双语有声阅读：经历的痛苦，也是人生的财富

 There’s no rose without a thorn. This thought is absolutely necessary to prepare you to experience less pain and more joy in your journey of life.

人生固然有欢乐，但也一定不乏痛苦。有了这种认识和思想准备也是非常必要的，因为这样会使你的生活增加欢乐而减少痛苦。

With a bird’s-eye view, you may realize something meaningful. During your school years, while joyfully¹ acquiring knowledge you are also under the pressure of homework, examinations, and ranking. You face crises and agony. Meanwhile, all sorts of intricate affairs may happen between you and your classmates. In your youth, puberty may fill you with unrealized desires and send you into deeper perplexity.

鸟瞰人生，可略有领悟。上学时，有获得知识的乐趣，便有做功课、考试、排名次的危机与痛苦。同样，也有同学间相处的融合与纠结。青年时，春心萌动，幻想联翩，难以实现，亦难免陷入困扰。

Entering marriage, you are actually in the center of all the contradictions—the matching of different personalities², enduring of family members, children’s schooling³, financial management and so on, you may also fall into marriage crisis. As you age, your health may deteriorate⁴ and various troubles in your career and family may gradually emerge. Mid-life and old-age crisis will follow, leading you to your eternity⁵.

结婚之后，实际进入了更多的矛盾之中；思想的落差、相处的困难、子女的教育、财务的争执等等，也会陷入婚姻危机。随后，年龄愈大，健康愈差，事业、家庭中的许多潜在矛盾会日益突出，因而又会有中年危机和老年危机，直至步入死亡。

We may therefore conclude that much of our life may not be spent in contentment. However, the things that discontent are, in fact, not useless since you may learn more from them than from the things that cheered you up.

所以说，人生在世，如意的事不足一二，不如意的则十有八九。但这“八九”不是负担，而是有用的，因为人在痛苦中所学到的，要比在欢乐中所学到的多得多。

As the saying goes, “It seems to be a perpetual rule that flops⁶ are produced elatedly and masterpieces painstakingly”. To put it vividly⁷, the great historian Sima Qian had a view even two thousand years ago: “When Emperor Wen of Zhou Dynasty was arrested, he produced the classic Zhou Yi Jing; Confucius wrote the History of Spring and Autumn while he was experiencing adversity; Qu Yuan produced his monumental long poem, On Encountering Sorrow, during his exile. When Zuo Qiu lost his sight and Sun Zi had his feet chopped off, they edited their writings and stratagems⁸. After Lü Buwei was forced to live in Shu, the valuable The Book of Lü was fortunately handed down to posterity⁹. Similarly, when Han Feizi was imprisoned¹⁰ in Qin, On Difficulty and On Resentment—two precious books—were written by him. Three hundred Classic Poems were also produced in roughly the same way, where the writers’ hearts were smouldering in the doldrums with no way out: they therefore conveyed everything in words, narrating¹¹ the past and contemplating¹² the future”.

“自古欢愉酿糟糠，从来痛苦出杰作”。对此，司马迁早在两千多年前便有精彩论述：“盖西伯拘而演《周易》；仲尼厄而作《春秋》；屈原放逐，乃赋《离骚》；左丘失明，厥有《国语》；孙子膑脚，《兵法》修列；不韦迁蜀，世传《吕览》；韩非囚秦，《说难》、《孤愤》；《诗》三百篇，大氐贤圣发愤只所为作也。此人皆有所郁结，不得通其道，故述往事，思来者”。

Let’s treat all the sufferings at every stage of life as assets which can only do us good.

所以，让我们把人生每一阶段上的痛苦，都当做自己的宝贵财富吧。

1 joyfully   

adv. 喜悦地, 高兴地

参考例句：

• She tripped along joyfully as if treading on air. 她高兴地走着，脚底下轻飘飘的。
• During these first weeks she slaved joyfully. 在最初的几周里，她干得很高兴。

2 personalities   

n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• There seemed to be a degree of personalities in her remarks.她话里有些人身攻击的成分。
• Personalities are not in good taste in general conversation.在一般的谈话中诽谤他人是不高尚的。

3 schooling   

n.教育；正规学校教育

参考例句：

• A child's access to schooling varies greatly from area to area.孩子获得学校教育的机会因地区不同而大相径庭。
• Backward children need a special kind of schooling.天赋差的孩子需要特殊的教育。

4 deteriorate   

v.变坏；恶化；退化

参考例句：

• Do you think relations between China and Japan will continue to deteriorate?你认为中日关系会继续恶化吗？
• He held that this would only cause the situation to deteriorate further.他认为，这只会使局势更加恶化。

5 eternity   

n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷

参考例句：

• The dull play seemed to last an eternity.这场乏味的剧似乎演个没完没了。
• Finally,Ying Tai and Shan Bo could be together for all of eternity.英台和山伯终能双宿双飞，永世相随。

6 flops   

n.失败( flop的名词复数 )v.（指书、戏剧等）彻底失败( flop的第三人称单数 )；（因疲惫而）猛然坐下；（笨拙地、不由自主地或松弛地）移动或落下；砸锅

参考例句：

• a pair of flip-flops 一双人字拖鞋
• HPC environments are often measured in terms of FLoating point Operations Per Second (FLOPS) . HPC环境通常以每秒浮点运算次数(FLOPS)加以度量。 来自互联网

7 vividly   

adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地

参考例句：

• The speaker pictured the suffering of the poor vividly.演讲者很生动地描述了穷人的生活。
• The characters in the book are vividly presented.这本书里的人物写得栩栩如生。

8 stratagems   

n.诡计，计谋( stratagem的名词复数 )；花招

参考例句：

• My bargaining stratagems are starting to show some promise. 我的议价策略也已经出现了一些结果。 来自电影对白
• These commanders are ace-high because of their wisdom and stratagems. 这些指挥官因足智多谋而特别受人喜爱。 来自互联网

9 posterity   

n.后裔，子孙，后代

参考例句：

• Few of his works will go down to posterity.他的作品没有几件会流传到后世。
• The names of those who died are recorded for posterity on a tablet at the back of the church.死者姓名都刻在教堂后面的一块石匾上以便后人铭记。

10 imprisoned   

下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He was imprisoned for two concurrent terms of 30 months and 18 months. 他被判处30个月和18个月的监禁，合并执行。
• They were imprisoned for possession of drugs. 他们因拥有毒品而被监禁。

11 narrating   

v.故事( narrate的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• She entertained them by narrating her adventures in Africa. 她讲述她在非洲的历险来使他们开心。
• [Mike Narrating] Worm and I fall into our old rhythm like Clyde Frazier and Pearl Monroe. [迈克叙述] 虫子和我配合得象以前一样默契我们两好象是克莱德。弗瑞泽和佩尔。门罗。 来自电影对白

12 contemplating   

深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想

参考例句：

• You're too young to be contemplating retirement. 你考虑退休还太年轻。
• She stood contemplating the painting. 她站在那儿凝视那幅图画。