They are the people in the newspaper, or the ones who live in the other part of town

這些人可能出現在報紙上，或是住在其他城鎮，

or went to the school we didn't go to, but it's nice not to imagine them too near to home.

或就讀跟我們不同的學校，但不去想他們離我們很近讓我們感到舒坦。

Yet that's to deny an obvious eventuality: snobs may lie closer to us.

然而，這抹殺了一個可能性：勢利小人可能就在我們身邊。

Snobs form couples, they have children, and we might be among them.

勢利者結為夫妻，生了孩子，而我們可能就是其中一個。

However painful the unvarnished thought, we might be the children of snobs.

無論這種不加掩飾的想法多令人痛苦，但我們可能是勢利者的孩子。

It's a situation, it can be therapeutic to face up to and to try to make sense of.

這種情況，透過直接面對和理解其定義可以達到治療功效。

What is a snob? It has little to do with an old-fashioned love of aristocracy.

何謂勢利小人？它與過時的仰慕貴族之心沒什麼關係。

A snob is simply someone without an independent center of judgement, someone who can only value what the 'in' group in society happens to esteem at any point in time.

勢利單純指缺乏獨立判斷能力的人，無論時間、地點，他們只重視社會「菁英」團體所重視的東西。

Snobs' opinions and tastes might be quite sane, or not.

勢利者的意見和品味可能相當明智 (也可能相反)。

The key thing is that they aren't their own.

重點是他們無法自己作主。

Snobs cannot tell what to make of anything until other prestigious voices have made up their minds for them.

勢力者對所有的事情都沒有自己的想法，而是讓有聲望的人決定他們的想法。

There is a particular conundrum that sets in when snobs have a child:

勢利者有了孩子後，會遇到一個特殊的難題：

How should they evaluate this new creature, in whom the world has no particular interest and who cannot wow or dazzle it?

他們該如何評價這個新生命，這個世人不特別感興趣、無法令人驚艷的生物？

The thing merely sits in its cot, dribbles and screams a lot. It cannot do, it can only be.

這個小東西只會坐在嬰兒床、流口水、不停喊叫。他沒有特殊技能，只能做自己。

The snobs' first reaction is often to say that they don't like babies as a generic category.

勢利者的第一反應往往是籠統地說他們不喜歡小孩。

It sounds innocent enough, but the distaste is more fundamental.

這聽起來很單純，但厭惡感才是根本原因。

Babies are unlikeable, first and foremost, not because they are messy and noisy, but because they are so unimpressive in worldly terms.

嬰兒不討喜的主因並非因為他們又髒又吵，而是因為他們在世俗的標準之下非常地不起眼。

At heart, the snob suffers from low self-confidence,

實際上，勢利者因自卑而苦，

which is why the incompetence of their own small child is so galling,

這就是為什麼小孩的無能會讓他們感到極度焦躁，

threatening to evoke their own sense of fragility and vulnerability.

害怕喚起自身的脆弱性。

The baby can't buy or sell a company, star in a movie, or even drink neatly from a cup,

嬰兒不能買賣公司、飾演電影主角，或斯文地喝東西，

and it may on this basis, generate panic and fury in their snobbish carers. Fortunately, with a little time, school comes along,

而這都讓勢利的照顧者感到恐慌和憤怒。還好，用不了多久，學校就能解救他們，

granting snobs the perfect tool with which to manage their feelings.

學校成為勢利者控制情感的完美工具。

Snobs make it very clear to their offspring that doing well at school, very well indeed, is not merely pleasing or cautionary.

勢利者會很清楚地告訴孩子，在學校表現好，應該說表現得非常地好，不只可取悅他人或僅為警世格言。

It's quite simply essential. Life more or less depends on it.

它是必要的。生活多少取決於此。

There need to be cups, prizes, trophies and high scores in pretty much every subject. Doing well isn't enough, excelling is the goal.

獎盃、獎品、戰利品，以及每科高分通過是必要的。做得好還不夠，出類拔萃才是最終目標。

If you don't perform, you cannot be loved.

