same energy. And you have to take it and let it grow where you find it. When you find only one of these forms existing, if at least you will water it, the rest will blossom as well. But the effectual prerequisite from the beginning is to let it have its own way.

重要的一點是將愛視為一個頻譜。 沒有,因為只有愛和討厭的愛,屬靈的愛和物質的愛,一方面是成熟的感情,另一方面是癡情。 這些都是相同能量的形式。 而且,您必須接受它並讓它在找到它的地方生長。 當您發現僅存在其中一種形式時,如果至少要澆水,其餘的也將開花。 但是從一開始的有效前提就是讓它有自己的方式。

In the final of this article, I sharing the song for you 分享一首歌給大家 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2rM0ecRUQk

This painting is inspired by the song of Aurora Asknes — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2rM0ecRUQk

Awakening — Aurora Asknes

With a tiny rope and a bag of stone
And all heartbroken wishing bone
She’s going in, she’s going home
Oh this little golden knight, fighting every day
Behind the light, behind the light

Walking faster down the street
Red eyes and no shoes on her feet
Going on this journey, determined to complete
This is farewell, this is goodnight
The last time she will see the daylight
See the daylight

And she’s going on a journey
Always walking down the road
And the water is always calling
“My little child, please come home”

That’s when she went away
Away from the light of day
Standing by the riverside
Patiently waiting for the tide
To come along, to come along
The waters going through her feet
And on her body wind so cold and sweet
So cold and sweet

And she’s going on a journey
Always walking down the road
And the water is always calling
“My little child, please come home”
And the stars were brightly shining
When she reached out they were gone
And the water started calling
“My little child, please come home”

Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out
Feel the water in her body, water’s never going out

And she’s going on a journey
Always walking down the road
And the water is always calling
“My little child, please come home”
And the stars were brightly shining
When she reached out they were gone
And the water started calling
“My little child, please come home”
When a shiny light hit her eye
And she turned around and climbed
towards the sky
Towards the sky…

--

--

Milo Chen

Study in Law/CS/EE & Dev in blockchain, AI, IoT, mobile app. Good in almost programming language with github https://github.com/milochen0418. 永遠十八歲/對世界好奇/INFP型