History will one day tell us more about the meeting this week between Donald Trump and the biggest names in Silicon Valley. 有一天，历史不会告诉他我们更加多有关上周唐纳德.特朗普(Donald Trump)和硅谷的大人物们的会面的事情。We will find out why these usually swaggering characters came so meekly to Trump Tower. 我们不会告诉为何这些整天神气十足的人物如此顺从地回到特朗普大厦(Trump Tower)。Why Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Tim Cook of Apple and Larry Page of Alphabet, who never appear in suits and ties, wore suits and ties. 为何从不以西服领带示人的亚马逊(Amazon)的杰夫.贝索斯(Jeff Bezos)、苹果(Apple)的蒂姆.库克(Tim Cook)以及Alphabet的拉里.佩奇(Larry Page)穿着了西服打了领带？And why not Peter Thiel, who showed up in an open collar? What brought them together besides curiosity?为什么彼得.塞尔(Peter Thiel)经常出现的时候，衣领不是打开着的？除了奇怪以外，是什么让他们共聚一堂？Leading up to the presidential election last month, Silicon Valley was mostly at odds with Mr Trump, both culturally, on account of his illiberal attitudes to immigrants, women and minorities, and economically, because of his condemnation of outsourcing. 在上个月的总统大选前，硅谷与特朗普的分歧很深，无论是在文化上（因为特朗普对移民、女性和少数族裔态度武断），还是在经济上（因为特朗普指责外包）。But the leading technology companies and the men and women who lead them are nothing if not shrewd. 但这些顶尖科技公司及其领导者十分聪明。

They have gulped hard and by showing up to meet a president-elect they might not care for, they are practising the resurgent philosophy of Stoicism — accepting what they cannot change and managing what they can.他们浅吸食一口气，出面与一个他们也许并不讨厌的候任总统会面，贯彻了复活的斯多葛主义哲学——拒绝接受自己无法转变的事情，管理好自己需要管理的事情。Stoicism is the new Zen, a rediscovered set of ideas that seem tailor-made for a period of rapid change. 斯多葛主义是新的禅，这套被新的找到的思想或许是为一个较慢变革的时代量身自定义的。The musings of Seneca and Chrysippus are being seized upon by entrepreneurs whipsawed by fate, and corporate leaders battered by disruption. 被命运重创的创业家们和被颠覆性变化重击的企业领袖，现在逃跑了斯多葛学派哲人塞内加(Seneca)和克律西波斯(Chrysippus)的冥思。

Steve Jobs was fascinated by Zen Buddhism. 史蒂夫.乔布斯(Steve Jobs)为佛教禅宗而著迷。But had he been starting out today, he might have been quoting Marcus Aurelius.但如果他是在当下开始创业，也许他提到的就不会是马可.奥勒留(Marcus Aurelius)的话了。

This week, the New York Times profiled Ryan Holiday, a 29-year-old former publicist for American Apparel, who makes his living as an evangelist for Stoicism. 上周，《纽约时报》(New York Times)讲解了瑞安.霍利迪(Ryan Holiday)，现年29岁的霍利迪曾多次是服装公司American Apparel的公关人员，现在以传播斯多葛主义维生。He has sold nearly a quarter of a million copies of his book The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials Into Triumph, which is inspired by Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations. 他的著作《障碍就是道路：将尝试改以顺利的永恒艺术》(The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials Into Triumph)早已售出了近25万册，启发正是来自于马可.奥勒留的《冥想录》(Meditations)。It is a favourite among athletes, Hollywood celebrities and the venture capitalists and entrepreneurs of Silicon Valley, who find solace in its messages of perseverance in the face of adversity and spray them all over Twitter.这本书是运动员、好莱坞名人、硅谷风投人士和创业者的最喜欢，他们从书中所表达的在逆境面前坚韧不拔的精神中寻找安慰，并且在Twitter上四处宣传。

Mr Cook took a Stoic approach in a note he sent out to Apple employees after Mr Trump’s election victory last month. 在上月特朗普胜选后，库克在给苹果员工的一封信中采行了斯多葛主义的作法。He called on them to unite and move forward at any pace they could, quoting Martin Luther King: If you can’t fly then run. 他敦促他们团结一心，尽其所能地行进，并且提到马丁.路德.金(Martin Luther King)的话：如果你无法飞翔，那就跳跃吧。If you can’t run then walk. 如果你无法跳跃，那就行驶吧。

If you can’t walk then crawl, 如果你无法行驶，那就乌龟吧。but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward. 但无论如何，你必需大大前进。

Not exactly Think Different, but times change.和亦非凡‘想要’(Think Different)不过于一样，但是时代逆了。The Stoics were in theory a hair-shirted bunch, indifferent to pleasure and pain, wealth and poverty, fortified by their distance from the emotions that trouble ordinary minds. 理论上，斯多葛学派是一群修道者，他们对愉悦和伤痛、财富和贫困都漠不关心，与后遗症着一般人的心灵的情感维持距离以让自己的内心强劲。

