奥巴马在开学第一课上的演讲词(中英文对照)(11)

But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework

assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

因为，成功是件难事。你不可能对要读的每门课程都兴趣盎然，你不可能和每名带课教师都相处顺利，你也不可能每次都遇上看起来和现实生活有关的作业。而且，并不是每件事，你都能在头一次尝试时获得成功。

That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

但 那没有关系。因为在这个世界上，最最成功的人们往往也经历过最多的失败。 J.K. 罗琳的第一本《哈利 ? 波特》被出版商拒绝了十二次才最终出版；迈克尔 ? 乔 丹上高中时被学校的篮球队刷了下来，在他的职业生涯里，他输了几百场比赛、投失过几千次射篮，知道他是怎么说的吗？ ― 我一生不停地失败、失败再失败，这就 是我现在成功的原因。 ‖

These people succeeded because they understand that you can’t let

your failures define you – you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn’t mean you’re stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.

他们的成功，源于他们明白人不能让失败左右自己 —— 而是要从中吸取经验。从失败中，你可以明白下一次自己可 以做出怎样的改变；假如你惹了什么麻烦，那并不说明你就是个捣蛋贵，而是在提醒你，在将来要对自己有更严格的要求；假如你考了个低分，那并不说明你就比别 人笨，而是在告诉你，自己得在学习上花更多的时间。