斯坦福大學(xué)英文演講：別在不斷優(yōu)秀中淪落平庸（上）
What Are You Going to Do With That?
教育為何?
By William Deresiewicz
The question my title poses, of course, is the one that is classically aimed at humanities majors. What practical value could there possibly be in studying literature or art or philosophy? So you must be wondering why I'm bothering to raise it here, at Stanford, this renowned citadel of science and technology. What doubt can there be that the world will offer you many opportunities to use your degree?
我的題目提出的問(wèn)題，當(dāng)然，是一個(gè)傳統(tǒng)地面向人文科學(xué)的專業(yè)所提出的問(wèn)題：學(xué)習(xí)文學(xué)、藝術(shù)或哲學(xué)能有什么實(shí)效價(jià)值(practical value)?你肯定納悶，我為什么在以科技堡壘而聞名的斯坦福提出這個(gè)問(wèn)題呢?大學(xué)學(xué)位給人帶來(lái)眾多機(jī)會(huì)，這還有什么需要質(zhì)疑的嗎?
But that's not the question I'm asking. By "do" I don't mean a job, and by "that" I don't mean your major. We are more than our jobs, and education is more than a major. Education is more than college, more even than the totality of your formal schooling, from kindergarten through graduate school. By "What are you going to do," I mean, what kind of life are you going to lead? And by "that," I mean everything in your training, formal and informal, that has brought you to be sitting here today, and everything you're going to be doing for the rest of the time that you're in school.
但那不是我提出的問(wèn)題。這里的“做(do)”并不是指工作，“那(that)”并不是指你的專業(yè)。我們不僅僅是我們的工作，教育的全部也不僅僅是一門主修專業(yè)。教育也不僅僅是上大學(xué)，甚至也不僅是從幼兒園到研究生院的正規(guī)學(xué)校教育。我說(shuō)的“你要做什么”的意思是你要過(guò)什么樣的生活。我所說(shuō)的“那”指的是你得到的正規(guī)或非正規(guī)的任何訓(xùn)練，那些把你送到這里來(lái)的東西，你在學(xué)校的剩余時(shí)間里將要做的任何事。
We should start by talking about how you did, in fact, get here.
我們不妨先來(lái)討論你是如何考入斯坦福的吧。
You got here by getting very good at a certain set of skills. Your parents pushed you to excel from the time you were very young. They sent you to good schools, where the encouragement of your teachers and the example of your peers helped push you even harder. Your natural aptitudes were nurtured so that, in addition to excelling in all your subjects, you developed a number of specific interests that you cultivated with particular vigor. You did extracurricular activities, went to afterschool programs, took private lessons. You spent summers doing advanced courses at a local college or attending skill-specific camps and workshops. You worked hard, you paid attention, and you tried your very best. And so you got very good at math, or piano, or lacrosse, or, indeed, several things at once.
你能進(jìn)入這所大學(xué)說(shuō)明你在某些技能上非常出色。你的父母在你很小的時(shí)候就鼓勵(lì)你追求卓越。他們送你到好學(xué)校，老師的鼓勵(lì)和同伴的榜樣激勵(lì)你更努力地學(xué)習(xí)。除了在所有課程上都出類拔萃之外，你還注重修養(yǎng)的提高，充滿熱情地培養(yǎng)了一些特殊興趣。你用幾個(gè)暑假在本地大學(xué)里預(yù)習(xí)大學(xué)課程，或參加專門技能的夏令營(yíng)或訓(xùn)練營(yíng)。你學(xué)習(xí)刻苦、精力集中、全力以赴。所以，你在數(shù)學(xué)、鋼琴、曲棍球等眾多方面都很出色。
Now there's nothing wrong with mastering skills, with wanting to do your best and to be the best. What's wrong is what the system leaves out: which is to say, everything else. I don't mean that by choosing to excel in math, say, you are failing to develop your verbal abilities to their fullest extent, or that in addition to focusing on geology, you should also focus on political science, or that while you're learning the piano, you should also be working on the flute. It is the nature of specialization, after all, to be specialized. No, the problem with specialization is that it narrows your attention to the point where all you know about and all you want to know about, and, indeed, all you can know about, is your specialty.
