熱情成就未來

Years ago， when I started looking for my first job， wise advisers urged， \"Barbara， be enthusiastic! Enthusiasm1 will take you further than any amount of experience.\"

How right they were. Enthusiastic people can turn a boring drive into an adventure， extra work into opportunity and strangers into friends.

\"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm，\" wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson. It is the paste2 that helps you hang in3 there when the going gets tough. It is the inner voice that whispers， \"I can do it!\" when others shout， \"No， you can't.\"

It took years and years for the early work of Barbara McClintock， a geneticist4 who won the 1983 Nobel Prize in medicine， to be generally accepted. Yet she didn't let up on her experiments. Work was such a deep pleasure for her that she never thought of stopping.

We are all born with wide-eyed， enthusiastic wonder as anyone knows who has ever seen an infant's delight at the jingle of keys or the scurrying5 of a beetle. It is this childlike wonder that gives enthusiastic people such a youthful air， whatever their age.

At 90， cellist Pablo Casals would start his day by playing Bach. As the music flowed through his fingers， his stooped shoulders would straighten and joy wouldreappear in his eyes. Music， for Casals， was an elixir6 that made life a neverending adventure. As author and poet Samuel Ullman once wrote， \"Years wrinklethe skin， but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul.\"

How do you rediscover the enthusiasm of your childhood? The answer， I believe， lies in the word itself. \"Enthusiasm\" comes from the Greek and means \"God within.\" And what is God within is but an sense of love -- proper love of self (self-acceptance) and， from that， love of others.

Enthusiastic people also love what they do， regardless of money or title7 or power. If we cannot do what we love as a full-time career， we can as a part-time avocation8， like the head of state who paints， the nun who runs marathons， the executive9 who handcrafts furniture.

Elizabeth Layton of Wellsville， Kan， was 68 before she began to draw. This activity ended bouts of depression that had plagued10 her for at least 30 years， and the quality of her work led onecritic to say， \"I am tempted to call Layton a genius.\" Elizabeth has rediscovered her enthusiasm.

We can't afford to waste tears on \"might-have-beens.\" We need to turn the tears into sweat as we go after \"whet-can-be.\"

We need to live each moment wholeheartedly， with all our senses -- finding pleasure in the fragrance of a back-yard garden， the picture of a six-year-old， the beauty of a rainbow. It is such enthusiastic love of life that puts a sparkle in our eyes， a lilt in our steps and smooths the wrinkles from our souls.

多年前，當我第一次找工作時，不少明智之士強烈向我建議:“巴巴拉，要有熱情!熱情比任何經驗都更有益。”這句話多么正確，熱情的人可以把沉悶的車程變成探險，把加班變成機會，把陌生人變成朋友。

“沒有熱情就不會有任何偉大的成就，”拉爾夫·沃爾多·愛默生寫道。當事情進展不順時，熱情是幫助你堅持下去的黏合劑。當別人叫喊“你不行”時，熱情是你內心發出的聲音:“我能行”。

1983年諾貝爾醫學獎的獲得者遺傳學家巴巴拉·麥克林托克早年的工作直到很多年后才被公眾所承認。然而她并沒有放棄實驗工作。對她來說工作是一種如此巨大的快樂，她從未想過要停止它。

我們都生來好奇，睜大眼睛，滿懷熱情——每一個看到過嬰兒、聽到鑰匙聲或看見亂爬的甲蟲就興奮不已的人都會明白這一點。

正是這種孩子氣的好奇給了熱情的人們(不論年齡大小)一種青春的氣息。大提琴家帕布羅·卡薩爾斯在90歲時還堅持以拉巴赫開始他的每一天。音樂從他的指間流出，他彎著的背挺直起來，歡樂再度溢滿他的眼眸。音樂對卡薩爾斯來說，是使人生變成無止境的探索之旅的靈丹妙藥，就像作家兼詩人塞繆爾·厄爾曼曾寫過的:“歲月使皮膚起了皺紋，但如果失去熱情，便會使靈魂生出皺紋”。

怎樣才能找回孩提時代的熱情呢?我相信答案就在“熱情”這個詞本身。“熱情”一詞源于希臘語，原義是“內在的上帝”這里所說的“內在的上帝”不是別的，而是一種持久不變的愛——恰當的自愛(自我接受)，并推而及于他人。

熱情的人們同樣熱愛他們所做的事，不顧金錢、頭銜和權力。如果我們不能把熱愛的事作為正式職業，我們也可把它當作業余消遣:比如有國家元首喜歡畫畫的，有修女參加馬拉松長跑的，有行政官員手工制作家具的。

堪薩斯州韋爾斯維爾市的伊麗莎白·萊頓到68歲才開始畫畫。這一愛好消除了曾糾纏她至少達30年之久的憂郁癥，而她的作品水準之高使得一個評論家說:“我忍不住要稱萊頓為天才。”伊麗莎白又找回了她的熱情。

我們不應該把眼淚浪費在“早該”之類的后悔上，我們需要把眼淚化為汗水，去追求“可能”之物。

我們需要以全身心去度過生命中的每一分鐘——在后花園的芬芳中，在6歲小孩的畫中，在彩虹的美中找到快樂。正是這種對生活的熱愛，讓我們雙目有神，讓我們步履矯健，讓我們靈魂的皺紋展平。

注釋:

①enthusiasm n.熱心，熱情

②paste n.黏合劑

③hang in堅持

④geneticist n.遺傳學家

⑤scurry vi.疾走

⑥elixir n.靈丹妙藥

⑦title n.稱號，頭銜

⑧avocation n.業余愛好

⑨executive n.執行者，行政長官

⑩plague vt.折磨，使苦惱