The founding principle of modern psychotherapy, that it is all to do with one's childhood can sound especially irritating.

現代心理治療的創始原則，即所有的治療都與一個人的童年有關，這聽起來特別令人惱火。

Why should we be forever tied to things that happened infinitely long ago?

為什麼我們要永遠被髮生在無限久之前的事情所束縛？

One hardly ever sees one's mother now and dad might have died 20 years ago.

現在人們幾乎見不到自己的母親，而父親可能在20年前就已經去世了。

And anyway, aren't genetics more important.

而且無論如何，遺傳學不是更重要嗎。

Nevertheless, the maddening idea refuses to go away as we'd love it too.

儘管如此，這個令人抓狂的想法卻拒絕消失，因為我們也很喜歡它。

There is too much in the end that keeps backing it up.

最後有太多的東西在不斷地支持它。

Our characters appear to be miserably determined by dynamics that unfolded within the family circle before our 15th birthdays.

我們的角色似乎是由我們15歲生日之前在家庭圈子裡展開的動態因素悲慘地決定的。

We can accept well enough that we once learned to speak an entire language around our families, tens of thousands of words, hundreds of decline shins and a host of complex rules of syntax were all picked up while we played in the garden or drew sunflowers in the kitchen.

我們可以很好地接受，我們曾經圍繞著我們的家庭學會了整個語言，數以萬計的單詞，數百個下降的小腿和一系列複雜的文法規則都是我們在花園裡玩耍或在廚房裡畫向日葵時學會的。

It should, by extension, be no more implausible, that we simultaneously learned an entire emotional language that is now as much part of our nature as our native tongue, a language about how to express love, what we can expect of men and women, the decline shins of desire and what the rules are around happiness.

推而廣之，我們同時學會了整個情感語言，現在就像我們的母語一樣是我們天性的一部分，一種關於如何表達愛的語言，我們可以對男人和女人有什麼期望，慾望的衰退，以及圍繞幸福的規則是什麼。

We need to think about our families a lot, not necessarily because we like or miss them.

我們需要經常思考我們的家庭，不一定是因為我們喜歡或想念他們。

It's the opposite.

這恰恰相反。

We need to reflect on them in order to get over them.

我們需要對它們進行反思，以便克服它們。

We should be unembarrassed about our search for the details of how our particular family, like all families was and has rendered us mad.

我們應該毫無顧忌地尋找我們的特定家庭，像所有的家庭一樣，曾經和已經使我們瘋狂的細節。

We may feel that it is a uniquely Western neurosis, especially one afflicting people who are spent too long in therapy to go on about one's parents and their contribution to one's unhappiness To be 25 or 62 and still turning over in one's mind often while sobbing how mummy or daddy have been responsible for spoiling one's relationships or ruined one's life.

我們可能會覺得這是西方人特有的神經症，尤其是那些在治療中花了太長時間去談論自己的父母和他們對自己不快樂的貢獻的人，到了25歲或62歲，仍然經常在腦海中翻來覆去，啜泣著說媽媽或爸爸是如何破壞自己的關係或毀了自己的生活。

But lest we be overly struck or appalled by this approach, we should keep in mind that every society, whatever its level of development, appears to entertain extremely elaborate, ongoing thoughts about its ancestors and their powerful impact on the lives of the living.

但是，為了避免我們對這種做法過於震驚或驚駭，我們應該記住，每個社會，無論其發展水準如何，似乎都對其祖先和他們對活著的人的生活的強大影響有著極其詳盡的、持續的思考。

From cambodia to peru papa new guinea to burkina faso.

從高棉到祕魯，從巴巴新幾內亞到布基那法索。

The patterns are the same one's parents or relatives die and one then has to handle their ghosts or spirits with immense care because the dead are known to have powers to cause grave mischief.

這些模式都是一樣的，一個人的父母或親戚去世後，他必須非常小心地處理他們的鬼魂或精神，因為眾所周知，死者有能力造成嚴重的惡果。

They may unleash guilt.

他們可能會釋放出負罪感。

They can destroy sex for us.

他們可以為我們摧毀性。

They may put a curse on our ambitions at work.

他們可能對我們在工作中的雄心壯志下了詛咒。

They can cause us insomnia or chronic stomach pains, much time and energy therefore, has to be spent managing their memories, which might involve bringing them presents honoring them with cakes or songs or if all else fails and their characters are too mean and far gone actively trying to drive them away into the netherworld in Madagascar in the ceremony of fama Deana.

他們可能會導致我們失眠或慢性胃痛，是以必須花很多時間和精力來管理他們的記憶，這可能涉及到給他們帶來禮物，用蛋糕或歌曲來紀念他們，或者如果所有其他方法都失敗了，他們的角色太卑鄙和遙遠了，積極嘗試在馬拉加西的法瑪德納儀式上把他們趕到陰間。

Every year the dead have to be unburied and are invited to a big party in the village where their relatives sacrificed oxen and dance with their corpses above their heads.

每年，死者都要被解埋，並被邀請參加村裡的一個大聚會，他們的親屬在聚會上祭祀牛，並在頭頂上舞動他們的屍體。

In the hope that these ever more moldy cadavers will rest easily in the months to come, Quite what one might have to do to keep an ancestor from ruining one's life may change from society to society.

希望這些不斷髮黴的屍體在未來的幾個月裡能夠輕鬆地休息，相當人可能要做什麼來防止祖先毀掉自己的生活，這一點可能會因社會而改變。

But the underlying feeling that one must try something is universal.

但是，人們必須嘗試一些東西的基本感覺是普遍的。

One might have to dis into them or treat them to a dance or one might need to lie on a couch and analyze their hold on one psyche through free association.

一個人可能要對他們進行盤問或請他們跳舞，或者需要躺在沙發上，通過自由聯想分析他們對一個人心理的影響。

But the idea is fundamentally the same.

但這個想法在根本上是相同的。

The spirits of the past have the power to throttle the present.

過去的精神有能力扼殺現在。

The headaches or the impotence, the paranoia or the bad marriage have to do with ghosts.

頭痛或陽痿，妄想症或糟糕的婚姻都與鬼有關。

Mommy and daddy are everywhere doing unholy things and the wise pay them enough attention to loosen their punitive grip and get on with their lives, how to overcome your childhood.

媽媽和爸爸到處都在做不道德的事情，明智的人對他們給予足夠的關注，讓他們放鬆懲罰性的控制，繼續生活，如何克服你的童年。