A Practical Guide to Taking Control of Your Life | Cate Hall | TED · TED
Cate Hall分享她如何从毒瘾中走出，通过培养个人自主性实现人生转变。适合练习演讲技巧和人生规划。
Five years ago, I was a prisoner in my own life.
五年前，我仿佛成了自己生活的囚徒。
I was hopelessly addicted to drugs.
我对毒品已经产生了无法摆脱的依赖。
Every morning I would get up, go buy drugs, and then spend the rest of the day using,
每天早上我都会起床，去买毒品，然后一整天都在吸食这些毒品。
barely conscious, until I passed out again at the end of the night.
我几乎处于昏迷状态；直到深夜，我又失去了意识。
I spent months at a time like that.
我有过好几个月的时间都是这样度过的。
I don't have a lot of memories from that time, but one thing I do remember very clearly
我对那段时期的记忆并不多，但有一件事我记得非常清楚。
is this incredible sense of awe and resentment I felt just watching normal people do normal things.
仅仅看着普通人做着再平常不过的事情，我就会产生这种难以置信的敬畏之情与怨恨情绪……
I would see somebody meeting a friend for lunch, and it would seem inconceivable to me that anybody could be that free.
我会看到有人和朋友一起吃午饭；在我看来，竟然有人能有这么多的空闲时间，实在难以置信。
They could just decide what to do with an afternoon.
他们完全可以自己决定如何度过一个下午的时间。
This talk isn't about addiction per se, but I'm telling you this because I really need you to understand where I'm coming from,
这次演讲的主题并不是关于成瘾本身，但我之所以要跟你们讲这些，是因为我真的需要你们理解我的立场和想法。
how trapped I was, before I tell you that my life is amazing now.
在我告诉你们我的生活现在多么精彩之前，你们得先知道我曾经是多么的迷茫、多么的被困在困境之中。
I'm clean, first and foremost.
首先，我是一个守法的人（即没有犯罪记录）。
I'm married to an incredible man, and we get to do all sorts of fun projects together.
我嫁给了一个非常出色的男人，我们可以一起完成各种各样的有趣项目。
And I'm CEO of Astera Institute, a multibillion dollar private foundation that's pioneering a new approach to supporting innovative science and technology.
我是 Astera Institute 的首席执行官。这是一家价值数十亿美元的私人基金会，致力于探索支持创新科学与技术的新方法。
What I do want to talk about today is how I got from point A to point B.
今天我想谈谈的是，我究竟是如何从起点A到达终点B的。
What changed?
发生了什么变化？
It's not that I got smarter or that I started trying harder.
并不是因为我变得更聪明了，也不是因为我开始更加努力了。
I think what changed was even more fundamental.
我认为真正发生变化的，是一些更为根本性的因素。
It was developing a sense of personal agency, which I think about as the capacity to both see and act on
这正在培养一种“个人能动性”的意识；我认为这种能动性指的是既能够认识到问题，也能够采取行动去解决问题的能力。
all of the degrees of freedom we actually have.
我们实际拥有的所有自由度（即可以独立变化的参数或状态）。
It's about being able to find the hidden doors in the walls of life.
关键在于能够发现生活中那些隐藏在“墙壁”背后的机会（或可能性）。
I want to argue that when it comes to living a satisfying and meaningful life, agency is actually much more important
我想说的是，在追求一种令人满足且有意义的生活时，个人的自主性（即能够自主决策和行动的能力）实际上要重要得多。
than the things we usually think about as critical to success, like intelligence and hard work, both of which are next to useless if misapplied,
比那些我们通常认为对成功至关重要的因素（比如智力与勤奋）更重要。事实上，如果这些因素被错误地运用，它们的作用几乎可以忽略不计。
and which are becoming less and less important as we increasingly outsource them to machines.
随着我们越来越多地将这些工作外包给机器，这些工作的重要性正在逐渐降低。
I saw a quote recently from Garry Tan, the CEO of Y Combinator, that I really liked.
最近我看到了一句来自 Y Combinator 首席执行官 Garry Tan 的话，我非常喜欢。
He said, "Intelligence is on tap now, so agency is even more important."
他说：“目前情报信息随时都可以获取，因此情报机构的作用变得更加重要了。
For all of the freedom that addiction took from me, I think it actually gave me an unnatural advantage when it came to cultivating agency.
尽管成瘾夺走了我许多自由，但在培养自主性（即自我决定和行动的能力）方面，它反而给了我某种“非自然”的优势。
And that's because while agency has many mothers, one of them is certainly desperation.
之所以如此，是因为虽然“代理行为”（agency）有多种“根源”或“动力”，但其中之一无疑就是“绝望”（desperation）。
Addicts call this the gift of desperation, actually.
实际上，瘾君子们将这种现象称为“绝望带来的馈赠”。
The willingness to do whatever it takes to change your life, to embarrass yourself by standing up in front of a roomful of strangers and say,
愿意不惜一切代价来改变自己的生活；甚至愿意在满屋陌生人的面前站出来、说出那些可能会让自己难堪的话……
“My name is Cate, and I’m a drug addict.”
我叫凯特，我是个吸毒成瘾的人。
Or to lock yourself away for months.
或者把自己关起来好几个月。
Or to take medications that will put you in the ER if you drink.
或者服用某些药物——如果服用后饮酒，这些药物会让你被送进急诊室。
By the time I went to rehab, I definitely had the gift of desperation.
等我去康复中心的时候，我已经完全陷入了绝望的境地。
I lost my job, most of my friends.
我失去了工作，也失去了大部分朋友。
For a time, I'd basically lost the ability to walk.
有一段时间，我基本上失去了行走的能力。
And so when I left, I walked into a halfway house and a complete mess of a life.
当我离开时，我住进了一家过渡性住房（即帮助人们重新适应社会生活的机构），但我的生活却一片混乱。
But in a way, I think that was actually good.
但在某种程度上，我认为那其实是一件好事。
Because I felt like I had nothing left to lose.
因为我觉得自己已经没有什么可失去的了。
And that made me fearless and hungry.
这让我变得无所畏惧，同时也充满了对成功的渴望（或：让我变得勇敢且渴望成功）。