如果你做不到，你就不值得被愛。

Whether this is directly spelt out or merely artfully suggested, this is the ideology under which the offspring of snobs grow up.

不管是直接說出來或是巧妙地建議，這都是一種意識形態，它是勢利者的子孫成長必經之路。

Unsurprisingly, most children of snobs do very well at school and at university,

不出所料，大多數勢利者的孩子在學校都表現良好，

and later on, in the job market.

隨後在工作上也是如此。

A feeling that one doesn't deserve to exist unless one meets the criteria of worldly success can do wonders for one's productivity.

這種就像一個人若不能滿足世俗成功標準就不值得生存，這種想法對個人生產力有著奇蹟般的影響。

Offering conditional love has a habit of getting people to meet one's conditions.

提供有條件的愛能讓人養成使命必達的習慣。

But that's also why the children of snobs are uncommonly likely to be on their way to a nervous breakdown,

但這也是為什麼勢利者的孩子經常會面臨精神崩潰的情況，

which often sets in just when most of the worldly boxes have been ticked.

通常會在他們完成大部分的人生任務時發生。

The longing that one should be recognized for being and not just doing,

渴望自己因存在而有價值而不是因為成就，

even if one has done quite a lot, is an extremely stubborn part of human psychology,

即使他們已經做了很多，這是人類心理學極其頑固的一部份，

which has a habit of periodically rearing its head and creating serious trouble, if it keeps being ignored across a lifetime.

三不五時製造嚴重的問題，以因應長期被忽略的情況。

We may well be able to meet conditions, but we can't quite forget the desire to be loved without them,

我們也許能夠滿足所有的要求，但我們仍然渴望無條件的愛、

simply for being ourselves, in all our original messiness and confusion.

做自己，並接受我們天生的混亂與困惑。

Through a breakdown, by deliberately sabotaging what we have achieved in the world,

透過崩潰、故意破壞我們在世上取得的成就，

we may be trying to go back and taste a simple, condition-less love that was denied to us in the early years.

我們可能會試圖回到過去，體驗過去缺乏的純粹且無條件的愛。

We're trying, at huge cost, to re-experience a missing stage of development.

我們試圖付出巨大的代價去重新體驗成長時缺失的部分。

We are tired of decades of making symbolic offerings under emotional duress to the ghosts of emotionally withholding parents.

我們受夠了十幾年以來的情感勒索，在壓抑情感的父母造成的陰影之下，做出象徵性的奉獻。

It might be better to sit in hospital for a while and disappoint everyone.

在醫院待一陣子並讓大家失望似乎是更好的選擇。

The more we understand the risks we face, as children of snobs, the less danger there will be of having to act out our complaints.

身為勢利者的孩子，我們愈了解我們面臨的危險，就愈能減少發洩不滿的情況。

To be a child of snobs is a diagnosis like any other and deserves its own taxonomy, treatment and pathway to health.

身為勢利者的小孩就像是一種症狀，需要被分類、接受治療並變得健康。

Part of this involves overcoming anger towards one's carers and realizing that snobs are not evil,

其中包括克服對照顧者的憤怒並體悟勢利小人並不邪惡，

merely wounded and worried.

只是受了創傷和擔驚受怕而已。

As their child, one will have to put extra effort into the delicate task of finding oneself valuable and worthy outside of achievement,

身為他們的孩子則必須付出額外的努力才能發現即使不看成就，自己也具有價值，

not because of anything one has said or done,

這跟他們的說了什麼或做了什麼無關，

but just because one exists, which should always, of course, have been enough.

而單純是因為他們存在世上，這就已經足夠了。

The Joys and Sorrows of Parenting promises us a gentle way of staying calm around one of the most arduous yet deeply fulfilling jobs in the world. Click on the link on screen now to find out more.

《育兒的喜怒哀樂》一書告訴我們，面對世界上最艱難但充滿成就感的工作時，如何保持冷靜。點擊螢幕上的連結以了解更多資訊。