临阵磨枪是一个相当有趣的成语，表示某人在最后一分钟才准备，太晚了。我在美国长大就有这样的文化，很多学生早知道老师按排了考试或布置了作业，但最后拖到最后一晚上甚至最后一分钟才复习。这种习惯大家明明知道不好，但是照样去做，一个原因是可以跟朋友夸张自己临时复习还可以或得好成绩，买萌似的。其实这种想法不可靠，因为有好多学生自称没复习多少，但其实是暗暗的学了不少。人长大了就知道没什么好夸的，好成绩是应该用努力换来的，像天才似的轻而易举地得到好成绩缺乏成就感。怒力也是一种天才。
读完学以后往前赶也很重要。付租金，付国税，起床上班，回答客户的问题都越早越好。我的大错误是一直想正好准时达到地点，早到还不舒服，希望能一分钟都不差的到。尤其在洛城这是不可能的，就算有一次两次恰好准时到，总有一次会堵车或出意外，引起晚点。尤其是一件难完成的任务。咬咬牙坚持做完了就不用再担心了，否则一直像烟不下肚子的鱼刺的留在那儿。还有人生的态度，不要想做什么事情拖到后头，觉得生活那么长总有一天可以做到的。比如在加个学位，或打掃衛生，或在日记里写一张感想文章。拖了太长就忘掉了，永远没有干力了。
说的容易做的难，各位加油！
"Polishing one's gun at the battlefield" is an interesting Chinese saying that means "procrastinating," where you're literally finally polishing the gun right before the battle's about to start. Too late. Growing up in America I experienced this culture, where a lot of students knew the teacher had assigned homework due a certain day or a test to be taken, but they procrastinated until the night before the test, or even the last minutes before the test to study. This type of habit is obviously bad, but people do it partly because they can get lucky and brag that they got a good grade even without studying, thereby acting cool in front of classmates. Actually this type of thinking is unreliable, since a lot of people pretend not to have studied and got a good grade but actually secretly studied a lot, or vice versa pretended they got a good grade when they actually failed. When these students grow up they realize there's not much to brag about anyone, as good grades should be reflective of the effort put in, and acting like a genius and easily getting good grades doesn't reflect any work put in. Working hard is also a type of genius.
Life after school also requires resistance to procrastination. Paying one's rent, paying taxes, getting up to go to work, answering clients' questions are all examples of the sooner the better. My big mistake is to try to get to somewhere I need to be at the exact time I need to be there and not early, so as to get the thrill of making it just in time. Everyone in LA knows this is impossible, because even if you succeed once or twice, eventually there will be bad traffic or some other unforeseen circumstance that causes a delay, making you late. For really hard tasks it's really easy to procrastinate and not want to start, but gotta grit your teeth and get through it so you don't have to worry about it anymore, otherwise the task just sits there like a fishbone stuck in your throat you can't swallow. Also there's attitude in life, like "Oh I can get to that later, life's so long." Don't put things off till later in life like more education or cleaning in your room (MJ taught me this!) or writing a memorable event in one's blog/journal. If you wait too long, you'll lose motivation and never get to it.
Easier said than done, Ganbatte Kudasai! Add oil! Hwaiting!/ Himne! (Korean)
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
No comments:
Post a Comment