So this happy pick of me was taken in 1999. I was senior in college. It was right after dance practice. I was really, really happy. And I remember exactly where I was. About a week and a half later, I was sitting in the back of my used minivan in a campus parking lot, when I decided that I was going to commit suicide, and I went from deciding to a full blown planning very quickly.
所以这张我看起来很开心的照片拍摄于1999年。那时我大学快毕业了。照片拍摄于舞蹈练习刚结束之后。我当时真的、真的很开心。而且我清楚地记得自己当时所处的位置。大约一周半后，我坐在校园停车场一辆二手小型货车后排座位上，当时我决定要自杀，并且很快就从做出决定发展到精心策划整个过程。
And I came this close to the edge of the precipice. It's the closest I've ever come, and the only reason I took my finger off the trigger was. Thanks to a few lucky coincidences and after the fact that's what scared me the most the element of chance.
我离悬崖边缘只有一步之遥。这是我离死亡最近的一次，我之所以松开扳机，唯一的原因是——多亏了几次幸运的巧合。而事后让我最后怕的，正是这种偶然性带来的致命威胁。
I became very methodical about testing different ways that I could manage my ups and downs, which has proven to be a good investment. Many normal people might have said six to ten major depressive episodes in their lives.
我开始有条不紊地测试各种应对情绪起伏的方法，事实证明这是一项有益的投入。而许多普通人可能会说，他们一生中经历了六到十次重性抑郁发作。
I have bipolar depression runs in my family. I've had 50 plus at this point, and I've learned a lot. I've had a lot of at bats many rounds in the ring with darkness taking good notes. So I thought rather than get up and give any type of recipe for success or highlight real, I would share my recipe for avoiding selfdestruction and certainly self paralysis.
双相情感障碍在我的家族中延续。到目前为止，我已经经历了50多次发作，并从中学习到了很多。在无数次与黑暗的交锋中，我不断汲取经验教训。因此，与其起身传授成功秘诀或高谈阔论，我更想分享一份避免自我毁灭、尤其是防止自我瘫痪的生存法则。
And the tool I've found, which has proven to be the most reliable safety net for emotional freefall, is actually the same that has helped me to make my best business decisions. But that is secondary, and it is stoicism.
而我发现的工具——这个被证明最能成为情绪失控时的安全网的东西——正是同一种帮助我做出最佳商业决策的工具。但其次，它其实是斯多葛主义。
That sounds boring. Might think of Spock or might conjure an image like this. A cow standing in the rain. It's not sad. It's not particularly happy, just an impassive creature taking whatever life sends its way.
这听起来挺无聊的。可能会想到史波克，或者浮现出这样的画面：一头牛站在雨中。不悲伤，也不特别快乐，只是无动于衷地承受着生活给予的一切。
You might not think of the ultimate competitor, say build Belicheck head coach and the New England Patriots. He has the all-time NFL record for Super Bowl titles, and stoicism has spread like wildfire in the top of the NFL ranks as a means of mental toughness.
你可能不会想到终极竞争者，比如新英格兰爱国者队主教练比尔·贝利奇克。他保持着NFL历史上最多次超级碗冠军的纪录，而斯多葛主义（坚韧不拔的精神）已如野火般在NFL顶级球队中蔓延，成为培养心理韧性的重要方式。
Training in the last few years. You might not think of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, George Washington, to name but three students of stoicism. George Washington actually had a play about a stoic.
近几年的学习中，你可能想不到开国元勋们——比如托马斯·杰斐逊、约翰·亚当斯、乔治·华盛顿这三位斯多葛学派的学习者。乔治·华盛顿甚至写过一部关于斯多葛主义者的戏剧。
This was Cato, a tragedy performed for his troops at Valley Forge to keep them motivated. So why would people of action focus so much on an ancient philosophy? This seems very academic, and I would encourage you to think about stoicism a little bit differently, as an operating system for thriving and high stress environments for making better decisions.
