翻了 3/4 才開始懷疑人生，又不是要出版為什麼要為了翻譯這篇搞得廢寢忘食⋯⋯但真的翻完又覺得好有成就感喔，我難道就是 Wallace 影射的自我崇拜的奴隸嗎😭 話說回來，直到去年我才領悟，我所喜愛的作品都隱含著對迷戀和崇拜的思辨，〈This Is Water〉亦如是。「除了神靈之外，你崇拜的其他事物都會將你吞噬殆盡。」不正是《進擊的巨人》那句經典台詞的對照——你我皆為某些事物的奴隸。除此之外，我也在讀 Wallace 的時候後知後覺地意識到，《馬男波傑克》（BoJack Horseman）的情節與台詞，也像極了 Wallace 的筆鋒，無論是對自我的探討或是對現實荒謬的描寫，都能在兩者之間找到相似與關聯之處。針對這點，不只有相關的 reddit 討論串、YouTube 影片，甚至還有論文的解析（主要是關於 Postmodernism），有興趣的人可以隨意查找參閱。

話不多說，演講下半部開始，敬請細品🥸

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And I submit that this is what the real, no bullshit value of your liberal arts education is supposed to be about: how to keep from going through your comfortable, prosperous, respectable adult life dead, unconscious, a slave to your head and to your natural default setting of being uniquely, completely, imperially alone day in and day out. That may sound like hyperbole, or abstract nonsense. Let's get concrete. The plain fact is that you graduating seniors do not yet have any clue what "day in day out" really means. There happen to be whole, large parts of adult American life that nobody talks about in commencement speeches. One such part involves boredom, routine and petty frustration. The parents and older folks here will know all too well what I'm talking about.

我認為，人文教育真正的價值，是讓我們學會不把舒適、富足又體面的生活，過得行屍走肉、麻木不仁，淪為大腦與內建思維的奴隸，日復一日陷入深不見底的孤獨。你可能覺得我言過其實，淨是些抽象的空談，那我們就來談點實際的。事實就是，才剛要畢業的你們，對於「日復一日」還沒有絲毫體會。美國成年人的生活，從沒有人會在畢業典禮上說破，畢竟那多半是些枯燥的日常、機械化的例行公事，還有一個個令人喪志的時刻。坐在這裡的爸媽跟長輩，對於我所說的這些，應該再清楚不過。

By way of example, let's say it's an average adult day, and you get up in the morning, go to your challenging, white-collar, college-graduate job, and you work hard for eight or ten hours, and at the end of the day you're tired and somewhat stressed and all you want is to go home and have a good supper and maybe unwind for an hour, and then hit the sack early because, of course, you have to get up the next day and do it all again. But then you remember there's no food at home. You haven't had time to shop this week because of your challenging job, and so now after work you have to get in your car and drive to the supermarket. It's the end of the work day and the traffic is apt to be: very bad. 

舉個例子來說，想像你是一個普通的大人，某天早上你如常起床，去你那要求大學學歷的辦公室上班燒腦。你辛苦忙了八或十小時，好不容易下班了，卻還是一樣累，壓力還是一樣大，只想馬上回家吃頓飯，有空再放鬆一下，然後早點睡，畢竟隔天又要從頭再來一遍。結果這時你才想起家裡根本沒東西吃，因為你這週工作太忙，根本沒時間採買，所以下班後你得開車去一趟超市。問題是這時候正好是下班的尖峰時段，路上根本塞爆。

So getting to the store takes way longer than it should, and when you finally get there, the supermarket is very crowded, because of course it's the time of day when all the other people with jobs also try to squeeze in some grocery shopping. And the store is hideously lit and infused with soul-killing muzak or corporate pop and it's pretty much the last place you want to be but you can't just get in and quickly out; you have to wander all over the huge, over-lit store's confusing aisles to find the stuff you want and you have to manoeuvre your junky cart through all these other tired, hurried people with carts (et cetera, et cetera, cutting stuff out because this is a long ceremony) and eventually you get all your supper supplies, except now it turns out there aren't enough check-out lanes open even though it's the end-of-the-day rush. So the checkout line is incredibly long, which is stupid and infuriating. But you can't take your frustration out on the frantic lady working the register, who is overworked at a job whose daily tedium and meaninglessness surpasses the imagination of any of us here at a prestigious college.

