The cheerful partner may be cooking a cake for their visiting nephew or whistling a tune while they rearrange the kitchen.

比較樂天的那方可能會為了即將來拜訪的外甥做蛋糕，或是在整理廚房時哼歌。

They may be making plans for the weekend or discussing what fun it will be to see an old school friend again soon,

他們也可能為週末做計劃或講講見到老友時會發生的趣事，

or they may be expressing unusual optimism about their professional future and financial prospects.

或許他們也會突然興致勃勃地說起他們的職業或理財規劃。

Despite our love for them, something about the situation may suddenly grate with us.

儘管我們很愛他們，我們卻可能會突然對這種情況感到不滿。

Within a short time, we may find ourselves saying something unusually harsh or critical.

突然，我們發現自己脫口而出一些平常不會說的苛刻或挑剔的話。

We may point out a flaw with their school friend: they tell very boring anecdotes and they can be pretty snobbish.

我們可能會把矛頭指向他們學校朋友的缺點：總是講一些很無聊的軼事、他們都是一群勢利眼。

We may take exception to the arrangement of the cupboards.

我們可能會對櫥櫃的擺放提出異議。

We find fault with that cake.

我們對蛋糕提出異議。

We bring up an aspect of their work that we know our partner finds dispiriting.

我們提起另一半工作中讓其感到厭煩的某個方面。

We complain that they haven't properly considered the roadworks when planning the weekend.

我們抱怨他們在規劃週末時沒有好好考慮到道路施工的事。

We do everything to try to induce a mood of anxiety, friction and misery.

我們無所不用其極地去試圖激起焦慮、製造爭執和痛苦。

On the surface, it looks as if we're simply monsters.

表面上，我們的行為跟怪獸沒兩樣。

But if we dig a little deeper, a more understandable, though no less regrettable, picture may emerge.

不過深入了解的話，一幅讓人可以理解但卻也同樣令人覺得可悲的圖像會漸漸浮現。

We are acting in this way because our partner's buoyant and breezy mood can come across as a forbidding barrier to communication.

我們之所以這麼做是因為覺得另一半愉快和輕鬆的情緒可能會造成雙方的溝通障礙。

We fear that their current happiness could prevent them from knowing the shame or melancholy, worry or loneliness that presently possess us.

我們擔心他們目前的快樂會讓他們看不見我們正深受其中的羞恥、悲慘、擔憂、和孤單。

We are trying to shatter their spirits because we are afraid of being lonely.

我們試圖干擾他們的情緒因為我們害怕孤單。

We don't make this argument explicitly to ourselves, but a dark instinct in our minds experiences their upbeat mood as a warning that the uncheery parts of ourselves must now be unwelcome.

我們不會直接了當地向自己揭露這件事，但其實心中黑暗的那面會不自覺把對方愉悅的情緒視為不歡迎自己負面情緒的警訊。

And so we make a crude, wholly immature but psychologically comprehensible assumption that we will never be properly known and loved until our partner can feel as sad and frustrated as we do,

所以我們就不經思考又不成熟地自認為（但是心中還是能理解自己），除非我們的另一半可以和我們一樣感知這些難過和沮喪，否則我們永遠不會被愛，

a recalibration of mood that we put into motion with malicious determination.

我們是懷著惡意來去擾亂別人心情的。

But of course, the truth is quite the contrary.

但當然，事實恰恰相反。

We may succeed in making our partner upset but we almost certainly won't thereby secure the imagined benefits of their gloom.

我們可能會成功讓我們的另一半不高興，但幾乎很肯定的是，我們不會因為他們的不快樂就因此達到心中預想的那些好處。

They won't, once their mood has been spoilt, emerge with any greater appetite for listening to our messages of distress or for cradling us indulgently in their consoling arms.

他們在自己的心情被破壞後才不會還有心思聽我們說那些自己的不如意，或安慰地把我們抱在懷中。

They will just be furious.

他們只會大發雷霆。

The better move , if only we could manage it , would be to confess to, rather than act out, our impulses.

如果我們能辦到的更好的做法是，坦承而非胡亂發洩和衝動行事。

We would learn to get to know the mechanisms of our immaturity with unfrightened curiosity while making every effort to protect others from its effects.

我們也許就能學會以無所畏懼的好奇心了解自身不成熟的機制，同時盡一切努力保護他人免受這個不成熟影響。

We would admit to our partner that we had been seized by an ugly fear about the consequences of their happiness, would laughingly reveal how much we would ideally love to cause a stink,

我們向另一半承認我們確實被心魔給操控了，害怕他們的快樂會帶來的後果，打趣笑說自己無意間多愛鬧矛盾，

and would firmly pledge that we naturally aren't about to.

並堅定保證我們本不是有意為之。

We would all the while remind ourselves that every cheerful person has been sad, and that the buoyant among us have by far the best chances of keeping afloat those who remain emotionally at sea.

我們要一直提醒自己，每個開朗的人也有悲傷的一面，而另一方愉快的情緒其實能夠大大拯救身陷情緒汪洋中的一方。

The spoiling argument is a wholly paradoxical plea for love that leaves one party ever further from the tenderness and shared insight they crave.

如此心態而導致的爭執是對於愛的一種需索無度，讓一方不再溫柔和渴望擁有彼此相通的想法。

Knowing to spot the phenomenon should lead us, when we are the ones baking or whistling a tune, to remember that the person attempting to ruin our mood isn't perhaps just a monster, though they are a bit of that too.

當我們是做蛋糕或哼歌的那方時，知道這種情況讓我們明白那位試圖破壞我們心情的人不是一個怪獸。（雖然他們有一點像）

They are, childishly but sincerely, worried that our happiness may come at their expense, and they are, through their remorseless negativity, in a garbled and maddening way, begging us for reassurance.

他們幼稚又真誠，擔心我們的快樂會對他們造成影響，而他們透過這些無情又負面的情緒，一堆亂七八糟的方式，渴望我們能給的安全感。