幸福生活不等於有意義?Are happy people egoistic?
What kind of life do you want? Is pursuing happiness the goal of your life? Or would you rather lead a meaningful life? Wait, you say, but aren’t happiness and meaning linked with each other? Surely someone who leads a meaningful life is happy? And we find meaning in the pursuit of happiness?
你想要哪種生活？你生活的目標是追求幸福？抑或是想活得更充實？等一下，你是說，幸福與充實之間並無關聯嗎？充實的人生不都該是幸福的麼？我們不都是在追求幸福的過程中才找到人生意義的麼？according to a new study, a happy life and a meaningful life are not the same thing. In fact, the single-minded pursuit of happiness can leave people less happy.
一項最新研究顯示，幸福的人生和有意義的人生完全不是一回事。事實上，一味追求幸福只會讓人們的幸福感降低。The study will be published this year in the Journal of Positive Psychology. A recent article in The Atlantic provided a summary of the results.
這項研究成果年內將刊登在《積極心理學學刊》。近期發表在《大西洋月刊》上的一篇文章也概述了該研究成果。
Scientists asked nearly 400 US citizens aged 18 to 78 whether they thought their lives were meaningful and happy. These people were asked about their attitudes toward meaning, happiness and many other aspects in life, like stress levels, spending patterns, and family life. The researchers found that a meaningful life and a happy life overlap in certain ways, but are essentially different.
科學家就是否覺得生活幸福而充實這一問題採訪了約400位，年齡介於18-78歲間的美國人。受訪者就幸福、充實、以及壓力水平、消費模式和家庭生活等生活方方面面的給出了自己的態度。研究人員發現，儘管充實生活與幸福生活在某些方面重合，但本質不同。Leading a happy life, the researchers found, is associated with being a “taker”, while leading a meaningful life corresponds with being a “giver”.
研究人員發現，生活幸福的人往往是“索取者”，而生活充實的人則屬於“贈予者”。Happiness, the researchers found, is about feeling good and getting what we want. People who are happy tend to think that life is easy. They are in good physical health and able to buy the things that they need and want.
研究人員發現，幸福就是感覺良好並如願以償。幸福的人往往認爲生活簡單安逸。他們身體健康，而且買得起自己需要和想要的東西。Happiness is about satisfying our needs and desires. The pursuit of happiness is often associated with selfish behavior. Animals have needs and desires and they can feel happy too. What sets human beings apart from animals is not the pursuit of happiness, the researchers said, but the pursuit of meaning, which is unique to humans.
幸福便是滿足私慾。追求幸福往往伴隨着一些自私行徑。動物存在慾望，亦能感到幸福。研究人員表示，真正將人類與動物區分開來的，並非對於幸福的追求，而是對於人生意義的追求，這是人類的專屬。We can often find meaning in helping others or making a sacrifice for a “greater good”. Meaning often comes at the expense of happiness. That’s because people who have invested themselves in something bigger than themselves worry more and have higher levels of stress and anxiety in their lives than happy people. Volunteering in rural schools, for example, is meaningful but also entails hardship.
我往往在幫助他人，或者“犧牲小我完成大我”的過程中找到人生意義。獲得人生意義總是要以幸福爲代價。這是因爲當人們投身比自身更重要的事業中時，總是要比幸福的人承受更多的壓力和焦慮。比如去山區支教是件有意義的事，但同時也得歷經苦難。The study also found that meaning is not only about transcending the self, but also about transcending the present moment.
這項研究還發現，人生的意義不僅僅是超越自我，更是超越現在。Happiness, like any emotion, is felt in the here and now - it ultimately fades away. Meaning, on the other hand, is enduring. It connects the past to the present to the future. “Thinking beyond the present moment, into the past or future, was a sign of the relatively meaningful but unhappy life,” according to the researchers. “Happiness is not generally found in contemplating the past or future.”
正如其他情感一樣，幸福是一種即時的感受，也終將消散。而人生意義卻是恆久的。它連接過去、現在和未來。“那種超脫於當下，放眼過去或未來的思維方式，標誌着你的生活比較有意義卻並不幸福。”研究人員說，“注視着歷史或未來，一般是看不到幸福的。”Experiencing negative events, the study found, decreases your happiness but increases the feelings of meaningfulness in your life. No one knows this better than Viktor Frankl, writer of the best-selling book Man’s Search for Meaning. “If there is meaning in life at all,” he wrote, “then there must be meaning in suffering.”
研究發現，一些負面的經歷會降低你的幸福感，但同時會提升生活的充實感。想必沒人能比暢銷書《活出生命的意義》的作者維克多•弗蘭克爾更理解這一點了。他在書中寫道：“若人生確有意義，那它必隱於苦難磨礪之中。”Frankl wrote the book after having lived through the horrors of a Nazi concentration camp. In the book, he claims that one key thing separated those who perished and those who found a way to survive: a sense of meaning.
該書作者弗蘭克爾曾在納粹集中營中經歷了煉獄般的生活。在書中，他表示區分一個是滅亡，還是涅槃的關鍵就在於對生命意義的感知。
