有一个思想家帮我们理解为什么我们的生活 This is a thinker who helps us understand why our lives
和社会关系总让人忧虑和烦恼 and relationships are full of so much confusion and pain.
为什么生活如此艰难，以及该如何应对 虽然他自己也常常有许多烦恼 He tells us why life is hard, and how to cope. His own life incurred a lot of anxieties.
西格蒙德 弗洛伊德1856年出生于一个中产阶级犹太家庭 Sigmund Schlomo Freud was born to a middle-class Jewish family in 1856.
他的成功并非一触而就 医学生时代，他解剖了上百条鳗鱼 His professional life was not an immediate success. As a medical student, he dissected
试图找到他们的生殖器官，但都没有成功 hundreds of eels in an unsuccessful attempt to locate their reproductive organs.
他认为可卡因应该作为一种药物，但事实证明可卡因危险且易上瘾 He promoted cocaine as a medical drug, but it turned out to be a dangerous and addictive idea.
几年后，他终于创立了一种使他一夜成名的学说 A few years later he founded the discipline that would ultimately make his name.
一种精神治疗法，他称为 A new psychological medicine he called
精神分析法 PSYCHOANALYSIS
这个具有里程碑意义的研究第一场出现在1900年出版的著作《梦的解析》中 The landmark study was his 1900 book The Interpretation of Dreams.
更多著作纷踵而至 Many others followed.
尽管他很成功，他并不快乐 Despite his success, he was often unhappy.
在一些颇为繁重的研究期间，他写到：真正的病人其实是我自己 During some particularly strenuous research he recorded, “The chief patient I am preoccupied
他相信自己会在61，62岁左右死去 with is myself…” He was convinced he would die between 61 and 62 and had great phobias
而且对死亡极为恐惧 尽管他逝世时已83岁，远远晚于自己的预期。 about those numbers. (Although he actually died much later, at age 83.)
也许正是由于焦虑，弗洛伊德才能对 Perhaps because of his frustrations, Freud achieved a series of
人类不快乐的根源有深刻的洞见 deep insights into the sources of human unhappiness.
他认为人都由"快乐原则"驱动 He proposed that we are all driven by: the Pleasure Principle
所以我们往往喜欢身体和精神的愉悦 which inclines us towards easy physical and emotional rewards:
而讨厌乏味的工作和纪律 婴儿时期我们的行为几乎完全由 and away from unpleasant things like drudgery and discipline. As infants we are guided more
快乐原则驱动 or less solely according to the pleasure principle, Freud argued.
如果任凭发展而不加克制，会很容易导致危险的后果 But it will, if adhered to it without constraints, lead us to dangerous reckless things:
比如好吃懒做 like never doing any work eating too much
甚至，家庭成员之间乱伦 or, most notoriously, trying to sleep with members of own family.
我们需要遵从的是弗洛伊德所称为的 We need to adjust to what Freud called
现实原则 THE REALITY PRINCIPLE
弗洛伊德认为我们不得不屈从于现实原则，因此，存在好和坏， Though we all have to bow to this reality principle, Freud believed that there were
两种适应过程，他把适应的不好的过程称为 better and worse kinds of adaptations. He called the troublesome ones
神经症（或称神经官能症） NEUROSES
神经症是不得已妥协的结果，或用弗洛伊德自己的话讲是 Neuroses are the result of faulty negotiations with –or in Freud’s language, repression
压抑“快乐原则”导致的 of–the pleasure principle.
弗洛伊德认为人的头脑中存在三股势力之间的冲突 Freud described a conflict between three parts of our minds: the
“本我”，是有快乐原则驱动的 ID，driven by the pleasure principle, and the
“超我”，是由社会规则和伦理驱动的 THE SUPEREGO，driven by a desire to follow the rules and do the right thing according to society.
自我，则介于前两者之间 and the EGO，which has to somehow accomodate between the other two.
为了更好的理解这三个概念，让我们回想一下自己的童年 To understand more about these dynamics, Freud urged us to think back to the origins of our
neuroses in childhood.
我们成长的过程会首先经历，弗洛伊德称为的 As we grow up, we go through what Freud termed:
口欲期 THE ORAL PHASE
这一时期，我们所有的感觉都离不开吃 where we deal with all the feelings around ingestion and eating.
假如父母不加监督，我们此时就会染上各种神经症，比如： If our parents aren’t careful we might pick up all kinds of neuroses here: we might take
厌食，暴饮暴食 pleasure in refusing food, or turn to food to calm ourselves down, or hate the idea of
或讨厌依赖别人的食物 depending on anyone else for food.
接着是 Then comes
肛欲期 THE ANAL PHASE
类似于我们今天所说的“如厕训练” which is closely aligned with what we now call “potty-training”.
此时，父母会告诉我们该做什么，什么时候做 During this period, our parents tell us what to do--and when to go. At this phase we begin
这个阶段，我们开始尝试挑战权威 to learn about testing the limits of authority.
同样，如果过程出现差错，比如认为父母不够好，我们很可能会 Again, if things go wrong, if we don’t feel authority is benign enough, we might, for
向父母提出抗议 example, choose to withhold out of defiance. 
然后，作为一个成年人，我们会变得不容易屈从 Then, as adults, we might become “anally retentive”; in other words, not able to give or surrender.
接着是性器期 Next comes: THE PHALLIC PHASE
一直持续到六岁，弗洛伊德认为儿童也有性欲，让当时的人们颇为震惊 which goes until about age 6. Freud shocked his contemporaries by insisting that little
而且，在性器期，儿童将他们的性冲动向他们的 children have sexual feelings. Moreover, in the phallic phase children direct their sexual
父母表现出来，因为父母是最亲密也是最可行的人 impulses towards their parents, the most immediately available and gratifying people around.