这是加图（Cato），一部在福吉谷为华盛顿军队上演的悲剧，旨在鼓舞士气。那么，为什么行动派人士会如此重视一种古代哲学？这看似颇具学术性，但我建议换个角度看待斯多葛主义——将其视为一种在蓬勃发展且压力巨大的环境中茁壮成长、辅助决策的"操作系统"。
And it all started here. Kind of on a porch. So around 300 bc in Athens, someone named Zeno of Citium taught many lectures walking around a painted porch, a stoa that later became stoicism. And in the Greco Roman worlds, people use stoicism as a comprehensive system for doing many, many things.
这一切都始于这里，确切地说是在一个门廊旁。大约公元前300年，在雅典，一位名叫基提翁的芝诺的人在一座彩绘柱廊（stoa）周围边踱步边讲授课程，这座柱廊后来演变为斯多葛学派。在希腊罗马世界中，人们将斯多葛主义作为一种综合性体系，应用于生活的方方面面。
But for our purposes, chief among them was training yourself to separate what you can control from what you cannot control, and then doing exercises to focus exclusively on the former. This decreases emotional reactivity, which can be a superpower.
但就我们的目标而言，其中最重要的是训练自己区分可控与不可控之事，然后通过练习专注于前者。这种能力可以降低情绪反应性，堪称一种超能力。
Conversely, let's say, your quarterback, you miss a pan. So you get furious with yourself that could cost you a game. You're a CEO, and you fly off the handle at a very valued employee because of a minor infraction.
相反，假设你是球队的四分卫，却传球失误。你因此对自己大发雷霆，而这种情绪可能会让你输掉比赛。作为CEO，你却因为员工的一个小过错而暴跳如雷。
That could cost you the employee. If you're a college student who, say, is in a downward spiral and you feel helpless and hopeless unabated, that could cost you your life. So the stakes are very, very high, and there are many tools in the toolkit to get you there.
这可能会导致你失去一名员工。如果你是一名大学生，比如说，陷入恶性循环，感到无助和绝望永无止境，这可能会让你付出生命的代价。因此，风险非常高，而且工具箱中有许多工具可以帮助你渡过难关。
I'm going to focus on one that completely changed my life in 2004. And it found me then, because of two things. A very close friend, young guy my age, died of pancreatic cancer unexpectedly. And then my girlfriend, who I thought I was going to marry, walked out.
我要重点讲述一件在2004年彻底改变了我人生轨迹的事。当时两件事促使这件事降临到我身上：一位与我同龄的挚友猝不及防地因胰腺癌离世；而我原以为会共度余生的女友也离我而去。
She'd had enough, and she didn't give me a dear John letter. But she did give me this a dear John plaque. I'm not making this up. I've kept it. Business hours are over at 5:00. She gave this to me to put on my desk for personal health because at the time I was working on my first real business, I had no idea what I was doing.
她受够了，但没有给我写分手信。不过她确实送了我这个"分手牌匾"。我可不是瞎编的，我一直留着它。下班时间是五点。她把这个挂在我办公桌上说是为了我的身心健康，毕竟那时候我刚创业，根本不知道自己在做什么。
I was working 14 plus hour days, seven days a week. I was using stimulants to get going. I was using depressants to wind down and go to sleep. It was a disaster, completely trapped. I bought a book on simplicity to try to find answers.
我过去每天工作14个小时以上，一周七天无休。我靠兴奋剂来打起精神，又用镇静剂放松身心、强迫自己入睡。这种状态简直是灾难，我完全陷入了困境。后来我买了一本关于极简生活的书，试图寻找答案。
And I did find a quote that made a big difference in my life, which was we suffer more often in imagination than in reality. By Seneca the younger. He was a famous stoic writer. That took me to his letters, which took me to the exercise premedititaio Malorum, which means the premeditation of evils.
我确实找到了这样一句话，对我的人生产生了重大影响——"我们在想象中受苦多于现实"，出自小塞涅卡（Seneca the Younger）。他是著名的斯多葛派哲学家。这句话引导我阅读了他的书信集，进而接触到预想不幸的哲学练习，即通过预先思考可能遭遇的困境来培养心理韧性。
And in simple terms, this is visualizing the worst case scenarios in detail, that you fear preventing you from taking action, so that you can take action overcome that paralysis. My problem was monkey mind super loud, very incessant.
