碎金集 2021 Fortuitous Gold Nuggets 2021 第 06 篇 Section 06
五月 存道辟业，铸剑为犁 May: Preserving the Way, Beating Swords into Plowshares
返回 碎金集 2021 Back to Fortuitous Gold Nuggets 2021（一）这个学期，屡考屡败，令人啼笑皆非。
(I) This semester has been one of repeated exams and repeated defeats, a comedy of errors.
班主任说，“高二是面对高考慢慢试错的一年。”
Our homeroom teacher said: “The second year of senior high school is a year of gradually learning through trial and error in preparation for the gaokao.”
试什么错呢？留给我们的人生选择有多少呢？
What errors are we trying out? And how many life choices are left to us?
（二）我们常常看到的风景是：
(II) The landscape we so often witness is this:
人们总是仰望和羡慕着别人的幸福，一回头，却发现自己正被仰望和羡慕着。
People are forever looking up to and envying the happiness of others, only to turn their heads and discover that they themselves are being looked up to and envied.
我们的幸福，好像常常在别人眼里。
Our happiness seems so often to reside solely in the eyes of others.
殊不知从比较中获得的幸福，终将在比较中被夺去。
Little do we realize that happiness derived from comparison will inevitably be stripped away by comparison.
似乎国人唯一不比的，是比谁更幸福。
It seems the only thing our compatriots never compare is who is truly happier.
（三）我不喜欢苦大仇深式的反思。
(III) I harbor no fondness for theatrical, self-flagellating reflections.
两三年来，我落下一种流弊：在一次考试大失利或一次大挫折后，用一种自我批驳，近似忏悔的方式剖析自己这一阶段的问题。大多数在晚上，就像现今这样。
Over the past two or three years, I have fallen into a pernicious habit: after a major exam failure or a severe setback, dissecting my issues through a process of self-castigation that borders on penitence. Mostly deep at night, just as right now.
这不是什么“反思”，更不是什么“觉醒”，只是因为良心有愧，编造些理由自我麻痹，好挨过漫漫长夜。我曾自傲自己内心强大，其实不过是不敢正视挫折罢了。
This is neither “reflection” nor “awakening”; it is merely inventing reasons to numb myself out of a guilty conscience, so as to trudge through the long, grueling night. I once prided myself on possessing a formidable inner strength, when in truth I simply lacked the spine to look failure in the face.
我前桌说过一句令我印象深刻的话：“我什么时候真的想学习了，早上我就不会睡觉了。”在我看来，反思的第二步是执行，只有第二天一睁眼想的不是手机而是学习，我想这种反思才真正有效。
The classmate sitting in front of me once uttered a line that left an indelible mark on me: “Whenever I genuinely want to study, I won’t sleep in the morning.” In my eyes, the second step of true reflection is execution: only when the first thought upon opening one’s eyes the next morning is study rather than the smartphone does such reflection become genuinely effective.
虽然这条路看起来有多么多么难走，但它毕竟是一条未曾谋面的路，前方有着未曾谋面的人们。于是我还是想试试。
Though this road appears dauntingly arduous, it is after all an untrodden path, with people ahead whom I have yet to meet. And so, I still wish to give it a try.
毕竟，我不想在未来忆及18岁的我时，流露许多人都曾有过的、羞惭的神色。
After all, I have no desire, when looking back upon my eighteen-year-old self in the future, to wear the sheepish, ashamed countenance that so many have worn.