掌握這些技能當(dāng)然沒有錯(cuò)，全力以赴成為最優(yōu)秀的人也沒有錯(cuò)。錯(cuò)誤之處在于這個(gè)體系遺漏的地方：即任何別的東西。我并不是說(shuō)因?yàn)檫x擇鉆研數(shù)學(xué)，所以你的'語(yǔ)文能力沒得到充分發(fā)展;也不是說(shuō)除了集中精力學(xué)習(xí)地質(zhì)學(xué)之外，你還應(yīng)該研究政治學(xué);也不是說(shuō)你在學(xué)習(xí)鋼琴時(shí)還應(yīng)該學(xué)吹笛子。畢竟，專業(yè)化的本質(zhì)就是要專業(yè)性�？墒牵瑢I(yè)化的問(wèn)題在于它把你的注意力限制在一個(gè)點(diǎn)上，你所已知的和你想探知的東西都限界于此。真的，你能知道的一切就只是你的專業(yè)了。
The problem with specialization is that it makes you into a specialist. It cuts you off, not only from everything else in the world, but also from everything else in yourself. And of course, as college freshmen, your specialization is only just beginning. In the journey toward the success that you all hope to achieve, you have completed, by getting into Stanford, only the first of many legs. Three more years of college, three or four or five years of law school or medical school or a Ph.D. program, then residencies or postdocs or years as a junior associate. In short, an ever-narrowing funnel of specialization. You go from being a political-science major to being a lawyer to being a corporate attorney to being a corporate attorney focusing on taxation issues in the consumer-products industry. You go from being a biochemistry major to being a doctor to being a cardiologist to being a cardiac surgeon who performs heart-valve replacements.
專業(yè)化的問(wèn)題是它讓你成為專家，切斷你與世界上其他任何東西的聯(lián)系，不僅如此，還切斷你與自身其他潛能的聯(lián)系。當(dāng)然，作為大一新生，你的專業(yè)才剛剛開始。在你走向所渴望的成功之路的過(guò)程中，進(jìn)入斯坦福是你踏上的眾多階梯中的一個(gè)。再讀三年大學(xué)，三五年法學(xué)院或醫(yī)學(xué)院或博士，然后再干若干年住院實(shí)習(xí)生或博士后或助理教授�？偠灾M(jìn)入越來(lái)越狹窄的專業(yè)化軌道。你可能從政治學(xué)專業(yè)的學(xué)生變成了律師或者公司代理人，再變成專門研究消費(fèi)品領(lǐng)域的稅收問(wèn)題的公司代理人。你從生物化學(xué)專業(yè)的學(xué)生變成了博士，再變成心臟病學(xué)家，再變成專門做心臟瓣膜移植的心臟病醫(yī)生。
Again, there's nothing wrong with being those things. It's just that, as you get deeper and deeper into the funnel, into the tunnel, it becomes increasingly difficult to remember who you once were. You start to wonder what happened to that person who played piano and lacrosse and sat around with her friends having intense conversations about life and politics and all the things she was learning in her classes. The 19-year-old who could do so many things, and was interested in so many things, has become a 40-year-old who thinks about only one thing. That's why older people are so boring. "Hey, my dad's a smart guy, but all he talks about is money and livers."
再次，做這些事沒有任何錯(cuò)。只不過(guò)，在你越來(lái)越深入地進(jìn)入這個(gè)軌道后，再記得你最初的樣子就益發(fā)困難了。你開始懷念那個(gè)曾經(jīng)談鋼琴和打曲棍球的人，思考那個(gè)曾經(jīng)和朋友熱烈討論人生和政治以及在課堂內(nèi)容的人在做什么。那個(gè)活潑能干的19歲年輕人已經(jīng)變成了只想一件事的40歲中年人。難怪年長(zhǎng)的人這么乏味無(wú)趣。“哎，我爸爸曾經(jīng)是非常聰明的人，但他現(xiàn)在除了談?wù)撳X和肝臟外再無(wú)其他。”
And there's another problem. Maybe you never really wanted to be a cardiac surgeon in the first place. It just kind of happened. It's easy, the way the system works, to simply go with the flow. I don't mean the work is easy, but the choices are easy. Or rather, the choices sort of make themselves. You go to a place like Stanford because that's what smart kids do. You go to medical school because it's prestigious. You specialize in cardiology because it's lucrative. You do the things that reap the rewards, that make your parents proud, and your teachers pleased, and your friends impressed. From the time you started high school and maybe even junior high, your whole goal was to get into the best college you could, and so now you naturally think about your life in terms of "getting into" whatever's next. "Getting into" is validation; "getting into" is victory. Stanford, then Johns Hopkins medical school, then a residency at the University of San Francisco, and so forth. Or Michigan Law School, or Goldman Sachs, or McKinsey, or whatever. You take it one step at a time, and the next step always seems to be inevitable.
