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畢業演講－一切順利，沒問題。好。不，肯定棒極了。這是很棒的演講，你們會這麼說，我保證。絕對棒極了。
樹林裡有兩條叉路，而－（引用自Joss Whedon本人的名言）－不（笑聲），我沒那麼混（笑聲）。事實上，我參加過許多畢業典禮。當我坐在你們所坐的位置時，演講者是比爾‧寇司比（喜劇演員，代表作為《天才老爹》）。比爾‧寇司比很幽默，演講風趣而簡短，我對此十分感謝。但－他給我們的建議令我刻骨銘心，令許多畢業生永難忘懷－關於改變世界的建議。他說：「你無法改變世界，所以省省吧！」（笑聲）
僅此而已，他完全不曾加以解釋，然後開始抱怨替女兒買車的事，我們只好開溜（笑聲）。我記得我心想，你知道，我想我應該能表現得好些，也許能比這稍微振奮人心些。因此，我想告訴大家的是：你們全都正邁向死亡。（笑聲）（掌聲）
好，因此－這是一場很棒的演講，因為我認為－之後將漸入佳境，對嗎？只可能漸入佳境，所以這是好事。我的意思是，不可能更令人沮喪了。你們確實已開始邁向死亡，對嗎？你們的氣色棒極了（笑聲），別誤會我的意思。你們擁有青春和美貌，你們正處於生理顛峰期。你們的身體剛攀上成長和潛能的高峰，現在開始每況愈下，朝墳墓邁進。（笑聲）
令人不解的是，你的身體渴望死亡。以細胞層面來說，這是它的期望；也許不是你的期望。我從各位身上看見各式各樣的雄心壯志；有人想成為政治家、社會工作者，有人想成為藝術家，但身體的目標是：塵土。你的身體想製造一些嬰兒，然後歸於塵土、滋養萬物；僅此而已。這似乎有點矛盾，似乎不太公平。一方面，我們勉勵你們：「勇敢邁向世界！」一方面，你的身體卻說：「嘿，別急，慢慢來。」
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以下為系統擷取之英文原文
“Commencement address—it’s going well, it’s going well. Thank you, Jeanine, for…making me do this.
This is going to be great. This is going to be a good one. It’s gonna go really well.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and… no. I’m not that lazy.
I actually sat through many graduations. When I was siting where you guys were sitting, the speaker was Bill Cosby—funny man Bill Cosby, he was very funny and he was very brief, and I thanked him for that. He gave us a message that I really took with me, that a lot of us never forgot, about changing the world. He said, “you’re not going to change the world, so don’t try.”
That was it. He didn’t buy that back at all. And then he complained about buying his daughter a car and we left. I remember thinking, “I think I can do better. I think I can be a little more inspiring than that.”
And so, what I’d like to say to all of you is that you are all going to die.
This is a good commencement speech because I’m figuring it’s only going to go up from here. It can only get better, so this is good. It can’t get more depressing. You have, in fact, already begun to die. You look great. Don’t get me wrong. And you are youth and beauty. You are at the physical peak. Your bodies have just gotten off the ski slope on the peak of growth, potential, and now comes the black diamond mogul run to the grave. And the weird thing is your body wants to die. On a cellular level, that’s what it wants. And that’s probably not what you want.
I’m confronted by a great deal of grand and worthy ambition from this student body. You want to be a politician, a social worker. You want to be an artist. Your body’s ambition: Mulch. Your body wants to make some babies and then go in the ground and fertilize things. That’s it. And that seems like a bit of a contradiction. It doesn’t seem fair. For one thing, we’re telling you, “Go out into the world!” exactly when your body is saying, “Hey, let’s bring it down a notch. Let’s take it down.”