所以你花了比平常還久的時間抵達超市，店裡人滿為患，因為其他跟你一樣白天有正職的人也都擠在這時間來買東西。超市裡的燈光極其刺眼，背景播放的商業音樂令你精神委靡，你死也不想在這裡多待一秒，卻沒辦法立刻買好就走，因為你得在這間又大又快把你眼睛照瞎的賣場裡，來回穿梭一條條走道，一邊找你需要的東西，一邊推著那台歪七扭八的購物車，在一堆疲憊又匆忙的顧客之間穿梭（諸如此類，我先略過，後面流程還很長）。最後，你好不容易買齊了食材，才發現明明是下班尖峰時段，結帳的櫃台卻沒開幾個，導致每一道都排得超長，你被蠢到快氣死。但你不能把怒氣發洩在已經忙翻的店員身上，她已經超時工作，每天做的事還千篇一律，是我們這種念名校的人難以想見的單調和虛無。

But anyway, you finally get to the checkout line's front, and you pay for your food, and you get told to "Have a nice day" in a voice that is the absolute voice of death. Then you have to take your creepy, flimsy, plastic bags of groceries in your cart with the one crazy wheel that pulls maddeningly to the left, all the way out through the crowded, bumpy, littery parking lot, and then you have to drive all the way home through slow, heavy, SUV-intensive, rush-hour traffic, et cetera et cetera.

總之，終於輪到你結帳了。你付了錢，店員用他來自地獄的聲音對你說：「祝你有美好的一天。」你把那堆又薄又難拿的塑膠袋塞進那台輪子不斷往左偏的破推車，穿過滿地垃圾、坑坑疤疤又人擠人的停車場，上車之後，再擠進被休旅車塞爆的下班車潮，一路龜速回家⋯⋯諸如此類。

Everyone here has done this, of course. But it hasn't yet been part of you graduates' actual life routine, day after week after month after year.

我們在場大多數人都經歷過這些。但對即將畢業的你們而言，這至少還不是每天、每周、每年不斷上演的日常。

But it will be. And many more dreary, annoying, seemingly meaningless routines besides. But that is not the point. The point is that petty, frustrating crap like this is exactly where the work of choosing is gonna come in. Because the traffic jams and crowded aisles and long checkout lines give me time to think, and if I don't make a conscious decision about how to think and what to pay attention to, I'm gonna be pissed and miserable every time I have to shop. Because my natural default setting is the certainty that situations like this are really all about me. About MY hungriness and MY fatigue and MY desire to just get home, and it's going to seem for all the world like everybody else is just in my way. And who are all these people in my way? And look at how repulsive most of them are, and how stupid and cow-like and dead-eyed and nonhuman they seem in the checkout line, or at how annoying and rude it is that people are talking loudly on cell phones in the middle of the line. And look at how deeply and personally unfair this is.

但總有一天會的，而且還不僅止於此，未來會有更多枯燥、惱人、看起來毫無意義的日常瑣事讓你應接不暇。但這些都不是重點，重點是這些繁瑣又令人沮喪的爛事，正是對我們自主選擇的考驗。因為塞車、人擠人和排隊結帳給了我思考的時間，如果我不做有意識的選擇，不去調整自己思考的方式和在意的重點，那我每次去買東西都會氣個半死。因為我的預設值會讓我認為所有情況都是衝著我來的，一心只想著「我」餓了、「我」累了，「我」想趕快回家，覺得每個擋在我前面的人都是故意妨礙我。這些人到底是從哪裡冒出來的？看看這些排隊的人，多討人厭、多愚蠢、多遲鈍、了無生氣、多沒有靈魂。還有那些在隊伍中大聲講電話的人，多擾人又沒品。這一切擺明了就是針對我，根本就不公平。

Or, of course, if I’m in a more socially conscious liberal arts form of my default setting, I can spend time in the end-of-the-day traffic being disgusted about all the huge, stupid, lane-blocking SUV’s and Hummers and V-12 pickup trucks, burning their wasteful, selfish, 40-gallon tanks of gas, and I can dwell on the fact that the patriotic or religious bumper-stickers always seem to be on the biggest, most disgustingly selfish vehicles, driven by the ugliest [responding here to loud applause] — this is an example of how NOT to think, though — most disgustingly selfish vehicles, driven by the ugliest, most inconsiderate and aggressive drivers. And I can think about how our children’s children will despise us for wasting all the future’s fuel, and probably screwing up the climate, and how spoiled and stupid and selfish and disgusting we all are, and how modern consumer society just sucks, and so forth and so on.

