雙語對照 ● Growth That Starts from Thinking 在思考中成長
Growth That Starts from Thinking 在思考中成長
◎ Eleanor Roosevelt
It seems to me a very difficult thing to put into words the beliefs we hold and what they make you do in your life. I think I was fortunate because I grew up in a family where there was a very deep religious feeling. I don’t think it was spoken of a great deal. It was more or less taken for granted that everybody held certain beliefs and needed certain reinforcements[22]of their own strength and that came through your belief in God and your knowledge of prayer.
對我來說，用言語表達我的信仰以及它在我的人生中起到什么作用是一件很難的事情。我想我是幸運的，因為自己成長在一個篤信宗教的家庭里。可我并不覺得家人在時常談?wù)撟诮?。每個人心中都有某種信仰，都希望通過自己的力量將其實現(xiàn)，而這種力量就來自對上帝的信仰和懂得如何祈禱。
But as I grew older I questioned a great many of the things that I knew very well my grandmother who had brought me up had taken for granted. And I think I might have been quite a difficult person to live with if it hadn’t been for the fact that my husband once said it didn’t do you any harm to learn those things, so why not let your children learn them? When they grow up they’ll think things out for themselves.
然而，隨著年齡的增長，在祖母身邊長大的我也開始質(zhì)疑那些在她眼中理所應(yīng)當?shù)臇|西。我甚至將這些東西拒之門外，仿佛自己成了一個很難相處的人。直到有一次，我的丈夫勸我，這些東西你也學(xué)過，對你并無害處，為什么不讓孩子們接觸呢？他們長大后會懂得如何獨立思考這些問題。
And that gave me a feeling that perhaps that’s what we all must do—think out for ourselves what we could believe and how we could live by it. And so I came to the conclusion that you had to use this life to develop the very best that you could develop.
丈夫的一番話讓我覺得，或許我們每個人都應(yīng)該這么做——獨立思考自己的信仰以及如何在生活中堅守這些信仰。于是，我意識到，人的一生就應(yīng)該盡力讓自己做到最好。
I don’t know whether I believe in a future life. I believe that all that you go through here must have some value, therefore there must be some reason. And there must be some “going on”. How exactly that happens I’ve never been able to decide. There is a future—that I’m sure of. But how, that I don’t know. And I came to feel that it didn’t really matter very much because whatever the future held you’d have to face it when you came to it, just as whatever life holds you have to face it in exactly the same way. And the important thing was that you never let down doing the best that you were able to do—it might be poor because you might not have very much within you to give, or to help other people with, or to live your life with. But as long as you did the very best that you were able to do, then that was what you were put here to do and that was what you were accomplishing by being here.
我不知道自己是否相信未來。我相信的是，你所經(jīng)歷的一切都是有價值的，因此也必定是有道理的，必定預(yù)示著某些事情即將到來。至于這些事情是如何發(fā)生的，我無法決定。但我深信，一定會有未來。至于未來會如何來臨，我無從所知?？晌议_始覺得這一點并不重要，因為無論未來如何，我們都要面對。那么真正重要的是——傾盡全力做到最好。也許你能力有限，幫不上什么大忙，或者無法讓自己的生活精彩。但是，只要你傾盡全力，完成自己來到世上的使命，那你就不枉此生了。
And so I have tried to follow that out—and not to worry about the future or what was going to happen. I think I am pretty much of a fatalist[23]. You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.
我就是這樣聽從自己的信仰，不再擔心未來，不再為即將發(fā)生的事情憂心。我想我是一個十足的宿命論者。無論發(fā)生什么，你都要勇敢面對。最重要的是，面對的時候別忘了要勇敢，要傾盡全力。
美麗語錄
Just keep your mind open and suck in the experience and if it hurts, it’s probably worth it.
只要你敞開心扉去迎接新的經(jīng)歷，哪怕有所疼痛都是值得的！