简单来说，这就是通过详细想象你恐惧的最坏情况——那些阻碍你行动的念头——从而让你能够采取行动来克服这种瘫痪状态。我的问题在于头脑中的杂念特别喧闹，持续不断。
Just thinking my way through problems doesn't work. I needed to capture my thoughts on paper. So I created a written exercise that I called fear setting my goal setting for myself and it consists of three pages.
仅仅通过思考来解决问题是行不通的。我需要把想法记录在纸上。于是我创造了一个名为"恐惧设定"的书面练习——这是我为自己设计的目标设定方法，包含三个页面。
Super simple. First page is right here. What if I dot question mark? This is whatever you fear. Whatever is causing you anxiety, whatever you're putting off could be asking someone out, ending a relationship, asking for a promotion, quitting a job, starting a company could be anything.
超级简单。第一页就在这里。要是万一我不确定呢？这就是你所恐惧的一切。无论是什么让你焦虑，无论你在拖延什么——可能是约某人出去、结束一段关系、要求升职、辞职、创业……这些都可能是任何事情。
For me, it was taking my first vacation in four years, and stepping away from my business for a month to go to London, where I could stay in a French room for free, to either remove myself as a bottleneck in the business or shut it down.
对我来说，这是四年来首次休假——离开生意一个月前往伦敦，那里我能免费入住一间法式房间。此举目的在于：要么消除自己作为公司发展的瓶颈，要么直接关闭业务。
In the first column. Define your writing down all of the worst things you can imagine happening if you take that step and you want ten to 20. I'm not going to go through all of them, but I'll give you two examples so one was.
在第一列中。写下你能想象到的所有最糟糕的事情，如果你采取了那一步骤——你需要列出10到20件。我不会全部列举，但我会给你两个例子，比如其中一个例子是……
I'll go to London. It will be rainy. I'll get depressed. The whole thing will be a huge waste of time. Number two, I'll miss a letter from the IRS and I'll get audited or rated, or shut down or some such.
我要去伦敦。那里会下雨。我会变得抑郁。整件事会完全浪费时间。第二，我会收不到国税局的信，然后被审计、被评估、被关闭，诸如此类。
Then you go to the prevent column. In that column, you write down the answer to what could I do to prevent each of these bolts from happening? Or at the very least, decrease the likelihood even a little bit.
然后转到预防措施栏。在该栏中，写下你能采取哪些措施来防止这些（问题/螺栓）发生？或者至少稍微降低其发生的可能性。
So for getting depressed in London, I could take a portable blue light with me, use it for 15 minutes in the morning. I knew that help to stave off depressive episodes for the IRS bit. I could change the mailing address on file with the IRS, so the paperwork could go to my accountant instead of to my upps address.
因此，为了应对在伦敦可能出现的抑郁情绪，我可以随身携带便携式蓝光灯，每天早晨使用15分钟。我知道这种方法有助于预防季节性抑郁发作。我还可以向国税局更新档案中的邮寄地址，这样相关文件就能寄给我的会计师，而不是寄到我之前的地址了。
Easy pz. Then we go to repair. So if the worst case scenario has happened, what could you do to repair the damage? Even a little bit. Or who could you ask for help? So in the first case, London, well, I could fork over some money, fly to Spain, get some sun, undo the damage if I got into a funk.
翻译：别担心。那我们就开始修复吧。所以如果最坏的情况真的发生了，你能做些什么来挽回损失呢？哪怕只是一点点。或者你可以向谁求助？比如在伦敦的情况，我可以先花点钱，飞去西班牙晒晒太阳，如果我真的情绪低落的话，这样或许能弥补一些损失。
In the case of a missing letter from the IRS, I could call a friend who is a lawyer or ask, say a professor of law, what they would recommend, who I should talk to. How had people handled this in the public?
