诉说生命的启示，绝不会没有人愿意听的。但是经验告诉我，很不容易让人接受这个观点——他们极力避开个人经历，认为太琐碎、太局限。他们宁愿上天入地扯些一般概念或者哲学理论。可惜天上地下的空气稀薄，平凡的我们无法呼吸。我们渴望新闻，他们却给我们社论。我们不反对听社论，但是得由有这权力的人来说——报纸的编辑或发行者。因此，还是谈谈生命对你的启示吧，我自然会成为你的忠实听众。Speakers who talk about what life has taught them never fail to keep the attention of their listeners. I know from experience that speakers are not easily persuaded to accept this point of view-they avoid using personal experiences as too trivial and too restrictive. They would rather soar into the realms of general ideas and philosophical principles, where unfortunately the air is too rarefied for ordinary mortals to breathe. They give us editorials when we are hungry for the news. None of us is averse to listening to editorials, when they are given by a man who has earned the right to editorialize an editor or publisher of a newspaper. The point, though, is this: Speak on what life has taught you and I will be your devoted listener.
据说，爱默生常常喜欢倾听人们的谈话——不论对方身份多么卑微，因为他觉得自己从任何人身上都可以学到东西。恐怕我听过的谈话，比任何人都多。老实说，一个讲演者叙述生命给他的教导时，不管经验是多么的琐碎、多么的微不足道，我都从不感觉枯燥乏味。It was said of Emerson that he was always willing to listen to any man, no matter how humble his station, because he felt he could learn something from every man he met. I have listened to more adult talks, perhaps, than any other man west of the Iron Curtain, and I can truthfully say that I have never heard a boring talk when the speaker related what life had taught him, no matter how slight or trivial the lesson may have been.
现在针对这一点来作一个说明：几年前，我们的一位教师替纽约市立银行资深的官员开了当众说话的课程。这种团体里的人事情多得不能分身，常常感到要充分准备（或做好他们心目中认为的准备）很难。其实他们一直都在思考，有着自己的思想，形成个人的信念，从自身的角度去看待问题，走过的路为他们积累了原始的经验——他们已经积累了40年的谈话材料，但是他们中的有些人就是不知道这点。To illustrate: Some years ago, one of our instructors conducted a course in public speaking for the senior officers of New York City banks·. Naturally, the members of such a group, having many demands upon their time, frequently found it difficult to prepare adequately, or to do what they conceived of as preparing. All their lives they had been thinking their own individual thoughts, nurturing their own personal convictions, seeing things from their own distinctive angles, living their own original experiences. They had spent forty years storing up material for talks. But it was hard for some of them to realize that.
一个星期五，一位来自上区银行的先生——我们就叫他杰克逊先生吧——来到训练班，有45个人参加了这次训练。来之前，他离开办公室，在报摊上买了一份《弗贝》杂志。在前往上课所在地联邦储备银行的地铁上，他找了一篇题为《十年成功秘诀》的文章来阅读。他之所以读它，倒不是因为对它特别感兴趣，而是想找点谈话的资料，以便上课的时候作为他的讲话内容。One Friday a certain gentleman connected with an uptown bank-for our purposes we shall designate him as Mr. Jackson-found four-thirty had arrived, and what was he to talk about? He walked out of his office, bought a copy of Forbes' Magazine at a newsstand, and in the subway coming down to the Federal Reserve Bank where the class met, he read an article entitled, "You Have Only Ten Years to Succeed". He read it, not because he was interested in the article especially, but because he had to speak on something to fill his quota of time.
一小时后，他站起身来，准备把这篇文章讲得妙趣横生，让大家都称赞他讲得不错。An hour later, he stood up and attempted to talk convincingly and interestingly on the contents of this article.
结果呢？这样的结果没有别的可能。What was the result, the inevitable result?
他并没有把阅读到的东西消化，没有在里面吸收到“想要说”的东西。“想要说”形容得很准确，他真的只是“想要”而已。他想从文章里发掘一些有深度的内容来谈，可是除了引用以外并没有什么内涵，他的整个仪态和音调明显地透露出这一点。像这样的情况，他怎么可能期望听众比他自己更感动呢？他不断地提及那篇文章，说作者是怎么样讲的，可是没有提到自己是怎么样想的。在他的演讲里，《弗贝》杂志让我们了解了很多，遗憾的是杰克逊先生自己的东西却太少。He had not digested, had not assimilated what he was trying to say. "Trying to say"-that expresses it precisely. He was trying. There was no real message in him seeking for an outlet; and his whole manner and tone revealed it unmistakably. How could he expect the audience to be any more impressed than he himself was? He kept referring to the article, saying the author said so and so. There was a surfeit of Forbes' Magazine in it, but regrettably little of Mr. Jackson.
他讲演完毕，老师说：“杰克逊先生，我们对你讲的那位作者并不感兴趣——不知他是何方神圣，他也不在这儿，我们也见不着他。我们倒是对你和你的观点有兴趣。告诉我们你是怎么想的吧，不要谈别人怎么讲。把更多的杰克逊先生放在演讲里，下星期再用同样的题目进行讲演好吗？把那篇文章再读一遍，问问自己是否同意作者的论点。如果是，以你自己的观察经验来论证。你如果不同意，告诉我们为什么。就让这篇文章成为一个引子，引出你自己的讲演。”After he finished his talk, the instructor said, "Mr. Jackson, we are not interested in this shadowy personality who wrote that article. He is not here. We can't see him. But we are interested in you and your ideas. Tell us what you think, personally, not what somebody else said. Put more of Mr. Jackson in this talk. Would you take this same subject next week? Read this article again, and ask yourself whether you agree with the author or not. If you do, illustrate the points of agreement with reservations from your own experience. If you don't agree with him, tell us why. Let this article be the starting point from which to launch your own talk."
杰克逊先生把那篇文章重读以后，发现自己一点也不同意里面的观点。他从记忆里搜寻事例来反驳，并以自己身为银行主管的经验，来详尽阐述论证自己的观点。他的第二次讲演，充满了根据他自身背景所得的理念，不再是翻抄杂志文章的内容，他给我们的是自己矿场里的矿石，自己铸币厂里铸制的钱币。你想一想，哪一场讲演能给班上同学更强烈的印象？Mr. Jackson reread the article and concluded that he did not agree with the author at all. He searched his memory for examples to prove his points of disagreement. He developed and expanded his ideas with details from his own experience as a bank executive. He came back the next week and gave a talk that was full of his own convictions, based on his own background. Instead of a warmed-over magazine article, he gave us ore from his own mine, currency coined in his own mint. I leave it to you to decide which talk made a stronger impact on the class.
