TED热度排名第一，已有超过500万人观看，终篇，演讲从文化的角度来分析，最后给了我们答案，究竟爱情应该有的样子是什么呢？

文章目录：【TED音频】→【英文原稿&翻译】→【精彩表达】→【我的想法】

【TED音频】

【英文原稿&翻译】

Our experiences of love are both biological and cultural. Our biology tells us that love is good by activating these reward circuits in our brain, and it tells us that love is painful when, after a fight or a breakup, that neurochemical reward is withdrawn. And in fact -- and maybe you've heard this -- neurochemically speaking, going through a breakup is a lot like going through cocaine withdrawal, which I find reassuring. 

我们的爱情体验 既是生理上的，又是文化上的。生理通过激发我们大脑的激励反馈， 告诉我们爱情是美好的。然而在吵架或分手后， 它又告诉我们爱情是痛苦的， 这时候神经反馈是无效的。事实上，你可能听说过， 从神经学的角度来说， 经历分手和戒毒过程非常相似， 这点我感到很舒心。 

And then our culture uses language to shape and reinforce these ideas about love. In this case, we're talking about metaphors about pain and addiction and madness. It's kind of an interesting feedback loop. Love is powerful and at times painful, and we express this in our words and stories, but then our words and stories prime us to expect love to be powerful and painful. 

我们的文化利用语言 来塑造与加强对于爱的观念。现在的情况是，我们将其等同于 痛苦、癖嗜和痴狂。这好像是一个有趣的反馈循环。爱情很伟大，但有时也让我们痛苦， 我们用词句和故事来表达这点， 然后这些文字又使得我们 盲目期待爱情就应是伟大而痛苦的。 

What's interesting to me is that all of this happens in a culture that values lifelong monogamy. It seems like we want it both ways: we want love to feel like madness, and we want it to last an entire lifetime. That sounds terrible. 

而对我来说有趣的是， 这一切都发生在一个 鼓励终生一夫一妻制的文化里。这好像是说我们想两者兼得：我们既想让爱情疯狂一些， 我们又想让它持续一生。这听起来糟透了。 

To reconcile this, we need to either change our culture or change our expectations. So, imagine if we were all less passive in love. If we were more assertive, more open-minded, more generous and instead of falling in love, we stepped into love. I know that this is asking a lot, but I'm not actually the first person to suggest this. In their book, "Metaphors We Live By," linguists Mark Johnson and George Lakoff suggest a really interesting solution to this dilemma, which is to change our metaphors. They argue that metaphors really do shape the way we experience the world, and that they can even act as a guide for future actions, like self-fulfilling prophecies. 

要缓解这种情况， 我们要不改变我们的文化， 要不改变我们的期望。请各位想象一下， 所有人的爱情都没那么被动。如果我们更自信、 更开放、更大方，我们不再“坠入”爱河， 我们“步入”爱河。我知道这个要求有点高， 但我并不是第一个提出这点的人。在《我们赖以生存的隐喻》一书中， 语言学家马克·约翰逊和乔治·拉克夫 提出了一个非常有趣的方法 来解决这一矛盾， 那就是改变我们的比喻。他们认为，比喻真的可以 左右我们感受世界的方式， 而它们甚至可以成为 我们未来行动的指引， 就像是自我实现的预言。 

Johnson and Lakoff suggest a new metaphor for love: love as a collaborative work of art. I really like this way of thinking about love. Linguists talk about metaphors as having entailments, which is essentially a way of considering all the implications of, or ideas contained within, a given metaphor. And Johnson and Lakoff talk about everything that collaborating on a work of art entails: effort, compromise, patience, shared goals. These ideas align nicely with our cultural investment in long-term romantic commitment, but they also work well for other kinds of relationships -- short-term, casual, polyamorous, non-monogamous, asexual -- because this metaphor brings much more complex ideas to the experience of loving someone. 

约翰逊和拉克夫提出了爱情的一种新比喻：爱情是一个合作完成的艺术品。我很喜欢这种看待爱情的方式。语言学家运用比喻是有很多内涵的， 其实就是说喻体中包含了 本体的几乎一切含义与概念。而约翰逊和拉克夫的比喻涉及到了 合作创作艺术品的所有含义：努力、妥协、耐心、共同的目标等等。这些概念与我们在长期恋情中做出的精神投入很契合， 但它们同样适用于 其它各种恋爱关系—— 短期的、随意的恋情，多角恋， 非一夫一妻制，无性恋…… 因为这种比喻在恋爱的体验中 赋予了更多复杂的概念。 

So if love is a collaborative work of art, then love is an aesthetic experience. Love is  unpredictable, love is creative, love requires communication and discipline, it is frustrating and emotionally demanding. And love involves both joy and pain. Ultimately, each experience of love is different. 