如果美国国税局（IRS）的信件丢失，我可以给当律师的朋友打电话，或者咨询（比如）一位法学教授，询问他们的建议——我应该联系谁、采取什么行动。公众一般会如何处理这类情况？
Asked. So one question to keep in mind as you're doing this first page is. Has anyone else in the history of time less intelligent or less driven figured this out? Chances are the answer is yes. The second page is simple.
问：在做这第一页时，要记住的一个问题是——有没有历史上比你笨或不够努力的人已经搞定了这个问题？很可能答案是肯定的。第二页就简单了。
What might be the benefits of an attempt or a partial success so you can see we're playing up the fears and really taking a conservative look at the upside. So if you attempted whatever you're considering, might you build confidence develop skills emotionally financially otherwise, what might be the benefits of, say, a base hit?
尝试或部分成功可能带来哪些好处？这样你就能明白，我们是在放大恐惧，同时在保守地评估潜在的收益。如果你着手尝试正在考虑的事情，是否能建立信心、培养情感能力、提升财务能力或其他方面？比如，一次"安打"（比喻小成功）可能带来哪些益处？
Spend ten to 15 minutes on this page. Three. This might be the most important, so don't skip it. The cost of inaction. Humans are very good at considering what might go wrong if we try something new, say, ask for a raise.
请在此页面停留10至15分钟。三、这可能是最重要的部分，请勿跳过。不作为的代价。人们非常擅长设想尝试新事物（比如要求加薪）时可能出现的差错。
What we don't often consider is the atrocious cost of the status quo not changing anything. So you should ask yourself, if I avoid this action or decision, actions and decisions like it, what might my life look like in, say, six months, twelve months, three years any further out, it starts to seem intangible and really get detailed again, emotionally, financially, physically, whatever.
我们常常没有意识到的是，维持现状、不做出任何改变所付出的惨痛代价。因此你应该自问：如果我逃避这个行动或决定，以及类似的行动和决定——比如说六个月后、一年后、三年后，甚至更久之后——我的生活会变成什么样？这时，你的生活开始变得模糊不清，但当你从情感、经济、身体等各方面去仔细审视时，它又会重新变得具体而真实。
And when I did this, it painted a terrifying picture. I was self medicating. My business was going to implode at any moment at all times. If I didn't step away, my relationships were fraying or failing, and I realized that inaction was no longer an option for me.
当我这样做时，它描绘了一幅可怕的图景：我正在靠药物自我麻痹，我的事业随时可能分崩离析，如果我不抽身自省，人际关系也将土崩瓦解。我意识到，继续袖手旁观已经不再是个选项。
Those are the three pages that's it that's fear setting. After this, I realized that on a scale of one to ten, one being minimal impact, ten being maximal impact. If I took the trip, I was risking a one to three of temporary and reversible pain for an eight to ten of positive life-changing impact that could be semi-permanent.
"这就是所谓的恐惧设定，仅此而已。之后我意识到，如果用1到10分的评估标准（1分代表最小影响，10分代表最大影响），选择这次旅行意味着我可能要承受1-3分的暂时性、可逆的痛苦，去换取8-10分的积极改变人生的影响——这种影响甚至可能产生半永久性的效果。"
So I took the trip. None of the disasters came to pass. There were some hiccups. Sure, I was able to extricate myself from the business. I ended up extending that trip for a year and a half around the world.
于是我踏上了旅程。所有的糟糕情况都没有发生，不过还是遇到了一些小插曲。当然，我确实设法从那堆麻烦事中脱了身。结果这次旅行一延再延，最后在全球各地转悠了一年半载。
That became the basis for my first book that leads me here today. I can trace all of my biggest wins and all of my biggest disasters averted back to doing fear setting at least once a quarter. It's not a panacea.
这成为我第一本书的基础，正是这本书让我有了今天的成就。我能将人生中所有重大成功与躲过的重大危机，都追溯到至少每季度进行一次"恐惧设定"。当然，这并非万能解药。
You'll find that some of your fears are very well founded. But you shouldn't conclude that without first putting them under a microscope. And it doesn't make all the hard times the hard choices easy, but it can make a lot of them easier.
