你仍然可以在家里找到敬畏和惊奇的时刻

你仍然可以在家里找到敬畏和惊奇的时刻

No one could blame the babysitters for ditching us.

没有人会责怪保姆抛弃了我们。

Who wanted to spend time in a spooky old farmhouse with a couple of kids who were, as one doomed sitter put it, "full of beans"?

谁愿意花时间和几个孩子在一个阴森的旧农舍里度过呢?

Sometimes. a screen can be a most welcome distraction. (Photo: Christian Cotroneo)

As a result, my sister and I spent many days and nights on our own, mostly isolated from the rest of the world. Sound familiar?

结果，我和姐姐独自度过了许多日日夜夜，几乎与世隔绝。听起来是不是很熟悉?

Lately, it seems, we've all been returning to a point in our lives when we spent most of our time at home, often by ourselves.

最近，似乎我们都回到了我们生活中的一个阶段，我们大部分时间都呆在家里，通常是一个人。

Unlike childhood, these are not halcyon days — a pandemic is raging and people are dying. But the feeling of being alone and isolated may take many of us back to another time, a time when we exalted in everyday moments. That ability to find moments of awe shouldn't be left behind with childhood. As Sidney Stevens writes in MNN, "the more you're bowled over by things, the healthier you'll be physically, mentally and spiritually."

与童年不同的是，这些日子并不太平——一场大流行正在肆虐，人们正在死亡。但是，孤独和孤立的感觉可能会把我们许多人带回到另一个时代，一个我们在日常生活中感到兴奋的时代。这种发现令人敬畏时刻的能力不应该被遗忘在童年时代。正如西德尼·史蒂文斯在《MNN》中写道的那样:“你被事情压倒的越多，你的身体、心理和精神就会越健康。”

Finding awe where you are

在你所在的地方发现敬畏

Who says you have to go far to go camping? (Photo: Christian Cotroneo)

Berkeley researchers recently set out to prove a similar hypothesis, only for people mostly confined to their homes. In other words, the quarantine crowd. Can you, for example, find awe and growth while stuck at home?

伯克利大学的研究人员最近开始证明一个类似的假设，只是针对那些主要呆在家里的人。换句话说，就是隔离人群。例如，当你呆在家里的时候，你能发现敬畏和成长吗?

The answer was a resounding yes. It starts, as the researchers write in Greater Good magazine, with ignoring the myriad distractions that buzz around us.

答案是绝对的肯定。正如研究人员在《更伟大的好杂志》上所写的那样，它始于忽视我们周围的无数干扰因素。

"When you do, your mind quiets down," they note. "Whatever you're doing — showering, eating, driving, gardening, writing, reading emails, playing with your kids, hiking — you can choose to bring your full attention to the present moment."

他们指出:“当你这样做的时候，你的大脑就会安静下来。无论你在做什么——洗澡、吃饭、开车、园艺、写作、阅读电子邮件、和孩子一起玩、徒步旅行——你都可以选择将你的全部注意力集中在当下。”

When you do that, you're engaging in what they call "Microdosing Mindfulness," a means of easing stress and anxiety by essentially getting high on the present.

当你这样做的时候，你就进入了所谓的“微剂量正念”，这是一种缓解压力和焦虑的方法，本质上就是让自己沉浸在当下。

Of course, there's a lot more to mindfulness than just slowing things down. Researchers recommend treating your house like a museum, pondering every object. And you'll need to time your inhales and exhales just right.

当然，正念不仅仅是让事情慢下来。研究人员建议把你的房子当做一个博物馆，思考每一个物体。你需要掌握正确的吸气和呼气时间。

But ultimately, as previous studies note, cultivating awe in our every day, even in isolation, can be a powerful tonic for both body and soul.

但最终，正如之前的研究指出的，在我们的每一天中培养敬畏之心，即使是在孤立的状态下，也能对我们的身体和灵魂产生强大的滋补作用。

The thing is, children do much of that with a lot less effort.

问题是，孩子们在这方面做得很少。

You develop a kind of sensitivity to seemingly normal patterns. Like the way sunlight pours through the front window, gets carved into slender blades by the curtains and appears like a highway of light on the carpet below. That's the perfect road to cruise with the unused eraser from your back-to-school pencil case that looks like a car from the future.

你会对看似正常的模式产生一种敏感性。就像阳光从前窗倾泻进来，被窗帘雕刻成细长的叶片，在下面的地毯上看起来像一条光的高速公路。这是一个完美的道路巡航与未使用的橡皮从你的返校铅笔盒，看起来像来自未来的汽车。

You might even notice the aerodynamics of a classic pen cap make it well-suited for elastic-propelled rocketry. Especially when launched at your sister.

你甚至可能会注意到一个经典的笔帽的空气动力学，使它非常适合于弹性推进火箭。尤其是对你姐姐发起攻击的时候。

Please don't shoot these at people you're in lockdown with. (Photo: Pokin Sethapokin/Shutterstock)

And when the imagination sputters, there's always a good book. In my case, it was often "The Good Book." My dad always made sure there was a bible around — though I favored "The Comic Book" a bit more.

当想象力迸发时，总有一本好书。对我来说，它通常是“一本好书”。我爸爸总是确保身边有一本圣经——尽管我更喜欢“漫画书”。

There were dark times too. I was certain those were ghostly fingers plucking my bed springs at night. And why was the attic door at the far end of my room always heaving open on its own?

也有黑暗的时候。我敢肯定，那是夜里拨我床上弹簧的幽灵般的手指。为什么我房间那头的阁楼门总是自己开着?

Even the tree in front of the house grew human brains.

甚至房前的那棵树也长出了人类的大脑。

Isolation may be be good for strengthening familial bonds. Or not. (Photo: Christian Cotroneo)

It was a strange and surreal kind of place for kids. And I probably annoyed my sister with the same question a little too often: When's dad coming home?

对孩子们来说，这是一个奇怪而超现实的地方。我可能经常用同样的问题来烦我姐姐:爸爸什么时候回家?

She may not have always known the answer or appreciated that it came up so often, but we agreed on one thing: we had our own little world on the farm, with room for the imagination to soar.

她可能并不总是知道答案，也不知道为什么这个问题经常被提起，但我们在一件事上达成了一致:我们在农场里有自己的小世界，有想象翱翔的空间。

And that's all you need.

这就是你所需要的。