弗洛伊德最著名的论断是 Freud famously described what he called
俄狄浦斯情结 THE OEDIPUS COMPLEX
即我们无意识地偏爱 Where we are unconsciously predisposed towards
父母中的一方，而讨厌另一方 “being in love with the one parent and hating the other.”
但是棘手的是，不管父母有多么爱我们，他们不能 What is complex is that no matter how much our parents love us, they cannot extend this
将性延伸到我们身上，因此不得不依靠伴侣 这使年幼的我们 to sexual life and will always have another life with a partner. This makes our young
感到嫉妒和愤怒，但又对这种愤怒感到羞耻 selves feel dangerously jealous and angry – and also ashamed and guilty about this
这种复杂的关系使孩子的内心产生矛盾 anger. The complex provides a huge amount of internalised worry for a small child.
最终，我们所经历的矛盾很可能 Ultimately, most of us experience some form of confusion around our parents
会影响到我们对“爱”的看法 that later ties into our ideas of love.
父母都能给我们爱，但这种爱常常和别的东西挂钩 Mum and dad may both give us love, but they often mix it in with disturbed behaviour.
但毕竟他们是我们的父母，所以对我们仍然爱他们，无论他们多么奇怪，多么可恨 Yet because we love them, we remain loyal to them and also to their bizarre, destructive
比如，尽管你的母亲可能很冷漠，你仍然会爱她 patterns. For example, if our mother is cold, we will be apt nevertheless to long for her.
结果，你就会倾向于把爱和保持一定距离联系在一起 And as a result, however, we may be prone to always associate love with a certain distance.
我们从父母那里学到 Naturally, the result is very difficult adult relationships. Often the kind of love we’ve
不能将性和爱混为一谈，因为尽管你爱父母 learned from mum and dad means we can’t fuse sex and love because the people we learnt
你不能和他们做爱 你会发现你越爱一个人 about love from are also those we were blocked from having sex with. We might find that the
越不想和他（她）做爱 more in love with someone we are, the harder it becomes to make love to them. This can
结了婚有了孩子以后更甚 reach a pitch of crisis after a few years of marriage and some kids.
弗洛伊德将这个问题比作冬天的刺猬之间的关系 Freud compared the issues we so often have with intimacy to hedgehogs in the winter:
他们需要抱团取暖，但又不能靠地太近，因为身上有刺 they need to cuddle for warmth, but they also can’t come too close because they’re prickly.
没有简单的办法 弗洛伊德认为我们做不到完全理性 There’s no easy solution. Freud says we can’t make ourselves fully rational, and
也不能改变社会观念. 在他1930年的著作《文明及其不满》中 we can’t change society, either. In his 1930 book Civilisation and its Discontents,
他写到：社会给我们提供了很多东西，但是也强加给我们 Freud wrote that society provides us with many things, but it does this by imposing
许多沉重的戒律：只能和很少的人（一般只有一个）在一起 heavy dictates on us: insisting that we sleep with only a few (usually one) other, imposing
禁止乱伦，要求我们放弃欲望，遵从权威 the incest taboo, requiring us to put off our immediate desires, demanding that we follow
努力工作挣钱。社会本身就是神经质的，社会就是这么运行的 authority and work to make money. Societies themselves are neurotic–that is how they
这就是为什么战争和政治争斗从不间断 function - and it’s why there are constant wars and other political troubles.
弗洛伊德尝试发明一种治疗神经症的方法，他称为精神分析 Freud attempted to invent a treatment for our many neuroses he called it: psychoanalysis. He thought
他认为通过正确的分析，人们能找到困扰他们的疾病的原因 that with a little proper analysis, people could uncover what ails them and better adjust
并调整自身以适应现实 to the difficulties of reality.
他分析了一系列关键的因素 In his sessions he analysed a number of key things.
他观察人的梦境，认为梦是 He looked at people’s dreams, which he saw as expressions of
欲望的满足的表现 WISH FULFILLMENTS
他还观察失误行为也即口误 He also looked at PARAPRAXES or slips of the tongue.
我们现在称这种现象为 We now call these revealing mistakes
弗洛伊德失误 FREUDIAN SLIPS
比如我们想写“thigh”却写成了“though” Like when we write ‘thigh’ when we wanted to write ‘though’.
他也常思考笑话的作用 他认为笑话能帮助我们轻松 He also liked to think about jokes. He believed that jokes often help us make fun of something
面对较严肃的事，比如死亡和婚姻，减轻我们谈论这些话题时的焦虑 symbolic like death or marriage, and thus relieve some of our anxiety about these topics.
很多人说弗洛伊德的理论都是瞎编，在他眼中生活似乎很美好 There’s a temptation to say Freud just made everything up, and life isn’t quite so hard
可是当你有天早晨发现对 as he makes it out to be. But then one morning we find ourselves filled with inexplicable
伴侣一肚子的怒火，或不要命一样地跑去搭火车上班时 anger towards our partner, or running high with unrelenting anxiety on the train to work,
你就会发现我们的思维是多么令人费解 and we’re reminded all over again just how elusive, difficult, and Freudian our mental workings actually are.
你当然可以不同意他的观点，但是就像弗洛伊德自己所说 We could still reject his work, of course. But as Freud said,
鄙视钥匙的人永远打不开锁 “No one who disdains the key will ever be able to unlock the door.”
弗洛伊德的观点对理解我们自己 We could all use a bit more of Freud’s ideas
仍然有一定的帮助 to help us unpick ourselves.