If we didn't possess a native genius for flooding our minds, at astonishing speed, with a cocktail of the most intense and panicky hormones our bodies can secrete.

如果我們沒有天賦，能以驚人的速度讓腦中充滿身體所能分泌最強烈、最令人恐慌的荷爾蒙調和物的話。

And yet, our capacity to keep surviving — or at least and, as importantly, to draw some enjoyment from what remains of life — depends on something quite contrary and even more challenging.

然而，我們維持生存的能力，或同樣重要地，在所剩生命中獲得樂趣的能力，仰賴完全相反、甚至更具挑戰性的東西。

An ability, at points, to unpanic ourselves, to wind down the alarm and clear the bloodstream of catastrophic foreboding, a mastery of the delicate art of unworrying.

讓自己在特定情況下保持鎮定、放鬆警惕、消除身體的災難預感，掌握排解憂慮的巧妙藝術。

Many of us belong within a damnable category known as hypervigilant.

許多人都可以被歸類為所謂的「過度警覺」。

That is, we're not merely ordinarily careful and on the lookout for our safety, as we should be, but we are outright panicked and alarmed pretty much all the time.

這代表我們不僅如往常地謹慎並留意自身安全，而是幾乎一直處於驚慌、警戒的狀態。

We, in the unhappy hypervigilant camp, wake up terrified, spend the day in low-level dread, and exist in near certainty that something appalling will fell us.

我們處於不開心的過度警覺陣營，在驚恐中醒來，在輕微的恐懼中渡過一天，並確信會有可怕的事情降臨到我們頭上。

At points, it's so tiring, it's normal that we may long for it all to be over, though that, too, is a dreadful prospect.

有時候這令人疲倦，所以我們可能會渴望結束一切，也是很正常的，儘管這也是一個可怕的前景。

The reasons why we're like this are always somewhat the same:

我們會變成這樣的原因總是雷同。

At some point, long before we could cope, in the past, we were frightened very badly indeed.

在某種程度上，我們在能夠應付之前，的確會非常地害怕。

So badly, we've never really recovered a faith in the solidity of anything.

害怕到我們無法完全恢復對任何事情的信念。

Something so challenging unfolded, it has jammed our minds in a state of alarm.

一件極具挑戰性的事情浮現，使我們的大腦陷入了警戒的狀態。

Even when the outward conditions have changed and when there is — in the objective sense, as kindly friends like to tell us — nothing in particular to be terrified of.

即使是外在條件改變，從客觀的角度來看，如友善的朋友所言，沒有什麼值得恐懼的，也是一樣。

Perhaps someone was very angry in the vicinity ; perhaps we were humiliated and made to feel unwanted and sinful.

可能附近有人十分憤怒；可能我們被羞辱了，因此感到不受歡迎、罪惡感。

Maybe an older sibling tortured us.

或許我們受年長手足的折磨。

Perhaps we got sent away to an institution where we were appallingly isolated.

也許我們被送到了一個完全與世隔絕的機構。

In response, our level of panic hormones spiked, and never came down.

作為回應，我們的恐慌荷爾蒙飆升並居高不下。

Now our hypervigilance scrambles the part of the mind that regulates basic functions like sleep, digestion, and touch.

我們的過度警覺擾亂了大腦中調節睡眠、消化和觸覺等基本功能的部位。

And so, a telling symptom is that it will, almost certainly, be difficult for us to rest, to manage our bowels, or to be wholly at ease being touched by a fellow human, however much we might long to be.

因此, 一個明顯的症狀是，我們肯定難以休息、難以管理腸胃或完全放鬆地與一個人相處，無論我們多渴望能夠如此。

There is no easy cure, but it is the start of something to have at least a name to put to the inner chaos.

過度警覺不容易治癒，但這是一個開始，至少可以為內心混亂的狀態命名。

A degree of compassion can start up, too.

並開始萌生憐憫之心。

We can start to notice how much of life has been held together by fear.

我們開始留意到生活中有多少面向因恐懼而維繫。

We have a concept that links why it's so hard to go to parties, to trust a lover, to relax on holiday, to go to the bathroom, or to sleep much past 4 a.m.

我們有一個大致的想法，明白為什麼我們難以參與派對、信任愛人、在假日放鬆、安心上廁所或一覺到天明。

We might dare to tell a few others about our hypervigilance, handing them the word like a gift, a clue to our own particular brokenness.

我們可能勇於告訴一些人我們的過度警覺，把這個詞當做禮物送給他們，當作我們破碎不堪的線索。

Every time we find a kindly other to whom we can safely entrust news of our state, and who can smile tenderly in response, the panic goes down and the world becomes ever so slightly more bearable.

每當我們發現善良、值得信賴並在得知我們的心理狀態後回以溫柔微笑的人，恐慌就會消退，世界也會變得好一些。

But sometimes, when we are alone and the pressures mount once more, we may simply have to stand back and observe the hypervigilance do its thing.

但有時當我們獨自一人，壓力再次升高時，我們可能只能退一步，觀察過度警覺的行為。

Smash our plans and hopes, and unleash panic in a way that will knock us out for the day or the month.

摧毀我們的計畫與希望並釋放恐慌，使我們渾渾噩噩地度過一整天，甚至是一整個月。

We should forgive ourselves; this is a disease like any other.

我們應該原諒自己，這也是一種疾病。

What can be hardest but most important to believe is that being an adult means having options.

最困難但最重要的是要相信，作為一個成人意味著你擁有選擇。

We can, nowadays, push back against bullies, move away when it gets too much, and tell other people what we need from them.

如今我們可以擊退並遠離霸凌行為，並告訴他人我們需要什麼幫助。

We don't need to be hypervigilant because we have the option of being truly vigilant.

我們不需要過度警覺，因為我們可以選擇性地保持警惕。

That is, if there were to be real dangers, we would now have the inner resources to greet and fight them in good time.

也就是說，如果危險真的出現，我們現在擁有內在的資源及時面對並對抗它們。

We can worry when we need to, not just because we exist.

我們可以在需要的時候擔心，而不是因為活著就時刻擔憂。

In the meantime, we should allow ourselves, with this strange, slightly ugly word in hand, to feel sorry for our desperate impulses and strive, where we can, at 4:35 a.m. perhaps, to turn over and get a little more rest.

同時，我們試圖調節奇怪的過度警覺時, 應為我們的絕望衝動感到遺憾，並在能力所及的情況下，也許是清晨 4:35 驚醒時，翻個身，多休息一會兒。

We can learn the skill of being calm, not through specialties or slow breathing, but through thinking. Our book guides us through that process. Click to find out more.

我們可以學習讓心情平靜的技巧，不是透過特技或緩慢地呼吸，而是透過思考。我們的這本書引導我們實踐這個過程。點擊了解更多資訊。