4. I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.
5. This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept: No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
6. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
1. 17岁的时候，我读到了一句格言，好像是：“如果你把每一天都当作生命中最后一天去生活的话，肯定有一天你会是正确的。”这句话给我留下了深刻的印象。自那以后，在过去的33年中我每天早晨都会对着镜子问自己：“如果今天是我生命中的最后一天，我会去做今天打算做的那些事吗？”每当答案连续多日都是“不会”的时候，我知道我该做些改变了。
2. 提醒自己我即将死去，是帮我做出人生中许多重大抉择的最重要的工具。因为几乎所有的一切——所有他人的期望、荣耀、面子问题和对失败的恐惧——这些在死亡面前都会消失殆尽，留下的是真正重要的东西。提醒自己我将要死去，我认为是避免患得患失的最好办法。你本来就一无所有，没有理由不顺心而为。
3. 大约一年前， 我被诊断出得了癌症。我在早晨7点半做了扫描， 扫描结果清楚地显示我的胰腺上长了一个肿瘤。我当时甚至都不知道胰腺是什么东西。医生告诉我，这基本上是一种无法治愈的癌症， 我活在世上的时间不会超过3～6个月。医生劝我回家，安排后事，这是医生让病人等死的婉言。这意味着你要尽量把本来想在未来10年内对孩子们说的话在几个月里说完；意味着你要把一切安排妥当，让你的家人尽可能地轻松一点；意味着你要说“再见”了。
4. 诊断结果让我想了一整天。那天晚上晚些时候，我做了活组织切片检查。医生将一个内窥镜从我的喉咙伸进去，通过我的胃， 进入我的肠子， 然后用一根针刺进我的胰腺，在肿瘤上提取了一些细胞。我当时注射了镇定剂，但在场的妻子后来告诉我，医生在显微镜下观察这些细胞的时候，忽然叫了起来， 因为我患的竟然是一种非常罕见的、可以用手术治愈的胰腺癌。我做了手术，现在痊愈了。
5. 那是我与死神擦肩而过的一次， 我希望这也是以后几十年最接近死神的一次。以前死亡对于我只是一个有用但抽象的概念，有了这次经历后，我现在可以更加确信地对你们说：没有人愿意死， 即使人们想上天堂， 也不会为了去那里而死。但是死亡是我们每个人共同的归宿，无人幸免。也应该如此，因为死亡很可能是生命惟一最好的发明。它是生命变化更替的推动力。它破旧立新。你们现在是新人，但是不久的将来，你们会慢慢变老，然后被清除掉。我很抱歉这很戏剧性，但事实就是这样。
6. 你们的时间很有限， 所以不要把时间浪费在重复他人的生活上。不要受教条的束缚，因为那就意味着你依据别人的思想在生活。不要让他人喋喋不休的意见淹没掉你自己内心的声音。最重要的是， 要勇于听从你内心的直觉。可以说，内心的直觉早已知道你想要成为什么样的人，而其他一切都是次要的。
How Happy Is The Little Stone这颗小石何等幸福
1. How happy is the little Stone
2. How happy is the little Stone
3. That rambles in the Road alone,
4. And doesn’t care about Careers
5. And Exigencies never fears
6. Whose Coat of elemental Brown
7. A passing Universe put on,
8. And independent as the Sun
9. Associates or glows alone
10. Fulfilling absolute Decree
11. In casual simplicity
1. 这颗小石何等幸福
2. 这颗小石何等幸福
3. 独自在路旁漫步
4. 它不汲汲于功名
5. 也从不为变故担心
6. 变幻的宇宙
7. 也得被它质朴的棕色外衣
8. 它独立不羁如太阳
9. 与众辉煌或独自闪光
10. 它顺应天意
11. 单纯，一味自然
Write Your Life书写你的生命华章
1. Suppose someone gave you a pen—a sealed, solid-colored pen. You couldn’t see how much ink it had. It might run dry after the first few tentative words or last just long enough to create a masterpiece (or several) that would last forever and make a difference in the scheme of things. You don’t know before you begin.
2. Under the rules of the game, you really never know. You have to take a chance! Actually, no rule of the game states you must do anything. Instead of picking up and using the pen, you could leave it on a shelf or in a drawer where it will dry up, unused. But if you do decide to use it, what would you do with it? How would you play the game?
3. Would you plan and plan before you ever wrote a word? Would your plans be so extensive that you never even got to the writing?
4. Or would you take the pen in hand, plunge right in and just do it, struggling to keep up with the twists and turns of the torrents of words that take you where they take you?
5. Would you write cautiously and carefully, as if the pen might run dry the next moment, or would you pretend or believe (or pretend to believe) that the pen will write forever and proceed accordingly?
6. And of what would you write: Of love? Hate? Fun? Misery? Life? Death? Nothing? Everything?
7. Would you write to please just yourself? Or others? Or yourself by writing for others?
8. Would your strokes be tremblingly timid or brilliantly bold? Fancy with a flourish or plain?
9. Would you even write? Once you have the pen, no rule says you have to write. Would you sketch? Scribble? Doodle or draw?
10. Would you stay in or on the lines, or see no lines at all, even if they were there? Or are they? There’s a lot to think about here, isn’t there?
11. Now, suppose someone gave you a life...
1. 假如有人给了你一支笔，一支密封的、纯色的水笔，里面有多少墨水你无法看到，很可能刚刚试着写几个字就用干；也可能足以完成一部或几部辉煌之作，流传千古，使世事为之大变。而这一切你在动笔之前无法知晓。
2. 根据游戏的规则，你确实永远也不会知道，只能碰碰运气。而事实上，也没有规则阐明你一定要做些什么。你可以不去执笔挥毫，而把笔搁在架子上、放在抽屉里，弃置不用，任墨水蒸发干净。可是，如果你真的决定使用它，你会用来做什么呢？你会怎样来做这个游戏？
3. 你会穷思竭虑，计划周全，然后才慢慢下笔吗？你的计划会不会广泛庞杂，根本达不到写作这一步？
4. 你会不会提笔在手，迫不及待地投入其中，任由手中的笔、笔下的字引领着你在词海中左突右冲？
5. 你会不会小心下笔，似乎生怕墨水随时都有耗尽的危机？会不会假装或相信、或假装相信笔中墨水永不会枯竭，任你神驰？
6. 你会写些什么？爱？恨？趣？苦？生？死？虚或实？
7. 你是会以写作自娱，还是取悦他人？还是为人写作而愉悦自身？
8. 你的一笔一画会颤抖怯懦还是亮丽大胆？花里胡哨还是朴实无华？
9. 你确实会去写吗？你一旦有了这支笔，却也没有规则说你一定就要去写。你会粗略描摹？潦潦草草？信手涂鸦？还是认真描画？
10. 你会写在线里还是写在线上，或者全然不见？真的有什么线格吗？这其中，有很多东西值得思考，不是吗？
11. 那么，假如有人给了你一支生命之笔……