TED 演讲 | 为什么我们总是觉得自己忙得团团转？

演讲题目：The real reason you feel so busy (and what to do about it)
演讲简介：当下，几乎所有人都感觉时间紧迫，生活节奏快。专家多里·克拉克（Dorie Clark）分享了人们陷入不断忙碌的无休止循环的三个隐藏原因，以及是什么在真正激励着您，如何有效地度过时间。

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We live in a time-pressed culture.

我们生活在一个快节奏的文化氛围中。

There is never enough time.

时间似乎永远不够用。

And we see it, we feel it around us every day.

我们能够看到，我们能每天无时不刻地感受到它。

We live in a world that valorizes work, accomplishment, busyness.

我们生活在一个看重工作，成就，忙碌的世界中。

And there's real upside to that; there's real value.

这当然是有好处的，因为它确实有价值。

We're pushed, we're driven toward achievement and action and creation.

我们被推动，被驱使追求成就和行动、追求创造。

And that's great, but there's also a downside.

这当然很好，但也有不好的一面。

And that's something that I think is worth talking about.

我认为这是一个值得讨论的事情。

There was a study done a while back, by the Management Research Group, of 10,000 senior leaders.

不久前，研究管理小组做过一项研究，针对10,000个高管。

And they asked them, "What is key to your organization's success?"

参与者被问到，“你认为你的团队成功的关键是什么？”

And 97 percent said long-term strategic thinking.

97%的受访者认为是长期的战略性思考。

I mean, when was the last time that 97 percent of people agreed on anything?

我很好奇，上一次让97%的人达成如此一致意见是什么时候？

There is near unanimity that being a long-term thinker -- having perspective,

人们几乎一致认为，有远见，有思考，

having the ability to think and ask big questions -- is essential to our success.

拥有思考和提出大问题的能力——这对我们的成功至关重要。

And yet in a separate study, 96 percent of leaders were surveyed, and they said they don't have time for strategic thinking.

然而，在另一项研究中，96%的领导者接受了调查，他们表示没有时间进行战略性思考。

What is going on?

怎么一回事？

Why is it -- how can it be that 96 percent of people are not doing the one thing that they say is most critical to their success?

为什么会这样？怎么回事呢？96%的人没有去做他们认为对成功最关键的事情？

Well, I think we know the answer ...

我想我们知道答案……

or at least we think we do.

或者说，至少我们认为我们知道。

The average professional attends 62 meetings per month.

专业人士每个月平均参加62次会议。

That sounds pretty outrageous.

这听起来很不可思议。

How could that be?

怎么做到的？

But if you actually break it down, it's not that many.

但是如果你分开来看，那其实也不是很多。

It's two to three meetings per day, which is probably average for many of you.

平均到每天，有2-3次会议，这和大多数人的平均水平一致。

So 62 meetings a month.

所以一个月要开62次会。

That does not help, and that is not wrong.

这说明不了什么，但这也没什么错。

It is a contributor.

这是其中的一个影响我们认知的因素。

Also, we know -- we know what else ... email.

而且我们知道，一些其他的例子——电子邮件。

A study a while back by McKinsey showed that the average professional spends 28 percent of their time just responding to email.

麦肯锡不久前的一项研究表明，职场人士平均花费28%的时间用来专门回复邮件。

Of course that drains us, of course that makes us busy.

当然，这耗费精力，也让我们变得忙碌起来。

But the truth is, it's also, I believe, not the full picture.

但我相信事实全貌并非如此。

Those are manifestations.

这些都只是表现形式。

Those are problems, legitimately.

这些都是合理的问题。

But there are also some other things going on underneath the surface, reasons that perhaps we are, in some ways, working at cross-purposes.

但是在表面之下还有一些其他的事情在发生，原因可能是，在某些方面，目标不一致导致的。

Because for so long almost all of us have said we want desperately to be less busy,

因为这么久以来，几乎我们所有人都说过，我们迫切希望能少忙碌一点，

and yet we keep making choices that put ourselves in the position where we're just as busy as we've always been.

但我们还是不断选择让自己陷入一如既往的忙碌之中。

What is going on?

这是怎么回事？

Well, some research out of Columbia University sheds a little bit of light on this.

一些哥伦比亚大学的研究给我们提供了一些启示。

Silvia Bellezza and her colleagues have done interesting research into the fact that in some cultures -- American culture chief among them -- busyness is actually a form of status.

西尔维娅·贝莱扎和她的同事们做了一项有趣的研究，发现在某些文化中——尤其是美国文化——忙碌表现了一种社会身份。

When we say, "Oh, I am so crazy busy," what we're really saying is a societally-accepted version of "I am so important!"

当我们说”噢，我忙得要命”，我们实际上是在寻求一种社会认同，我们其实是在说，“我是如此重要！”

"I am so popular!"

“我很受欢迎！”

"I am so in demand!"

“我正被人需要！”

And the truth is that feeling can be hard to give up ...