還有另外一個(gè)問(wèn)題�；蛟S你從來(lái)沒有想過(guò)當(dāng)心臟病醫(yī)生，只是碰巧發(fā)生了而已。隨大流最容易，這就是體制的力量。我不是說(shuō)這個(gè)工作容易，而是說(shuō)做出這種選擇很容易�；蛘撸@些根本就不是自己做出的選擇。你來(lái)到斯坦福這樣的名牌大學(xué)是因?yàn)槁斆鞯暮⒆佣歼@樣。你考入醫(yī)學(xué)院是因?yàn)樗牡匚桓撸巳硕剂w慕。你選擇心臟病學(xué)是因?yàn)楫?dāng)心臟病醫(yī)生的待遇很好。你做那些事能給你帶來(lái)好處，讓你的父母感到驕傲，令你的老師感到高興，也讓朋友們羨慕。從你上高中開始，甚至初中開始，你的唯一目標(biāo)就是進(jìn)入最好的大學(xué)，所以現(xiàn)在你會(huì)很自然地從“進(jìn)入下個(gè)階段”的角度看待人生。“進(jìn)入”就是能力的證明，“進(jìn)入”就是勝利。先進(jìn)入斯坦福，然后是約翰霍普金斯醫(yī)學(xué)院，再進(jìn)入舊金山大學(xué)做實(shí)習(xí)醫(yī)生等�；蛘哌M(jìn)入密歇根法學(xué)院，或高盛集團(tuán)或麥肯錫公司或別的什么地方。你邁出了這一步，下一步似乎就必然在等著你。
Or maybe you did always want to be a cardiac surgeon. You dreamed about it from the time you were 10 years old, even though you had no idea what it really meant, and you stayed on course for the entire time you were in school. You refused to be enticed from your path by that great experience you had in AP history, or that trip you took to Costa Rica the summer after your junior year in college, or that terrific feeling you got taking care of kids when you did your rotation in pediatrics during your fourth year in medical school.
也許你確實(shí)想當(dāng)心臟病學(xué)家。十歲時(shí)就夢(mèng)想成為醫(yī)生，即使你根本不知道醫(yī)生意味著什么。你在上學(xué)期間全身心都在朝著這個(gè)目標(biāo)前進(jìn)。你拒絕了上大學(xué)預(yù)修歷史課時(shí)的美妙體驗(yàn)的誘惑，也無(wú)視你在醫(yī)學(xué)院第四年的兒科學(xué)輪流值班時(shí)照看孩子的可怕感受。
But either way, either because you went with the flow or because you set your course very early, you wake up one day, maybe 20 years later, and you wonder what happened: how you got there, what it all means. Not what it means in the "big picture," whatever that is, but what it means to you. Why you're doing it, what it's all for. It sounds like a cliché, this "waking up one day," but it's called having a midlife crisis, and it happens to people all the time.
不管是什么，要么因?yàn)槟汶S大流，要么因?yàn)槟阍缇瓦x定了道路，20年后某天醒來(lái)，你或許會(huì)納悶到底發(fā)生了什么：你怎么變成現(xiàn)在這個(gè)樣子，這一切意味著什么。不是它是什么，不在于它是否是“大藍(lán)圖”而是它對(duì)你意味著什么。你為什么做它?到底為了什么?這聽起來(lái)像老生常談，但這個(gè)被稱為中年危機(jī)的“有一天醒來(lái)”一直就發(fā)生在每個(gè)人身上。
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