usually by eating more couscous and broccoli, going to bed early and running in the rain.

通常藉著吃更多的庫司庫司 (北非小米) 和綠花椰菜、早睡和在雨中跑步。

But this approach may turn out to be quixotic, not only because Death can't reliably be warded off with kale,

但這種方法可能最終是異想天開，不僅因為羽衣甘藍不能可靠地擊退死神，

but at a deeper level, because the best way to lengthen a life is not by attempting to stick more years on to its tail.

而是因為在更深的層次上，延長壽命的最佳方式並非試圖在它的尾端加上更多年。

One of the most basic facts about time is that, even though we insist on measuring it as if it were an objective unit, it doesn't, in all conditions, feel as if it were moving at the same pace.

關於時間最基本的事實之一是，即便我們堅持用一個客觀單位來衡量它，但無論如何，我們都不會覺得時間的流逝速度是相同的。

Five minutes can feel like an hour; ten hours can feel like five minutes.

五分鐘可能感覺像一小時 ; 十小時感覺像五分鐘。

A decade may pass like two years; two years may acquire the weight of half a century.

十年就像兩年一樣過去了 ；兩年或許相當於半個世紀的分量。

And so, in other words, our subjective experience of time bears precious little relation to the way we like to measure it on the clock.

因此換言之，我們對時間的主觀體驗與我們喜歡在時鐘上衡量它的方式關係不大。

Time moves more or less slowly according to the vagaries of the human mind: it may fly or it may drag. It may evaporate into airy nothing or achieve enduring density.

隨著人類思維的變幻莫測，時間過得或快或慢 :時間可能轉瞬即逝或慢條斯理，它可能會無聲無息地消逝亦或成為永恆。

If the goal is to have a longer life, whatever the dieticians may urge, it seems like the priority should not be to add raw increments of time,

如果目標是延長壽命，無論營養師怎麼提倡，看來似乎不該優先考慮增加原始的時間含量，

but to ensure that whatever years remain feel appropriately substantial.

而是確保不管壽命還剩多少年，仍感覺過得充實。

The aim should be to densify time rather than to try to extract one or two more years from the fickle grip of Death.

我們的目標應該是精實我們的時間，而非試圖由死神那變幻無常的手中抽出一兩年。

Why then does time have such different speeds, moving at certain points bewilderingly fast, and at others with intricate moderation?

為何時間會有如此不同的速度，在某些時刻過得令人不知所措的快、在其他時刻卻錯綜複雜地慢 ?

The clue is to be found in childhood.

我們可以在童年時期找到線索。

The first ten years almost invariably feel longer than any other decade we have on earth.

前十年幾乎總比我們活在世界上的任何其他十年感覺來得長。

The teens are a little faster but still crawl.

青少年時期過得快一點但仍然緩慢爬行。

Yet by our 40s, time will have started to trot; and by our 60s, it will be unfolding at a bewildering gallop.

然而到了四十幾歲時，時間將開始小跑步 ; 到了我們六十幾歲時，它將以令人眼花繚亂的疾馳速度展開。

The difference in pace is not mysterious: it all has to do with novelty.

這之間節奏的差異並不神秘：它與新奇的事物有關。

The more our days are filled with new, unpredictable and challenging experiences, the longer they will feel.

生活中越充滿新的、不可預測和具有挑戰性的經歷，我們就覺得這些日子過得越長。

And, conversely, the more one day is exactly like another, the faster it will pass by in an evanescent blur.

而相反地，某一天與另一天完全相同，它在短暫的模糊中過得越快。

Childhood ends up feeling so long because it is the cauldron of novelty; because its most ordinary days are packed with extraordinary discoveries and sensations:

童年時光讓人感覺這麼長，因為它是新奇事物的大雜燴；因為童年最平凡的日子裡都充滿了非凡的發現和感受 :

these can be as apparently minor yet as significant as the first time we explore the zip on a cardigan or hold our nose under water,

這些看來都顯得微不足道，但與我們第一次在羊毛衫上探索拉鍊或在水底下憋氣時、

the first time we look at the sun through the cotton of a beach towel or dig our fingers into the putty holding a window in its frame.

