We obsessively go back over our slips and errors and contrast what did happen with what could so easily have been skirted if we had not been so fatuous and so witless.

我們執著地回顧我們的失誤和錯誤，並以為要不是我們那麼愚蠢的話，本來應該要可以輕易地避開這些錯誤。

We experience recurring jabs of pain at the disjuncture between the agonising present and it's now-vanished alternative:

我們比較著痛苦的當下與現已失去的機會，在落差中反覆感受著椎心刺骨的痛苦：

We should never have written that email, we should never have become involved with that person, we should have listened more closely to the advice, we should never have borrowed the money…

我們真不應該寫那封電子郵件、真不應該和那個人扯上關係、真應該更認真地聆聽別人的建議、真不應該去借錢...

Alongside the pain come questions: why didn't we have greater foresight?

而伴隨著痛苦而來的便是對自己的質問：為什麼不能更有遠見一點？

Why couldn't we muster more self-restraint? How could we have been so indiscreet?

為什麼不能更克制自己一點？為什麼會如此輕率？

From this close up, there are no realistic, let alone kind, ways to answer our punitive self-interrogations; and they are, as a result, likely to go on forever, without let up in agony.

從這個角度看，我們失去了實際的，甚至是良善的方式來回應這些自我懲罰般的質問，而他們便會就此不斷持續下去，並不停地折磨自己。

We will at best conclude that we messed up because we were greedy, because we were vain, shallow, intemperate and weak-willed; that we have ruined our lives because we are lustful, harebrained, immature and egocentric.

我們最後也只能歸咎於因為自己太貪心、太虛榮、膚淺、不耐煩又意志薄弱；我們之所以毀了自己的人生，都是因為我們慾望太多、思想淺薄、不成熟又自我中心的緣故。

Our self-hatred will grow ever more intense as we contrast our soiled lives with the impeccable choices of others.

我們對自我的厭惡還會隨著在與周遭其他人無懈可擊的人生選擇對比之下，逐漸加深。

They — the reasonable and good ones, the calm and happy ones - had it right all along:

那些通情達理又善良，冷靜自制又快樂的人們似乎什麼都做對了：

They didn't succumb to temptations. They stayed steady and dutiful. They kept their priorities straight and paid due respect to public opinion.

他們不會屈服於各種誘惑。他們保持情緒穩定且對工作負責。他們知道自己該優先做什麼，而且尊重社會上的不同意見。

The overall conclusion is that we are ultimately simply awful people who should probably (depending on the severity of the problem we are in) kill ourselves forthwith.

最終的結論就是，我們單純是糟糕的人類，取決於我們所造成問題的嚴重程度，甚至或許應該直接自殺。

If we are to avoid eternal self-loathing or suicide, we will have to find another approach.

如果我們想要擺脫這種永遠持續下去的自我厭惡與避免自殺，我們必須從另一個角度來觀察問題。

We cannot forever explain our mistakes by examining this or that local flaw in our characters.

我們無法永遠藉由檢視自身人格上的缺陷來解釋所犯下的錯誤。

We need to lean on a far more holistic and objective answer.

我們需要倚重一個更全面且客觀的答案。

We messed up because we are human -

我們搞砸了的原因是因為我們是人類。

Which in this context means that we belong to a species that is compelled by its very nature to steer through life without the knowledge and experience required to ensure goodness and wisdom, kindness and happiness.

而在這個情況下，這代表我們從屬於一個本質上就能在不需要知識或經驗的情況下，順利的度過人生並找到屬於自己的良善與智慧，慈悲與幸福的物種。

We may regret this or that error, but from the right distance, we are fundamentally steering blind and are therefore doomed to slip up with greater or lesser severity at some point or other.

我們可能會為各種犯下的錯誤所後悔，但從長遠的角度看來，我們本來就在摸著石頭過河，而於此途中犯下或大或下小錯誤本來就是正常的。

We can't know exactly who we should marry.

我們無法得知究竟該與誰結婚才好。

We don't have foolproof knowledge of where our real talents lie, let alone how the economy will perform, and therefore can't determine the sort of career we should optimally invest ourselves in.

我們沒有辦法完美地判斷自己真正的天份是什麼，更別說整個經濟的走向表現會是如何，因此也無法完全決定究竟該在哪種工作上投資自己。

We may make a reasonable guess at what activities and situations might be dangerous, but we cannot know ahead of time exactly where the true risks lie; there are landmines buried everywhere.

我們只能依據合理的判斷來猜測那些活動與狀況可能有危險，但我們無法預知真正的風險潛藏在何處，因為處處都有可能有隱藏的地雷。

Assumptions made in one era may fail to be correct in another.

在當前時代所做的推斷，不見得在別的時代也適用。

We can be caught out by swift changes in mores: what could have been acceptable at one point can turn into an indecency a few years later.

社會風俗習慣變遷迅速，一件本來為大眾所接受的事情可能在幾年之後便變得猥瑣不堪。

Certainly we may have experienced a particularly jagged edge of life which has destroyed us in a very specific way.

