58.Never Stops, And Never Should

It Never Stops, And Never Should When I was five years old, I played the role of the turtle in a play organized by my older sister. I had one line at the end, when I beat the sleeping rabbit to the finish line: slow and steady wins the race. 我五岁时在我姐姐组织的一场演出中扮演乌龟，最后打败熟睡的兔子冲过终点线时有一句台词：又慢又稳赢得了比赛。 I’ve always felt that those words guided my career. I was never the fastest; I was rarely an A student. But as the careers of others stalled, I kept going. My goal was always the same: to learn more this year than I had last year. 我总是感觉那些话对我的事业有指导作用，我从来不是最快的，我几乎没得过A。但当其他人事业停滞不前时，我的事业一直在发展。我的目标始终如一：今年要比去年多学点东西。 Some people have difficulty with particular topics. They may also have a slow deliberate style. The goal of education is not to gain as much knowledge as quickly as possible, but to gain useful knowledge and retain it. As a teacher, I don’t care how “fast” someone learns something. 有些人理解某些特定话题有困难，他们可能是缓慢从容的风格。教育的目标不是以最快速度获取最多知识，而是要获取有用的知识并记在大脑里。作为一名教师，我不在乎学生学习有多快。 There may be a lot of reasons someone picks up a particular subject or topic more quickly: more background, natural adeptness, previous exposure to the material, more sleep that night, less stress, and so on. We process information differently. 有很多原因会导致学生学习某一特定学科或话题比别人快：更多的背景知识、天生的熟练、之前接触过相关材料、前一晚睡眠更充足、压力更小等。我们处理信息有所不同。 In retrospect, I’ve come to realize that one of the ways I learn is “error-based.” That is, I effectively learn by making mistakes. This may be slower than other methods of learning, but when I learn something, I really learn it. 回顾过去，我意识到我的一种学习方法是“以错为鉴”，就是通过犯错有效地学习。这个方法可能比其他学习方法慢，但只要我学会了，就是真的学会了。 It never stops, and never should. Now the world is competitive and sometimes being too slow means you miss out. But speed is seldom the biggest marker of success. Learning, like a career, or like life, is a marathon, not a sprint. 学习永不停歇，也永远不该停下。现在社会竞争激烈，有时速度太慢意味着你会错过机会，但速度也极少是成功最大的标志。学习就像事业或生活一样，是一场马拉松，而不是（短跑）冲刺。