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這是一個矛盾，這正是我想和大家談論的話題：肉體和心智之間的矛盾，及心智本身的矛盾。我認為這些矛盾和分歧是我們最珍貴的天賦，希望我能解釋清楚。但首先，我想告訴大家，我所謂的矛盾是指根深蒂固地存在於你的生命和性格中的特質；不僅存在於你的肉體，也存在於你的心靈。也許你能意識到，也許不能。
我們不妨假設樹林裡有兩條叉路，你選擇人煙較稀少的道路。部分的你想著：「看那條路！另外那條，看起來好多了。大家都走那條路；路面平整，似乎每50碼就有一家星巴克。這條路是錯的，路上蕁麻遍佈，還有羅伯特‧佛洛斯特（美國詩人）的屍體（笑聲）。應該有人把它移開，感覺不太對勁。」你的心不僅這麼告訴你，它已邁向另一條道路，彷彿在那條道路上前進；它和你的做法分道揚鑣。
在你一生當中，以某種程度來說，你將做出違背心意的事。不僅是你所做的事，還有你對自己的認知。這是持續發生的情形，無論你多麼盡力，都可能做出違背心意的事。你需要做的是：尊重這個事實，瞭解它、體會它，傾聽另一個不同的聲音。
好，我現在要摘下帽子，因為－否則它會在不恰當的時機以誇張的方式飛出去（笑聲）。我知道，頭髮的問題讓我困擾很久了，因此－我得想個辦法才是。（笑聲）
你們擁有一項珍貴的東西－傾聽內心不同聲音的能力和責任。至少給它發言權，因為這是關鍵－不僅對自我認知而言，對真正的成長亦是如此。接受這個雙重性，才能獲得真正的自我。自我是隨著生命軌跡持續發展的特質，不僅在於成為什麼樣的人，而是你必須積極參與的過程。不僅是追隨父母的腳步或博學師長的想法，最重要的是瞭解自己，才能獲得真正的自我。
談到這個矛盾、這個分歧，我想說明兩件事。第一，它永遠不會消失。如果你認為實現某些目標，如果你認為解決某些問題，如果你認為擁有某種職業或親密關係，就能平息這個聲音，那就錯了。如果你認為快樂意味著全然的平靜，你將永遠無法獲得快樂。平靜來自於接受部分的你永遠無法獲得平靜這個事實。矛盾永遠存在，如果你接受它，一切都會順利多了。
另一個原因是，鑒於你逐步建立自我和信念，你需要自我質疑，因為別人會這麼做。別人會挑戰你；無論你擁有什麼信仰、想法、抱負，總會有人提出質疑。除非你先自我質疑，否則無法辯駁他人的質疑，無法堅守自己的立場。如果你不相信，試著僅用一隻腳站立；你必須瞭解事物的兩面。
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And it is a contradiction. And that’s actually what I’d like to talk to you about. The contradiction between your body and your mind, between your mind and itself. I believe these contradictions and these tensions are the greatest gift that we have, and hopefully, I can explain that.
But first let me say when I talk about contradiction, I’m talking about something that is a constant in your life and in your identity, not just in your body but in your own mind, in ways that you may recognize or you may not.
Let’s just say, hypothetically, that two roads diverged in the woods and you took the path less traveled. Part of you is just going, “Look at that path! Over there, it’s much better. Everyone is traveling on it. It’s paved, and there’s like a Starbucks every 40 yards. This is wrong. In this one, there’s nettles and Robert Frost’s body—somebody should have moved that—it just feels weird. And not only does your mind tell you this, it is on that other path, it is behaving as though it is on that path. It is doing the opposite of what you are doing. And for your entire life, you will be doing, on some level, the opposite—not only of what you were doing—but of what you think you are. That is just going to go on. What you do with all your heart, you will do the opposite of. And what you need to do is to honor that, to understand it, to unearth it, to listen to this other voice.
You have, which is a rare thing, that ability and the responsibility to listen to the dissent in yourself, to at least give it the floor, because it is the key—not only to consciousness-but to real growth. To accept duality is to earn identity. And identity is something that you are constantly earning. It is not just who you are. It is a process that you must be active in. It’s not just parroting your parents or the thoughts of your learned teachers. It is now more than ever about understanding yourself so you can become yourself.
I talk about this contradiction, and this tension, there’s two things I want to say about it. One, it never goes away. And if you think that achieving something, if you think that solving something, if you think a career or a relationship will quiet that voice, it will not. If you think that happiness means total peace, you will never be happy. Peace comes from the acceptance of the part of you that can never be at peace. It will always be in conflict. If you accept that, everything gets a lot better.
The other reason is because you are establishing your identities and your beliefs, you need to argue yourself down, because somebody else will. Somebody’s going to come at you, and whatever your belief, your idea, your ambition, somebody’s going to question it. And unless you have first, you won’t be able to answer back, you won’t be able to hold your ground. You don’t believe me, try taking a stand on just one leg. You need to see both sides.