又或者，如果我啟用的是左派覺醒青年的預設思維，我可能會被下班時間的車流惹得心煩意亂。看到一台台又大又蠢害我塞在這裡的休旅車、悍馬和 V-12 皮卡車，貪得無厭地耗著整整四十加侖的汽油，我就會開始鑽牛角尖：那些貼著愛國或宗教標語的車最自私，永遠都是它們在擋路，一定都是最沒水準最醜的人在開的（此時全場熱烈鼓掌）——這正是我說的，你不該有的思考模式——反正就是，那種自私到讓人想吐的車，一定都是最醜最沒公德心最暴躁的駕駛在開的。然後忍不住接著想，我們的子子孫孫一定會恨死我們這一代，因為我們把未來的能源都揮霍殆盡，還可能連帶地把氣候搞爛。想到這裡就覺得我們真是被寵壞又愚蠢又自私又噁心的一代，現代消費主義的社會根本沒救，這樣一路越想越氣，沒完沒了。

You get the idea.

你懂我意思。

If I choose to think this way in a store and on the freeway, fine. Lots of us do. Except thinking this way tends to be so easy and automatic that it doesn't have to be a choice. It is my natural default setting. It's the automatic way that I experience the boring, frustrating, crowded parts of adult life when I'm operating on the automatic, unconscious belief that I am the centre of the world, and that my immediate needs and feelings are what should determine the world's priorities.

選擇用這種方式去思考超市裡和高速公路上的情境也無妨，畢竟很多人都這樣。問題是，這種想法根本稱不上是種選擇，而是我們自然而然就陷入的狀態，是我的預設值。在這個狀態下，我會以我一貫的思維，下意識地去應對大人的生活中那些無聊、挫敗、擁擠的時刻，理所當然地認為地球繞著我轉，世界就應該要優先照顧我此刻的需求與感受。

The thing is that, of course, there are totally different ways to think about these kinds of situations. In this traffic, all these vehicles stopped and idling in my way, it's not impossible that some of these people in SUV's have been in horrible auto accidents in the past, and now find driving so terrifying that their therapist has all but ordered them to get a huge, heavy SUV so they can feel safe enough to drive. Or that the Hummer that just cut me off is maybe being driven by a father whose little child is hurt or sick in the seat next to him, and he's trying to get this kid to the hospital, and he's in a bigger, more legitimate hurry than I am: it is actually I who am in HIS way.

但我們其實可以用完全不同的方式來看待這些情況。也許擋在我前面那些休旅車裡，有人曾經歷過可怕的車禍，現在對開車充滿陰影，他們的心理醫師只差沒命令他們開這種又大又穩的休旅車，他們才有足夠的安全感上路。或許剛才那台硬切進來的悍馬是個爸爸在開，坐在他旁邊的小孩可能受傷或生病了，他正火速趕往醫院。他的確比我更急，也急得更有道理。搞不好，我才是擋住他的人。

Or I can choose to force myself to consider the likelihood that everyone else in the supermarket's checkout line is just as bored and frustrated as I am, and that some of these people probably have harder, more tedious and painful lives than I do.

或者，我可以選擇強迫自己思考一種可能性，也就是超市裡排隊結帳的其他人，其實跟我一樣無聊又煩躁，甚至有些人可能比我過得更辛苦、更乏味，也更艱難。

Again, please don't think that I'm giving you moral advice, or that I'm saying you are supposed to think this way, or that anyone expects you to just automatically do it. Because it's hard. It takes will and effort, and if you are like me, some days you won't be able to do it, or you just flat out won't want to.