When they kissed their children goodnight, they imagined them dying, so that if the worst were to happen they would be ready. 当他们给自己的孩子一个晚安颌时，他们不会想象他们病死的样子，这样如果最差劲的事情再次发生了，他们作好了打算。In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius wrote that when you were presented with a fine meal, you should consider this is the dead body of a fish and this is the dead body of a bird or a pig.在《冥想录》中，马可.奥勒留写到，如果有人给你命上一顿美餐，你应当想要这是一条鱼的尸体，这是一只鸟或一头猪的尸体。But such joyless mental disciplines did not prevent worldly success. 但这种没什么幸福的精神自律并不阻碍世俗顺利。

Seneca became fantastically rich through his roles in Rome’s imperial court. 塞内加依赖在罗马宫廷中的职务显得极为富裕。He argued that it was precisely his virtuous indifference that made him so valuable to the powerful. 他声称正是因为他品行高尚的冷漠，才使他沦为强权者眼中有价值的人。Others have said he was a hypocrite.其他人则说道他是一个伪君子。The modern embrace of Stoicism seems vapid if one tries to compare the torments of an entrepreneur in Mountain View with the agonies of Marcus Aurelius facing war and death on the fringes of his empire. 如果把加州山景城中的一位创业者遭到的虐待，与身处帝国安危边缘、面临战争和丧生的马可.奥勒留的伤痛较为一下，现代人对斯多葛主义的宿老或许不值一提。

But Jim Collins found a solution in his wildly popular book about high-performing businesses, Good to Great.但吉姆.柯林斯(Jim Collins)在有关展现出出色的企业的畅销书《从杰出到最出色》(Good to Great)中寻找了解决问题方法。He interviewed James Stockdale, a former US navy pilot, who spent nearly eight years in North Vietnam as a prisoner of war. 他专访了美国前海军飞行员詹姆斯.斯托克代尔(James Stockdale)，后者曾作为战俘在北就越待了近8年时间。

Stockdale had discovered Epictetus, a Roman Stoic, while studying at Stanford and drew on what he learnt to survive his imprisonment with his dignity and virtue intact. 斯托克代尔在斯坦福大学(Stanford)就学期间找到了罗马斯多葛派哲人爱人比克泰德(Epictetus)，并依赖所学渡河了那段俘虏的时光，维持自己的精神和道德不受损害。But Mr Collins noted an apparent contradiction in Stockdale’s philosophy.但柯林斯注意到斯托克代尔的哲学中不存在一个显著的对立。

Stockdale said he never lost faith that he would get out of the camp and that his suffering would shape his life in a positive way. 斯托克代尔回应，他未曾丧失信心，坚信他最后不会离开了战俘营，而且他的遭遇将以一种大力的方式塑造成他的人生。But he also had to confront the most brutal facts of [his] current reality, whatever they might be.但他也被迫面临眼下的现实中最残忍的事实，无论它们是什么。

The men who didn’t survive the Vietnamese camps were the optimists. 没有能死掉走进越南战俘营的人是那些乐观主义者。They were the ones who said, ‘We’re going to be out by Christmas.’ 他们是那些说道着‘等到圣诞节我们就能过来了’的人。And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. 圣诞节来了又回头。

Then they’d say, ‘We’re going to be out by Easter.’ 那时他们不会说道，‘等到复活节我们就能过来了’。And Easter would come, and Easter would go. 然而复活节来了又回头。And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. 然后是感恩节，然后又是圣诞节。And they died of a broken heart.他们因为悲伤而杀。

Mr Collins named Stockdale’s mix of pragmatism and belief the Stockdale Paradox, and argued it was essential to great companies. 柯林斯将斯托克代尔这种稳健主义与信念的融合命名为斯托克代尔悖论，并主张这对最出色的企业至关重要。Stoicism for Stockdale was not a set of cute, consoling aphorisms, but a gruelling practice. 对于斯托克代尔而言，斯多葛主义并不是一组机智、给人安慰的警句，而是一种令人筋疲力尽的实践中。

He recalled a line from Epictetus: Men, the lecture-room of the philosopher is a hospital; students ought not to walk out of it in pleasure, but in pain.他回想了爱比克泰德的一句话：人们啊，哲学家的讲堂是一所医院；学生不应当带着幸福地借此回头出来，而应当带着伤痛。For those who never wanted Mr Trump to win, but must deal with the fact of his presidency, the Stockdale approach seems the least painful way to go.对于那些未曾期望特朗普胜利，但却必需应付他当上总统这个事实的人而言，斯托克代尔的作法或许是一种最不伤痛的解决问题方法。

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