雙語故事:一個選擇,會改變你的生活
【英文原文】
One Choice That Will Change Your Life
This evening I met a friend at a local bar. She brought her laptop along so she could show me some of her latest digital art designs. As we chatted and scrolled through her artwork, the laptop suddenly started making an unhealthy buzzing noise, then the screen flickered on and off and then cut off completely. And as we both stared at one another in dismay, the funky smell of fried computer circuits consumed our nostrils.
I grabbed the laptop off the bar to inspect it and the problem instantly revealed itself. The bottom of the laptop was soaking wet and an empty, spilt water glass rested against the side of her purse just behind where the laptop was sitting. In the midst of us chatting and shifting the laptop’s 17 inch screen back and forth, we somehow spilt a glass of water that the bartender had inadvertently placed behind the screen, which was out of our view.
When life throws us nasty curveballs like this, it typically doesn’t make any sense to us, and our natural emotional reaction might be to get extremely upset and scream obscenities at the top of our lungs. But how does this help our dilemma? Obviously, it doesn’t.
The smartest, and oftentimes hardest, thing we can do in these kinds of situations is to be more tempered in our reactions. To want to scream obscenities, but to wiser and more disciplined than that. To remember that emotional rage only makes matters worse. And to remember that tragedies are rarely as bad as they seem, and even when they are, they give us an opportunity to grow stronger.
Every difficult moment in our lives is accompanied by an opportunity for personal growth and creativity. But in order to attain this growth and creativity, we must first learn to control our emotions. We must recognize that difficulties pass like everything else in life. And once they pass, all we’re left with are our unique experiences with each other and this crazy world, and the lessons we’ve learned along the way.
Life is short. Our thoughts steer our reality. We already know this. The choice is ours to make.
【中文譯文】
今天傍晚，我在當地的一個酒吧遇到了一個朋友。她隨身帶了個筆記本電腦，來給我看她最新的數字藝術設計。就在我們談論和瀏覽她的作品時，電腦突然發出了一陣不正常的嗡嗡聲，隨後屏幕不停的閃爍，直至完全關機。我們詫異地盯着對方，卻聞到了一股難聞的焦味。
我抓起了電腦，走出酒吧。一檢查，問題馬上就明瞭了。電腦的底部被浸溼了，水杯翻倒在了她的錢包旁，裏面的水全翻了出來，而恰巧那電腦就放在錢包的前面。我們談論時反覆地移動那17寸的屏幕，就這樣打翻了服務生送來的一杯水，他無意地放在了屏幕的後面，這也是我們沒有預料到的。
當生活給我們出類似於這種棘手的難題時，對我們來說根本不算什麼，我們自然的情緒反應可能會感到非常沮喪，想要聲嘶力竭地尖叫。但這樣會幫我們脫離困境嗎？顯然不會。
在這些情況下，我們只需在反應中鍛鍊自己，這也是最聰明，通常也是最難的事。與其出口污言，不如使自己變的更明智，更具約束力。留有狂怒的情緒只會使事情變得更糟，而記住這些不幸的遭遇卻不像它們本身那麼糟，反而是一個讓我們變得更堅強的機會。
在我們的生命中，每個艱難時刻都伴有一個自我成長和創造的機會，但我們必須首先要學會控制自己的情緒，這樣才能把握住這個機會。必須承認，困難是我們生命中的一個個過客，就像其他東西一樣。一旦經歷過這些困難，我們擁有的不僅是和他人以及這個瘋狂世界的獨特的經歷，還有從中學到的教訓。
生命是短暫的，我們的思想掌控着現實的生活。我們早就知道了這點。選擇，由我們自己做。
