亚马逊CEO杰夫·贝索斯英语演讲稿
Cleverness is a gift, kindness is a choice. Gifts are easy — they're given after all. Choices canbe hard. You can seduce yourself with your gifts if you're not careful, and if you do, it'll probablybe to the detriment of your choices.
聪明是一种天赋，而善良是 一种选择，
亚马逊CEO杰夫·贝索斯英语演讲稿
。天赋得来很容易——毕竟它们与生俱来。而选择却颇为艰难。如果一不小心， 你可能被天赋所诱惑，这可能会损害到你做出的选择。As a kid, I spent my summers with my grandparents on their ranch in Texas. I helped fixwindmills, vaccinate cattle, and do other chores. We also watched soap operas everyafternoon, especially "Days of our Lives." My grandparents belonged to a Caravan Club, a groupof Airstream trailer owners who travel together around the U.S. and Canada. And every fewsummers, we'd join the caravan. We'd hitch up the Airstream trailer to my grandfather's car,and off we'd go, in a line with 300 other Airstream adventurers. I loved and worshipped mygrandparents and I really looked forward to these trips. On one particular trip, I was about 10years old. I was rolling around in the big bench seat in the back of the car. My grandfather wasdriving. And my grandmother had the passenger seat. She smoked throughout these trips, andI hated the smell.
在我还是一个孩子的时候，我的夏天总是在德州祖父母的农场中度过。我帮忙修理风车，为牛接种疫苗，也做其它家务。每天下午，我们都会看肥皂剧，尤其是《我们的岁月》。我的祖父母参加了一个房车俱乐部，那是一群驾驶Airstream拖挂型房车的人们，他们结伴遍游美国和加拿大。每隔几个夏天，我也会加入他们。我们把房车挂在祖父的`小汽车后面，然后加入300余名Airstream探险者们组成的浩荡队伍。我爱我的祖父母，我崇敬他们，也真心期盼这些旅程。那是一次我大概十岁时的旅行，我照例坐在后座的长椅上，祖父开着车，祖母坐在他旁边，吸着烟。我讨厌烟味。
At that age, I'd take any excuse to make estimates and do minor arithmetic. I'd calculate ourgas mileage -- figure out useless statistics on things like grocery spending. I'd been hearing anad campaign about smoking. I can't remember the details, but basically the ad said, every puffof a cigarette takes some number of minutes off of your life: I think it might have been twominutes per puff. At any rate, I decided to do the math for my grandmother. I estimated thenumber of cigarettes per days, estimated the number of puffs per cigarette and so on. When Iwas satisfied that I'd come up with a reasonable number, I poked my head into the front ofthe car, tapped my grandmother on the shoulder, and proudly proclaimed, "At two minutesper puff, you've taken nine years off your life!"
在那样的年纪，我会找任何借口做些估测或者小算术，
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《亚马逊CEO杰夫·贝索斯英语演讲稿》(https://www.unjs.com)。我会计算油耗还有杂货花销等鸡毛蒜皮的小事。我听过一个有关吸烟的广告。我记不得细节了，但是广告大意是说，每吸一口香烟会减少几分钟的寿命，大概是两分钟。无论如何，我决定为祖母做个算术。我估测了祖母每天要吸几支香烟，每支香烟要吸几口等等，然后心满意足地得出了一个合理的数字。接着，我捅了捅坐在前面的祖母的头，又拍了拍她的肩膀，然后骄傲地宣称，“每天吸两分钟的烟，你就少活九年!”I have a vivid memory of what happened, and it was not what I expected. I expected to beapplauded for my cleverness and arithmetic skills. "Jeff, you're so smart. You had to havemade some tricky estimates, figure out the number of minutes in a year and do somedivision." That's not what happened. Instead, my grandmother burst into tears. I sat in thebackseat and did not know what to do. While my grandmother sat crying, my grandfather, whohad been driving in silence, pulled over onto the shoulder of the highway. He got out of thecar and came around and opened my door and waited for me to follow. Was I in trouble? Mygrandfather was a highly intelligent, quiet man. He had never said a harsh word to me, andmaybe this was to be the first time? Or maybe he would ask that I get back in the car andapologize to my grandmother. I had no experience in this realm with my grandparents and noway to gauge what the consequences might be. We stopped beside the trailer. My grandfatherlooked at me, and after a bit of silence, he gently and calmly said, "Jeff, one day you'llunderstand that it's harder to be kind than clever."
我清晰地记得接下来发生了什么，而那是我意料之外的。我本期待着小聪明和算术技巧能赢得掌声，但那并没有发生。相反，我的祖母哭泣起来。我的祖父之前一直在默默开车，把车停在了路边，走下车来，打开了我的车门，等着我跟他下车。我惹麻烦了吗?我的祖父是一个智慧而安静的人。他从来没有对我说过严厉的话，难道这会是第一次?还是他会让我回到车上跟祖母道歉?我以前从未遇到过这种状况，因而也无从知晓会有什么后果发生。我们在房车旁停下来。祖父注视着我，沉默片刻，然后轻轻地、平静地说：“杰夫，有一天你会明白，善良比聪明更难。”
What I want to talk to you about today is the difference between gifts and choices. Cleverness isa gift, kindness is a choice. Gifts are easy -- they're given after all. Choices can be hard. Youcan seduce yourself with your gifts if you're not careful, and if you do, it'll probably be to thedetriment of your choices.
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