我們第一次透過海灘巾的棉布直視太陽時或者將手指插入窗框上的油灰中時一樣重要。

Dense as it is with stimuli, the first decade might as well be a thousand years long.

充滿了各種密集的刺激，人生的頭一個十年可能感覺有一千年這麼長。

By middle age, things can be counted upon to have grown a lot more familiar.

到了中年，對可預測的事物變得更加熟悉。

We may have flown around the world a few times.

我們可能已經飛行至世界各地幾次了。

We no longer get excited by the idea of eating a pineapple, owning a car or flipping a lightswitch.

我們不再對吃鳳梨、擁有一輛車或打開燈開關的想法感到興奮。

We know about relationships, earning money and telling others what to do.

我們了解到人際關係、賺錢和告訴別人該做什麼。

As a result, time runs away from us without mercy.

因此，時間無情地離我們而去。

One solution often suggested at this point is that we should put all our efforts into discovering fresh sources of novelty.

針對這點常被提出的一個解決方法，是我們應該全力以赴探索新鮮的新奇事物泉源，

We can't just continue to live our small predictable and therefore 'swift' lives in a single narrow domain; we need to become explorers and adventurers.

我們不能僅僅繼續在一個狹小的領域中過著卑微、可預測而且 「快速」的生活 ; 我們需要成為探險家和冒險家。

We must go to Machu Picchu or Angkor Wat, Astana or Montevideo, we need to find a way to swim with dolphins or order a thirteen course meal at a world-famous restaurant in downtown Lima.

我們必須造訪馬丘比丘或吳哥窟、阿斯塔納 (哈薩克首都) 或蒙特維多 (烏拉圭首都)、我們必須想辦法與海豚共游，或在位於利馬市中心的全球知名餐廳吃一頓有十三道菜的飯。

That will finally slow down the cruel gallop of time.

這終究將減緩時間殘酷的奔馳。

But this is to labour under an unfair, expensive and ultimately impractical notion of novelty.

但這種做法是誤信了一種不平等、昂貴且非常不切實際的新奇事物。

We may by middle age certainly have seen a great many things in our neighborhoods, but we are – fortunately for us – unlikely to have properly noticed most of them.

可能從我們步入中年起，確實在週遭看過很多事物，但我們幸運的是，不太可能恰好注意到其中的大部份事物。

We have probably taken a few cursory glances at the miracles of existence that lie to hand and assumed, quite unjustly, that we know all there is to know about them.

我們或許對信手拈來的奇蹟的存在匆匆一瞥，並很先入為主地認為我們已對它們瞭若指掌。

We've imagined we understand the city we live in, the people we interact with and, more or less, the point of it all.

我們自認為已經了解我們所居住的城市、與我們互動的人們，及或多或少這一切的重要性。

But of course we have barely scratched the surface.

但當然這只不過是蜻蜓點水罷了。

We have grown bored of a world we haven't begun to study properly.

我們尚未開始好好地研究這世界就已對它逐漸厭煩了。

And that, among other things, is why time is racing by.

而這一點，先不提別的，就是時間飛逝的原因。

The pioneers at making life feel longer in the way that really counts are not dieticians, but artists.

讓壽命感覺過得更長的先驅並非營養學家，而是藝術家。

At its best, art is a tool that reminds us of how little we have fathomed and noticed.

在發揮到極致的狀態下，藝術是一種工具， 用來提醒我們所瞭解和留意到的是多麼地少。

It re-introduces us to ordinary things and reopens our eyes to a latent beauty and interest in precisely those areas we had ceased to bother with.

它向我們重新介紹平凡的事物並讓我們的雙眼再次看向隱約的美，並引起我們對已經不再在乎的那些領域的興趣。

It helps us to recover some of the manic sensitivity we had as newborns.

