不知从什么时候开始，我们的生活似乎被“将来时态”牢牢掌控。18岁之前，父母和老师告诉我们，“等上大学就好了”。然而，等到大学校园的铃声响起，才发现事实远非如此。大三时，新的目标又被设定——“考上研究生就好了”。可当我们真正踏入研究生生涯，许多人却惊觉，“最快乐的那一刻，可能只是收到录取通知书的瞬间。”就这样，我们被推着奔向一个又一个未来——“毕业了就好了”、“找到好工作就好了”、“升职加薪就好了”……眼睛始终注视着前方，脚步不曾停歇，但回头望去，那些感到真正幸福与满足的时刻却寥寥无几。在这个人人都活在将来时态的社会里，“活在当下”反倒成了一种稀缺而珍贵的能力。![]()
Future Tense
将来时态
原著 | 《焦虑星球笔记》
WHEN PROGRESS HAPPENS fast it can make the present feel like a continual future. When watching a viral clip of a human-sized back-flipping robot, it feels like reality has become science fiction.这个世界发展得太快，现在时态仿佛等同于将来进行时态。有一次，我看到一段网络爆款视频，一个真人大小的机器人在视频中表演后空翻。那一刻，我感觉现实有如科幻电影。And we are encouraged to desire this state of affairs. ‘Embrace’ the future and ‘let go’ of the past. The whole of consumerism is based on us wanting the next thing rather than the present thing we already have. This is an almost perfect recipe for unhappiness.经过潜移默化，我们习惯于向往未来，“拥抱”未来，“放下”过去。消费主义的核心便是鼓励我们“看着锅里”，而非“吃着碗里”。这几乎是导致抑郁的绝佳配方。We are not encouraged to live in the present. We are trained to live somewhere else: the future. We are sent to kindergarten or pre-school, which by its very nature reminds us of what is about to hit us. School school. And once there, from an increasingly early age, we are encouraged to work hard so we pass tests. Eventually, these tests evolve into actual exams, which we know will dictate important future things like whether we pursue further education or decide to get a job at the age of sixteen or eighteen. Even if we go to university, it doesn’t stop there. There will be more tests, more exams, more looming decisions. More where do you see yourself in a few years’ time? More what career path would you like to pursue? More think very carefully about your future. More it will all pay off in the long run.我们不喜欢活在当下。在后天的训练下，我们习惯于活在别处——未来。小时候，我们被送进幼儿园或学前班。“学前班”顾名思义，就是上小学之前的教育，它不断提醒我们未来的方向。是的，上学，上学。可等到我们略长几岁进入了小学，家长和教师便开始循循善诱，鼓励我们用功学习，顺利通过一门又一门的测验。最后，这些测验逐渐进化为真正的大考，我们都知道，这样的大考会决定我们人生关口的走向。例如，到了16岁或18岁，我们该决定是上大学还是闯荡社会。即便我们升入大学，也并非意味着从此便高枕无忧。大学有更多的测验，更多的大考，更多迫在眉睫的决定，更多的“你如何看待几年后的自己”，更多的“你打算以后从事什么工作”，更多的“你该为自己的未来好好打算了”，更多的“从长远来看这对你有好处”。All through our education we are being taught a kind of reverse mindfulness. A kind of Future Studies where – via the guise of mathematics, or literature, or history, or computer programming, or French – we are being taught to think of a time different to the time we are in. Exam time. Job time. When-we-are-grown-up time.被灌输了这些教育理念后，我们渐渐学会了一种逆向思维。一种披着数学、文学、历史、电脑编程或法语的外衣，实则为“未来学”的思维，它教会了我们永远心系别处。于是，我们心心念念的是未来的考试，未来的工作，未来长大成人的自己。To see the act of learning as something not for its own sake but because of what it will get you reduces the wonder of humanity. We are thinking, feeling, art-making, knowledge-hungry, marvellous animals, who understand ourselves and our world through the act of learning. It is an end in itself. It has far more to offer than the things it lets us write on application forms. It is a way to love living right now.学习不再是为了学习本身，而是为了在将来谋得某种利益。这样一来，做人的乐趣便少了许多。我们本是会思考、会感知、会创造艺术、求知若渴的高级动物，学习本是我们了解自己、了解这个世界的一种手段。学习的最终目的便是它本身。它带给我们的远比我们罗列在简历上的证书和成绩要多得多。它是我们活在当下、享受现在的途径之一。I am coming to realise how wrong many of my aspirations have been. How locked out of the present I have found myself. How I have always wanted moreof whatever was in front of me. I need to find a way to stay still, in the present, and, as my nan used to say, be happy with what you have.我逐渐意识到我曾经的诸多抱负错得有多离谱。我把当下抛得太远太远，我总是一心盯着前方，总是渴望更多。我得让自己沉淀下来，好好享受现在。正如幼时奶奶对我说的那样，“随遇而安，知足常乐”。本书下载链接
https://iyuedu.top/posts/books/notes-on-a-nervous-planet/
