孤独的力量
今天读书群读完了The Willpower Instinct，Willpower这个话题让我想到了海明威的The Old Man and the Sea，翻出来之前的一篇读书笔记和大家分享一下。
The Old Man and the Sea很短一天之内就可以读完，推荐大家边读边听Audiobook，是一种享受。
最大的一个感受就是“孤独”。老人太孤独了，孤独到他不敢把妻子的照片挂在墙上以免睹物思人；
Once there had been a tinted photograph of his wife on the wall but he had taken it down because it made him too lonely to see it and it was on the shelf in the corner under his clean shirt.
孤独到沉默寡言的他在大海上和自己大声的说话。
“If the others heard me talking out loud they would think that I am crazy,” he said aloud. But since I am not crazy, I do not care.
第二个感受是”鸡血“。老人从头到尾都是硬汉形象, 当大鱼第一次跳出来的时候他心里想:
I wonder why he jumped, the old man thought. He jumped almost as though to show me how big he was. I know now, any way, he thought. I wish I could show him what sort of man I am.
当他又抽筋又没力气又受伤的时候，他说:
Pain doesn’t matter to a man.
当他跟鲨鱼作战的时候,
He hit it without hope but with resolution and complete malignancy.
然而这种“硬汉正能量”是靠不停的给自己打鸡血的, 最出名那句名言来自这一段:
It was too good last, he thought. I wish it had been a dream now and that I had never hooked the fish and was alone in bed on the newspapers.
“But man is not made for defeat,” he said. “A man can be destroyed but not defeated.”
可以看出, 他也怀疑过动摇过: 干嘛不好好的过日子非得出来no zuo no die? 但是既然选择了，那就来吧，死而无憾。
他也曾迷茫过，面对一轮又一轮的鲨鱼，他开始胡思乱想，好在他强大到可以控制自己的大脑, 他命令自己:
Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is.
作为一个英语学习为主题的公众号，我不得不补充一句: 其实学英语也是如此诶 -- 忍得住寂寞，一边死磕，一边学会放下。
我们以为明天会更美好，事实更可能是明天会和今天一样糟糕。利用我们已有的，踏实诚实地前进吧。
Thinking so highly of our futyre selves would be fine if we could really count on our future selves to behave so nobly. But more typically, when we get to the future, our ideal future is nowhere to be found, and our same old self is left making the decisions.