它有助於我們某種程度上恢復如新生兒般極端的敏感度。

Here is Cezanne, looking closely at apples, as if he had never seen one before and nudging us to do likewise:

這是塞尚的畫，他仔細觀察蘋果，就像他以前從沒看過一樣，並促使我們也這樣做：

Here is Van Gogh, mesmerised by some oranges: Here is Albrecht Durer, looking – as only children usually do – very closely at a clod of earth:

這是梵谷的畫，他被一些橘子迷住了：這是杜勒的畫，他仔細觀察地表的土壤- 正如孩子們常做的那樣。

We don't need to make art in order to learn the most valuable lesson of artists, which is about noticing properly, living with our eyes open – and thereby, along the way, savouring time.

我們不需要創作藝術才能學習藝術家最珍貴的一課，正是關於好好地注意、有意識地生活著- 從而，一路品味時間。

Without any intention to create something that could be put in a gallery, we could – as part of a goal of living more deliberately – take a walk in an unfamiliar part of town,

不刻意創造可以被 放在畫廊中的物品，我們可以作為更刻意生活的目標的一部分，在城市中一個不熟悉的地方散步、

ask an old friend about a side of their life we'd never dared to probe at, lie on our back in the garden and look up at the stars or hold our partner in a way we never tried before.

向一位老朋友詢問我們從來不敢去探究的他們生活的某一面、仰躺在花園裡望著星空或以我們以前從未嘗試過的方式握住伴侶的手。

It takes a rabid lack of imagination to think we have to go to Machu Picchu to find something new.

認為我們必須去馬丘比丘尋找新事物是非常缺乏想像力的一件事。

In Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel The Idiot, a prisoner has suddenly been condemned to death and been told he has only a few minutes left to live.

在杜思妥耶夫斯基的小說《白痴》中，一名囚犯突然被判處死刑，並被告知他只剩下幾分鐘的生命

'What if I were not to die!,' he exclaims. 'What if life were given back to me – what infinity!… I'd turn a whole minute into an age…'

「萬一我不該死怎麼辦 !」他喊道。「萬一生命又交回我手上呢- 何等的無限哪 !...我會把一分鐘變成一個時代 ...」

Faced with losing his life, Dostoevsky's poor wretch recognises that every minute could be turned into aeons of time, with sufficient imagination and appreciation.

面對將失去生命，妥耶夫斯基的不幸可憐人體認到，只要有足夠的想像力和感激的心，每一分鐘都可以化為永恆。

It is sensible enough to try to live longer lives.

試著活得長壽是明智的。

But we are working with a false notion of what long really means.

但對於長的真正含義，我們正往錯的方向努力。

We might live to be a thousand years old and still complain that it had all rushed by too fast.

我們可能活到一千歲之久，卻仍抱怨人生倏忽即逝。

We should be aiming to lead lives that feel long because we have managed to imbue them with the right sort of open-hearted appreciation and unsnobbish receptivity,

我們應該致力於過那種感覺很長的人生，因為我們已經設法為它們注入真誠的欣賞和不勢利的感受性，

the kind that five-year-olds know naturally how to bring to bear.

就像五歲小孩天生知道該如何善用的那樣。

We need to pause and look at one another's faces, study the evening sky,

我們需要停下來看看彼此的臉、研究傍晚的天空、

wonder at the eddies and colours of the river and dare to ask the kind of questions that open our souls.

好奇河水的漩渦和顏色，並勇於詢問那些可以開闊我們靈魂的問題。

We don't need to add years; we need to densify the time we have left by ensuring that every day is lived consciously –

我們不需要活更多年 ; 我們需要透過確保每天都有意識地生活來增加我們剩下的時間，

and we can do this via a manoeuvre as simple as it is momentous: by starting to notice all that we have as yet only seen.

而且我們可以透過一個既簡單又重要的動作來實現這一點：藉由開始注意到我們所擁有的一切只如初見一樣。

Our Wisdom Display Cards explore what it really means to be wise and how we can strive to become more enlightened in our every day lives.

我們的智慧展示卡探討聰明的真義，以及我們如何努力在日常生活中變得更加開明。