事实是，这种感觉很难摆脱掉……

even if we say that we want to.

即使我们想要去摆脱它。

That's not the only reason, of course.

当然，这不是唯一的原因。

It turns out it is very hard for the human mind to deal with conditions of uncertainty.

事实证明，人类的大脑很难处理不确定的情况。

And in modern life, there's a lot of it.

在现代生活中，有很多这样的事例。

Sometimes we are given tasks or challenges, and the truth is, tactically, we just don't know how to do it.

有时我们会被分配任务或挑战，而事实是，从战术上讲，我们就是不知道该怎么做。

"Increase sales by 30 percent."

“将销售额提高30%。”

Well, how?

该怎么实现这个目标？

There's a lot of ways you could do it.

有很多方法可以实现这点。

You're not sure how.

但你不确定该如何做。

Sometimes it's easier, frankly, to just double down and keep doing more of what you're already doing.

坦率地说，有时候加倍努力并继续做更多你已经在做的事情会更容易。

That might not be the best answer, but it's an answer, and it removes uncertainty.

这可能不是最好的答案，但这是一个答案，它消除了不确定性。

The picture gets even worse when we're talking about existential questions;

当我们谈论存在主义的问题时，情况就更加糟糕了；

when we're talking about uncomfortable matters that we might not actually really want to deal with.

当我们谈论令人不舒服的事情时，我们实际上可能并不想处理这些事情。

That might be, "Am I in the right job?"

可能是“这个工作到底适合我吗？”

It might be, "Am I in the right career?"

可能是“我的事业发展是否正确？”

Those are often questions, truth be told, we might not want the answer to.

说实话，这些问题，我们可能不想知道答案。

And so we become busy as a way so that we don't even have to ask the question.

所以我们忙碌起来，这样我们就不用问这个问题了。

Now, there's a third reason, and I'll admit it's one that I know well, personally,

还有第三个原因，我承认这是我个人非常了解的一个原因，

and that is that sometimes we use busyness as a way to numb ourselves out.

那就是，有时我们用忙碌来麻痹自己。

I've experienced that.

我也有过同样的经历。

This is my boy Gideon, and he died in 2013.

这是我的儿子吉迪恩，他于2013年去世。

I'd had him for 17 years, and he was my best friend.

我们陪伴了彼此17年，他是我最好的朋友。

And after he died, I'll be honest, I didn't want to be home because I knew that he wouldn't be there.

在他离世后，老实说，我不想回家了，因为我知道他不会出现在那里。

And so for two years, my life basically was an Uber to an airport, to a hotel and back again, because I just really didn't want to face that.

所以这两年来，我的生活基本上就是打车去机场，去酒店，来回往返，因为我真的不想面对这个事实。

For a lot of us, there are things we sometimes don't want to face.

对于我们中的很多人来说，很多事情有时候我们不想去面对。

What we're really looking for with work is an anesthetic.

我们真正需要的是一种麻醉剂。

And as I like to say, work is better than crack --

正如我想说的，工作会更好—

so if you're choosing ...

所以如果你选择了……

it's not the worst.

这也不是最糟的。

But the truth is, it's also not a sustainable solution.

但事实是，这也不是一个可持续的解决方案。

For many of us, we get trapped in the pattern of busyness, of overwork.

对于我们中的许多人来说，我们陷入了忙碌、过度工作的模式。

It's hard sometimes even to remember what it was like before.

有时甚至很难回忆起以前的情形。

Oftentimes in our mind's eye, when we think of busyness, what we think of is this.

通常在我们的脑海中，当我们想到忙碌时，想到的是这个。

What we think of is triumphant success and the world at your fingertips.

我们想到的是胜利式的成功，世界就在你的指尖。

The truth is, more often, busyness looks like this.

事实是，更多时候，忙碌看起来是这样的。

It looks like loneliness.

看起来像是寂寞。

It looks like frustration.

看起来像是沮丧。

It looks like having a life that's not really in your full control.

看起来你的生活并不完全在你的掌控之中。

So I would like to propose that we make a change.

所以我想提议做些改变。

Because if we are ever going to succeed in beating back busyness once and for all, first of all,

因为如果我们要成功地、一劳永逸地避免庸碌，首先，

we have to get real and acknowledge what is actually behind some of the busyness that is filling our days.

我们必须实事求是地承认，在充斥着我们日常生活的一些忙碌背后究竟是什么。

We have to really get honest about what it is that's motivating us so that we can make a different choice.

我们必须真正诚实地面对是什么在激励着我们，这样我们才能做出不同的选择。

Because it is about our choice.

因为这事关我们的选择。

We need to recognize that real freedom is about creating the space so that we can breathe, the space so that we can think.

我们需要认识到，真正的自由是创造属于自己的空间这样我们才能自由呼吸，有自我思考的空间。

Ultimately, real freedom is about choosing how and with whom we want to be spending our time.

最终，真正的自由是选择如何度过我们的时间，以及和谁一起度过。

Thank you.

谢谢。

往期推荐

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