請容我重申，我不是在給你什麼道德勸告，沒有說你就一定得這麼想，也不是說有誰期待你能自動自發做到這一切。因為這真的很難，沒有足夠的意志力和努力是行不通的。如果你像我一樣，有時候就是會做不到，或者根本不想這樣做。

But most days, if you're aware enough to give yourself a choice, you can choose to look differently at this fat, dead-eyed, over-made-up lady who just screamed at her kid in the checkout line. Maybe she's not usually like this. Maybe she's been up three straight nights holding the hand of a husband who is dying of bone cancer. Or maybe this very lady is the low-wage clerk at the motor vehicle department, who just yesterday helped your spouse resolve a horrific, infuriating, red-tape problem through some small act of bureaucratic kindness.

但在多數日子裡，只要你有足夠的意識，察覺自己其實是有選擇權的，你就能選擇換個角度看待那位剛吼完小孩的女人。她體態臃腫、雙眼無神，妝又化得太濃，但她平常可能不是這樣的。也許她已經連續三天沒睡，守在罹患骨癌的老公身邊。又或者，她就是那位在監理站工作，領著低薪的櫃檯人員，昨天就是靠著她善意的通融，你的配偶才得以解決那繁瑣到令人崩潰的行政手續。

Of course, none of this is likely, but it's also not impossible. It just depends what you want to consider. If you're automatically sure that you know what reality is, and you are operating on your default setting, then you, like me, probably won't consider possibilities that aren't annoying and miserable. But if you really learn how to pay attention, then you will know there are other options. It will actually be within your power to experience a crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that made the stars: love, fellowship, the mystical oneness of all things deep down.

當然，剛剛說的這些不太可能發生，但也不是完全不可能，一切端看你願不願意設身處地。如果你總是理所當然地認定自己了解眼前的事實，只依據自己的內建模式行動，那你很可能會像我一樣，永遠深陷於惱人又悲慘的想法中。但如果你真正學會了看待事物的方式，就會發現其實還有各種不同的選項，你會真的有能力，在那擁擠、悶熱、慢吞吞、宛如消費地獄的情境裡，不只體會到意義，甚至領悟到某種神性，一股足以構成星辰的力量在你心中燃燒著，那是愛，是連結，是萬物底層神祕而真實的合一。

Not that that mystical stuff is necessarily true. The only thing that's capital-T True is that you get to decide how you're gonna try to see it.

不是說神祕的事物必定為真。你可以自己決定如何看待這一切，唯獨這個事實足以稱得上是真正的真理。

This, I submit, is the freedom of a real education, of learning how to be well-adjusted. You get to consciously decide what has meaning and what doesn't. You get to decide what to worship.

這才是我認同的，由真正的教育賦予我們的自由，教導我們成為一個真正適應良好的人。你可以有意識地決定哪些事情對你有意義，哪些則否。你可以自己選擇你崇拜的事物。

Because here's something else that's weird but true: in the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship——be it JC or Allah, be it YHWH or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble Truths, or some inviolable set of ethical principles——is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It's the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you. On one level, we all know this stuff already. It's been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.

因為，還有一件說來奇怪卻真實無比的事：在成年人日復一日的戰壕裡，根本不存在所謂的無神論，根本沒有「不崇拜」這回事。每個人都在崇拜，我們能選擇的只有崇拜的對象。至於為何該選擇崇拜某位神祇或精神象徵——無論是耶穌、阿拉、耶和華、威卡教的母神、四聖諦，或某套神聖不可侵犯的倫理準則——是因為除此之外，你崇拜的其他事物都會將你吞噬殆盡。如果你崇拜金錢與物質，把人生意義寄託在它們身上，你會一直貪得無厭，永遠不知饜足。這是事實。如果你崇拜自己的身體、美貌與性吸引力，你就會一直覺得自己醜；而一旦歲月與年齡開始浮現，你會在真正死去之前，先死過百萬回。說到底，我們都心知肚明，這些道理被編入神話、諺語、老生常談、警示金句和寓言故事裡，是所有偉大故事的骨幹。而我們真正該做的，是把這些真理擺在意識的前線，時刻牢記。

Worship power, you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to numb you to your own fear. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. But the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they're evil or sinful, it's that they're unconscious. They are default settings.