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好，如果你這麼做，意味著你可以改變世界嗎？好，我馬上就會解釋，別急。關於這一點，我只能說－我想我們都同意，這個世界需要稍作改變。我不知道父母是否曾經向你們解釋關於這個世界的情形，但我們－把它搞砸了（笑聲）。呃…抱歉－呃…情況有點糟。外面的世界生活不易，而－我們的國家正處於特殊時期。我認為我們國家的情形－喔，還不錯，我很喜歡。這個國家不再重視矛盾或分歧，不再重視這類的事。它希望事物簡單明瞭，傾向於將事物分類：好或壞、黑或白、藍或紅。我們並非如此；我們複雜多了。
我們進入這樣的世界，必須瞭解自己本身的矛盾、瞭解他人的矛盾，但不因此評判他人。欲瞭解這一點－在這個理性辯論日益減少、非理性的喧囂和恃強凌弱取而代之的世界－最佳做法並非據理力爭，而是輸掉辯論，因為這意味著你學到某些教訓。改變固有的想法，真正瞭解自我想法及其價值的唯一方式，就是瞭解與其對立的想法。
這並不是指在廣播中散佈憎恨的瘋子，而是指所有認為有必要傾聽那些話語的人所代表的人世真理。你和那些人息息相關，他們和傳播憎恨的人息息相關；你無法脫離這一切。這個關聯是矛盾的一部分，這就是我所謂的分歧。因為分歧並非兩個對立的點，而是連接它們的線，由對立端點所延伸。我們需要理解並尊重這種分歧，以及包含這種分歧的聯繫。不僅是與我們所愛之人的聯繫，而是與每個人的聯繫，包括我們無法忍受、不願與之共處的人。基本上，這份聯繫定義了部分的我們。
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Now, if you do, does this mean that you get to change the world? Well, I’m getting to that, so just chill. All I can say to this point is I think we can all agree that the world could use a little changing. I don’t know if your parents have explained this to you about the world but… we broke it. I’m sorry… it’s a bit of a mess. It’s a hard time to go out there. And it’s a weird time in our country.
The thing about our country is—oh, it’s nice, I like it—it’s not long on contradiction or ambiguity. It’s not long on these kinds of things. It likes things to be simple, it likes things to be pigeonholed—good or bad, black or white, blue or red. And we’re not that. We’re more interesting than that. And the way that we go into the world understanding is to have these contradictions in ourselves and see them in other people and not judge them for it. To know that, in a world where debate has kind of fallen away and given way to shouting and bullying, that the best thing is not just the idea of honest debate, the best thing is losing the debate, because it means that you learn something and you changed your position. The only way really to understand your position and its worth is to understand the opposite. That doesn’t mean the crazy guy on the radio who is spewing hate, it means the decent human truths of all the people who feel the need to listen to that guy. You are connected to those people. They’re connected to him. You can’t get away from it.
This connection is part of contradiction. It is the tension I was talking about. This tension isn’t about two opposite points, it’s about the line in between them, and it’s being stretched by them. We need to acknowledge and honor that tension, and the connection that that tension is a part of. Our connection not just to the people we love, but to everybody, including people we can’t stand and wish weren’t around. The connection we have is part of what defines us on such a basic level.
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所謂的自由並非脫離聯繫；連環殺人屬於脫離聯繫，某些大型投資公司建立脫離聯繫的制度，但身為人類的我們不會這麼做。我們不該這麼做，也不該希望這麼做。毫無疑問地，我們是獨立的個體。但不僅如此，因此以下內容和改變世界有關。
事實上，這並非問題所在，因為你們沒有選擇。你們將改變世界，因為這正是世界的屬性。你並非經歷生命，而是生命經歷你。你體驗它、詮釋它、做出反應，它因此變得不同。這是持續發生的情形；你們不斷地改變世界，一向如此。現在，它以前所未有的方式變得真實，這就是為什麼我只談論你們本身和你們內在的分歧，因為你們－這並非陳腔濫調，它具有特殊的字面意義－你們代表未來。你們走上講台、下台之後，將成為當下的主宰。你們將接管這個支離破碎的世界，成為改變它的力量－以前所未有的方式。你們將達成許多成就。
我希望自己早點知道、並與大家分享的一個領悟是：別只做部分的自己，盡力活出完整的生命；別只是活在世上，成為聯繫死亡的端點。
活在當下，活出生命中的每一刻。瞭解它、體會它、珍惜它、享受它，謝謝。
（歡呼聲）（掌聲）
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Freedom is not freedom from connection. Serial killing is freedom from connection. Certain large investment firms have established freedom from connection. But we as people never do, and we’re not supposed to, and we shouldn’t want to. We are individuals, obviously, but we are more than that.
So here’s the thing about changing the world. It turns out that’s not even the question, because you don’t have a choice. You are going to change the world, because that is actually what the world is. You do not pass through this life, it passes through you. You experience it, you interpret it, you act, and then it is different. That happens constantly. You are changing the world. You always have been, and now, it becomes real on a level that it hasn’t been before.
And that’s why I’ve been talking only about you and the tension within you, because you are—not in a clichéd sense, but in a weirdly literal sense—the future. After you walk up here and walk back down, you’re going to be the present. You will be the broken world and the act of changing it, in a way that you haven’t been before. You will be so many things, and the one thing that I wish I’d known and want to say is, don’t just be yourself. Be all of yourselves. Don’t just live. Be that other thing connected to death. Be life. Live all of your life. Understand it, see it, appreciate it. And have fun.”