所以假如爱情是合作完成的艺术品， 那么爱情就是一种美学体验。爱情是无法预测的， 爱情是创造性的， 爱情需要沟通，需要规矩， 爱情是令人沮丧的， 会造成很多精神压力。而爱情中既有快乐，也有痛苦。而最终，每次爱情经历都是不同的。 

When I was younger, it never occurred to me that I was allowed to demand more from love, that I didn't have to just accept whatever love offered. When 14-year-old Juliet first meets -- or, when 14-year-old Juliet cannot be with Romeo, whom she has met four days ago, she does not feel disappointed or angsty. Where is she? She wants to die. Right? And just as a refresher, at this point in the play, act three of five, Romeo is not dead. He's alive, he's healthy, he's just been banished from the city. I understand that 16th-century Verona is unlike contemporary North America, and yet when I first read this play, also at age 14, Juliet's suffering made sense to me. 

当我还年轻的时候， 我从来没想过我可以 从爱情中寻求更多， 或者说我不需要全盘接受 爱情给我提供的感受。当14岁的朱丽叶第一次见到…… 或者说，当14岁的朱丽叶 不能和罗密欧在一起， 她才认识罗密欧四天时间， 她不觉得失落或痛苦。她怎么了？她想寻死。对吧？大家回忆一下， 戏剧演到这里的时候 是五幕中的第三幕， 罗密欧并没有死， 他还活着， 他很健康， 他只是被驱逐出城了。我明白16世纪的维罗纳 和当今的北美非常不同， 然而当我第一次读到这部戏剧， 同样也在14岁， 我觉得能够感受朱丽叶的痛苦。 

Reframing love as something I get to create with someone I admire, rather than something that just happens to me without my control or consent, is empowering. It's still hard. Love still feels totally maddening and crushing some days, and when I feel really frustrated, I have to remind myself: my job in this relationship is to talk to my partner about what I want to make together. This isn't easy, either. But it's just so much better than the alternative, which is that thing that feels like madness. 

把爱情当作一个 与我所爱的人共同创造的东西， 而不是一个不经我控制或同意 就发生在我身上的东西， 这想法非常激动人心。这依然很难做到。爱情有时候还是让我 陷入疯狂与痛苦， 而当我感到特别沮丧时， 我必须提醒自己：在这段关系中， 我的任务是与伴侣交流， 沟通我们想共同创造的东西。其实这也不容易， 但它已经比另一种方式要好很多了， 那就是将爱情当作疯狂的体验。 

This version of love is not about winning or losing someone's affection. Instead, it requires that you trust your partner and talk about things when trusting feels difficult, which sounds so simple, but is actually a kind of revolutionary, radical act. This is because you get to stop thinking about yourself and what you're gaining or losing in your relationship, and you get to start thinking about what you have to offer. This version of love allows us to say things like, "Hey, we're not very good collaborators. Maybe this isn't for us." Or, "That relationship was shorter than I had planned, but it was still kind of beautiful." 

这种爱情不是为了 赢取或者失去某人的爱慕， 而是需要你相信你的伴侣， 而且当遇到信任危机时冷静交流， 虽说听起来很容易， 但这实际上是挺革命性、颠覆性的。因为你可以不再纠结于自身， 不再纠缠自己在爱情中的得与失， 而开始思考你可以做出什么贡献。这种爱情让我们可以这样说：“嘿，我们之间的合作不是很好。可能这不适合我们吧。” 或者说，“这段爱情 比我预计的要短一些， 但它还是挺美好的吧。” 

The beautiful thing about the collaborative work of art is that it will not paint or draw or sculpt itself. This version of love allows us to decide what it looks like. 

一个合作完成的艺术品的魅力所在， 就是它不会自己描绘或塑造自己。这种爱情让我们主动决定它的美。 

Thank you. 

【精彩表达】

going through a breakup is a lot like going through cocaine withdrawal, which I find reassuring 分手像戒毒，这个比喻只有经历过的人才懂吧

prime us to expect让我们盲目期待。prime形容词指顶级的，如亚马逊的会员就叫prime 会员，这里作动词，类似于“let，让……”的感觉，词典的解释是“使某人做好准备”

If we were more assertive, more open-minded, more generous，三个普通的形容词放在一起使用感觉很不普通了，assertive是坚定自信、坚决主张的意思，这里可以理解为自信；

love as a collaborative work of art，合作完成的艺术品，我只想说这个比如真好，艺术品看不懂但是每个人看都有不同的感受

align nicely with，很好的契合，align使成一条直线，line-lign读音相同，都可以理解为直线，a-加强语气的意思；

love is an aesthetic experience. Love is  unpredictable, love is creative, love requires communication and discipline, it is frustrating and emotionally demanding. And love involves both joy and pain这里的形容词包含了对爱这件艺术品特征的描述，不可预测、创造性、沟通、原则、沮丧、欢乐、痛苦……想象一下看美术展的感觉是不是也是这样的？

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