你会发现有些恐惧是很有根据的。但你不该在仔细审视之前就妄下定论。虽然它不会让所有的艰难时刻和痛苦抉择都变得轻松，但确实能让其中许多变得容易些。
I'd like to close with a profile of one of my favorite modern day stoics. This is jersey Gregorek. He is a four time world champion in Olympic weightlifting, political refugee, published poet, 62 years old.
最后，我想以一位我最欣赏的现代斯多葛主义者的个人简介作为结尾。这位是杰里·格雷戈里克（Jersey Gregorek）。他是四届奥运会举重世界冠军、政治难民、出版过诗集的诗人，现年62岁。
He can still kick myass and probably most asses in this room. He's, an impressive guy. I spend a lot of time on his stoa, his porch, asking life and training advice. He was part of the solidarity in Poland, which was a nonviolent movement for social change that was violently suppressed by the government.
他现在还能揍扁我，可能还有这屋里大多数人的屁股。他是个了不起的人。我经常在他家门廊上消磨时间，请教人生和训练方面的建议。他曾参与波兰的团结工会运动——那是一场通过非暴力手段推动社会变革的运动，却遭到政府的暴力镇压。
He lost his career as a firefighter. Then his mentor, a priest, was kidnapped, tortured, killed and thrown into a river. He was then threatened. He and his wife had to flee. Poland bounced from country to country until landed in the US with next to nothing.
他丢了消防员的工作。接着，他的导师——一位牧师——遭到绑架、折磨、杀害并被抛入河中。随后，他本人也受到了威胁。他和妻子不得不逃离，辗转多个国家，最终几乎身无分文地抵达美国。
Sleeping on floors. He now lives in Woodside, California, in a very nice place, and of the 10000 plus people I've met in my life, I would put him in the top ten in terms of success and happiness. There's a punchline coming to pay attention.
睡地板。他现在住在加利福尼亚州的伍德赛德，住处非常不错。在我这辈子见过的一万多人里，就成功和幸福程度而言，我能排他进前十。有个笑点要来了，请注意。
I sent him a text a few weeks ago asking him had he ever read any stock philosophy? And he replied with two pages of text. This is very unlike him. He is a terse dude, and not only was he familiar with stoicism, but he pointed out, for all of his most important decisions, his inflection points, when he stood up for his principles and ethics, how he had used stoicism and something akin to fear setting, which blew my mind.
几周前我给他发了一条短信，问他是否读过任何斯多葛哲学相关的书籍？结果他回了我两页纸的长文。这完全不像他平日的作风——他向来是个言简意赅的人。不仅对斯多葛主义颇有研究，更令我震惊的是，在他所有重大决策的转折点上，当他需要坚守原则和道德底线时，他坦言自己是如何运用斯多葛哲学，结合某种类似"恐惧设定"的心理技巧，这番见解彻底颠覆了我的认知。
And he closed with two things. Number one, he couldn't imagine any life more beautiful than that of a stoic. The last was his mantra, which he applies to everything and you can apply to everything. Easy choices.
他最后总结了两点。第一，他想象不出有什么生活比坚忍克己者的生活更美好。最后一点是他的信条，他将其应用于一切，你也能将其应用于一切。这就是简单的选择。
Hard life. Hard choices. Easy life. The hard choices. What we most fear doing, asking, saying, these are very often exactly what we most need to do, and the biggest challenges and problems we face will never be solved with comfortable conversations, whether it's in your own head or with other people.
艰难的生活。艰难的抉择。安逸的生活。那些艰难的抉择。我们最害怕去做的事、去问的问题、去说的话，往往正是我们最需要付诸行动的。无论困扰你的是内心的挣扎还是与他人的矛盾，生活中最大的挑战与难题，永远不可能通过舒适的对话获得解决。
So I encourage you to ask yourselves, where in your lives right now. Might defining your fears be more important than defining your goals? Keeping in mind all the water. The words of Seneca, we suffer more often in imagination than in reality.
所以我鼓励你们问问自己，在你们目前的生活中，哪些地方明确自己的恐惧可能比明确目标更重要？谨记塞涅卡的话：我们受苦更多是因为想象而非现实。