我們或許經歷了人生特別艱難的時刻，並以一種獨特的方式徹底傷害了我們。

But though the wound is local, injury is almost endemic.

但這樣的創傷是只限本人的，傷口只是局部的。

It could have been foretold from the start that something rather bad would at some moment happen to us, not because there is anything especially deficient about us, but because human brains are lacking the necessary matter to lead us faultlessly through the decades-long obstacle course of life.

打從人生的一開始，壞事便有可能會發生在我們的身上，而這並不是因為我們有什麼特別的缺陷，而是因為在數十年長的人生當中，人類的大腦本來就無法以毫無缺陷的方式引導我們前行。

That said, our self-contempt tends to be heightened because we refuse to think about luck.

也就是說，自我蔑視加劇的原因是因為我們拒絕去思考運氣在其中扮演的角色。

We look at where we have ended up and compare it with the more fortunate places of others and come to only one verdict:

我們總是只看自己做出的結果，並將它與其他運氣更好的人的結果相互比較，並在最後下了一個結論：

We must have been more stupid than they are, our characters must have been more corrupt than theirs.

我們肯定是因為比他們笨，性格比他們差所以才沒辦法像他們一樣成功。

But in the process, we miss out on a critical, explanatory factor: whatever our flaws may have been, we may have had to contend with a particularly vicious swerve of fate.

但在這個思考過程中，我們錯失了一個關鍵性的解釋因素：不論我們有那些缺陷，我們都不得不和生命中出現的命運轉折鬥爭。

There have been people every bit as hasty or unreasonable as us who ,for now, have sailed on unmolested.

有些人和我們一樣急躁或不可理喻，但在目前為止的人生中卻一帆風順。

Events have pressed more harshly on the vulnerable parts of our personalities.

人生中重大的事件會對我們人格中更脆弱的部分施加更多的壓力。

Anyone who would have been tested as we were would have failed in comparable ways.

任何在人生中遭遇到與我們碰到相似的試煉的人，都會以類似的方式失敗的。

In assessing our destiny, we should remember to claim a very large role for the forces of foul luck.

所以在分析自己的命運時，我們得記住純粹的運氣佔了人生中很大的一部份。

At the same time, we do ourselves an injury by comparing ourselves only with those above us, rather than considering our state in the round.

於此同時，將我們與比自己過得好的人們比較不過就是在傷害自己，而不是真正客觀地考量自己身處的狀態。

In our abject moods, we look enviously at those who are presently riding high while failing to consider the hundreds, even millions, of those who have endured destinies ever bit as cruel as our own.

在我們卑微的心態下，我們僅是以羨慕的眼光看著那些過得比我們好的人們，而沒有考慮到數百，甚至數百萬和我們同樣正奮力在殘酷的命運中掙扎的人們。

The human condition has seldom been a smiling one:

人類會面臨到的處境並不總是讓人充滿笑意：

We should not compound our difficulties by refusing to consider all those who have wept every bit as much, and lost even more than us.

我們不應該完全不考慮到那些比我們哭泣得更多，甚至失去更多的人的情況，而總是顧影自憐。

Nor should we keep equating ourselves with people who, while they might have some superficial similarities with ourselves in terms of age or educational background, in the end had incomparably different psychological beginnings.

我們也不應該將自己的狀況與那些表面上與我們有著相似年齡或是教育背景的人相比，因為我們在心靈層面上終究是截然不同的存在。

They didn't have our mother or our father. They didn't have to go through what we did. They didn't have to master our emotional immaturities.

他們沒有與我們相同的父母。他們並沒有經歷過我們所體會過的事物。他們不必克服我們內心的不成熟情緒。

They may seem to be our equals but they in fact belong to a more blessed cohort.

他們看起來或許與我們相同，但他們實際上享受到了更多福氣。

We should nurture sympathy for ourselves based on a fine grained appreciation of the specific burdens we had to take on.

我們必須將同情心轉移到自己身上，並對我們獨有且必須背負的事物感到感激。

A degree of regret may sometimes be helpful: it can help us to take stock of errors and to avoid the worst of the pitfalls next time.

懷抱著後悔在某種程度上是有所幫助的：它能幫我們為犯下的錯負責，並在下次迴避掉最糟糕的狀況。

But runaway self-hatred serves no useful purpose whatsoever; it is in its masochistic way an indulgence we can't afford.

但逃避式的自我厭惡無論如何都對你沒有幫助。這不過是種我們無法承擔的自虐式放縱。

We may be foolish, but this doesn't single us out as particularly awful or unusual, it only confirms that we belong to the human race, a fact for which we deserve limitless sympathy and compassion.

我們或許確實愚笨，但這並不代表我們做為人特別的糟糕或不正常。這只代表了我們屬於人類，而且應當受到他人無盡的同理心與同情的關懷。

Our online shop has a range of books and gifts that address the most important and often neglected areas of life.

我們的線上商店包含了許多書籍與禮物，當中強調了生命中重要卻常被忽略的要素。

Click now to learn more.

點擊連結來深入了解。