信奉權力，只會讓你變得軟弱又擔驚，繼而必須操控更多人，好麻痺自己內心的恐懼；信奉才智，一心想當個聰明人，終究會讓你自覺是個愚蠢的冒牌貨，總是因為擔心被拆穿而提心吊膽。這類型的崇拜之所以陰險，並不在於它們有多邪惡或罪孽深重，而是在於它們是無意識的，是我們的內建模式。

They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing.

你會不知不覺地就陷入這類型的崇拜，隨著一天天過去，漸漸地只看見你想看見的，只用特定的標準衡量一切，卻無從意識到自己的作為。

And the so-called real world will not discourage you from operating on your default settings, because the so-called real world of men and money and power hums merrily along in a pool of fear and anger and frustration and craving and worship of self. Our own present culture has harnessed these forces in ways that have yielded extraordinary wealth and comfort and personal freedom. The freedom all to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the centre of all creation. This kind of freedom has much to recommend it. But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talk about much in the great outside world of wanting and achieving…. The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.

而所謂的現實世界，絕不會主動勸你跳脫內建模式。這個由眾人、金錢與權力構成的所謂現實世界，依舊歌舞昇平地運轉著，彷彿驅動它的，不是一池混雜著恐懼、憤怒、挫敗、渴望與自我崇拜的渾水。我們的當代文化甚至成功馴服了這些力量，從中提煉出驚人的財富、舒適與個人自由，讓我們每一個人都能在那腦袋瓜大小的王國裡稱王，獨自身在宇宙的中心。這種自由的確有它的迷人之處，但世界上畢竟還有各種不同型態的自由。在這個欲壑難填的花花世界裡，你很少聽人談起那些最珍貴的自由。真正重要的自由，不只要你投入關注、覺察和自律，還要你發自內心地關懷他人，以瑣碎又枯燥的方式，不厭其煩地為他人付出。

That is real freedom. That is being educated, and understanding how to think. The alternative is unconsciousness, the default setting, the rat race, the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.

那才是真正的自由，才是真正學會思考、真正受過教育的定義。否則，你就只能活在無意識的狀態裡，受制於內建模式，在老鼠賽跑般的人生裡汲汲營營，終日被得而復失的空虛啃噬，彷彿你曾擁有過某種無限的可能，如今卻已然失落。

I know that this stuff probably doesn't sound fun and breezy or grandly inspirational the way a commencement speech is supposed to sound. What it is, as far as I can see, is the capital-T Truth, with a whole lot of rhetorical niceties stripped away. You are, of course, free to think of it whatever you wish. But please don't just dismiss it as just some finger-wagging Dr. Laura sermon. None of this stuff is really about morality or religion or dogma or big fancy questions of life after death.

我知道，這些話聽起來不怎麼輕鬆寫意，也不如畢業典禮致辭該有的鼓舞人心。但對我來說，這就是貨真價實的「真理」，只是剝去了所有華麗的修辭外衣。你當然可以有自己的想法，但請不要把這些話視為道貌岸然的說教，像 Dr. Laura 那種對人生指指點點的訓誡。我想傳達的，從來就無關道德、宗教、教條，或者關於死後世界的大哉問。

The capital-T Truth is about life BEFORE death.

真正關鍵的真理，都是關於死前的人生。

It is about the real value of a real education, which has almost nothing to do with knowledge, and everything to do with simple awareness; awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, all the time, that we have to keep reminding ourselves over and over:

真正的教育所傳達的真正的價值，幾乎與知識本身無關，而與意識息息相關。它要我們意識到那些無比真實又不可或缺，卻始終藏身於平凡日常的事物。無時無刻，這些事物都近在眼前，只是我們需要一次又一次地提醒自己：

"This is water."

「這就是水。」

"This is water."

「這就是水。」

It is unimaginably hard to do this, to stay conscious and alive in the adult world day in and day out. Which means yet another grand cliché turns out to be true: your education really IS the job of a lifetime. And it commences: now.

要在大人的世界裡日復一日清醒地活著，比什麼都來得難。也正因如此才證實了另一句偉大的老生常談：活到老，真的得要學到老。而這門功課，就從現在開始。

I wish you way more than luck. 

願你的人生不僅止於幸運。

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（英文逐字稿來源：fs.blog）

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