文字难度：★★☆
In my 20's, I was always 1)craving to “2)hang out”. After work, I would go straight to my friend Nadav's apartment and spend a whole evening hanging out with other friends who 3)commuted to Nadav's every night. We would watch TV or play video games while 4)bingeing on beers. Nothing productive. Nothing constructive. We just sat around watching the clock go around and around. Now I think back, it seems wasteful, but I don't regret it. Our 20's are, in many ways, about a sense of belonging. Part of the process of defining who you are is to find where you belong. It is ironic that after spending a whole decade trying to find your identity by struggling to belong somewhere, you find that to know who you truly are is to know that you don't really belong anywhere. That is, you are you; any differences or similarities that you see are only in your head. Anyone can be similar to you or different from you depending on which aspects you focus on.
20岁时，我总渴望着跟朋友“混在一起玩儿”。下班后，我都会直接到我朋友纳达夫的公寓和其他到他那儿过夜的朋友玩上一整夜。我们会一边狂饮啤酒，一边看电视或玩电子游戏。没什么“营养”，也没什么建设性可言。我们只是随便坐着，看着时针走了一圈又一圈。现在回想起当时，这一切好像是浪费时间，但我不后悔。从很多方面来说，我们的20岁，是寻找归属感的年龄。这个自我定义的过程离不开你找寻自己的归属地。讽刺的是，花了整整十年的时间苦苦扎堆结派追寻自我归属感，却发现，要真正了解你归属何方就是了解到你其实不属于任何地方。也就是说，你就是你，任何你看到的不同或是相同其实只是存在于你头脑之中。任何人都可以与你相去咫尺或相去天渊，只是你随你关注的方面而定。
A sense of belonging is a cause of many problems in the world. Some people spend their whole lives struggling to find a place to belong to, whether it is religion, nation, culture, or race. In many cases, the things that create the sense of belonging are negative aspects of being human, such as drug addiction, 5)alcoholism, racism, and mental/physical 6)affliction. They tend to strengthen the sense of belonging. In a way, they have 7)recourse in the very thing that they criticize.
归属感是这个世界上诸多问题的原因之一。有些人穷尽一生寻觅自己的归属之地，无论是在宗教、国度、文化还是种族方面。很多情况下，带给人归属感的都是一些负面的东西，例如毒瘾、酗酒、种族偏见以及精神上/身体上的苦痛。这种种一切都加强了归属感。从某种程度上来说，人们就是会做那些自己口诛笔伐的事来聊以自慰。
Belonging is a double-edged sword. On one hand, you want to belong because you feel lonely, so you seek out others who share certain similarities, but on the other, you don't want to be 8)categorized and 9)generalized. You conveniently switch your position depending on a merit. 10)You want to eat your cake and have it too.
归属感是把双刃剑。一方面，你因为感到孤独而想成为某个群体的一份子，因此你寻觅与你相去咫尺的人；但另一方面，你又不甘被贴上标签，淹没无闻。你左右摇摆，哪有好处就向哪处靠，总想鱼与熊掌兼得。
When I say I'm neither American nor Japanese, people commonly respond to this by saying that I'm a real American now, and therefore should not feel lonely. Some people go as far as to tell me that what makes this country great is its willingness to accept people like me. 11)Be that as it may, they are assuming that I want to belong, especially to America since it is where I live now, but I don't care to belong to any particular country. This is not to say that I never feel lonely or insecure. Loneliness is a natural feeling. So is insecurity. We all feel it from time to time, but that does not mean that it needs to be fixed. We have a mechanical tendency to try to fix everything negative, but not every negative thing needs to be fixed. Science and technology have blown up our egos to the point that we feel there is a solution for everything negative, that we have no reason to feel anything negative, that we can do away with every negative feeling. When I see these people who are constantly running around trying to fix their negative feelings, I feel like telling them to calm down, that it is only on TV and in Hollywood movies that people attain eternal bliss, that it is perfectly normal to be feeling what they are feeling, and that they should stop fixing everything. Ironically most of these people are busy fixing unfixable problems, and don't even try to fix fixable problems.
当我说我既不是美国人也不是日本人的时候，人们通常会回应说我现在可是货真价实的美国人了，所以不应该感到孤独了。有些人甚至告诉我说，这个国家的伟大之处是它乐于接受像我这样的人。不管怎么说，他们都认为我想要有所归属，特别是归属美国——这个我现在居住的国家，然而我根本就不在乎自己到底属于哪个国家。这不是说我从未被孤独与不安侵袭。感到孤独再自然不过，感到不安也一样。我们时不时会感到不安全，但那不代表我们要消除它。我们机械地认定要把所有负面的东西都消除，但并不是每样负面的东西就一定得消失。科学与技术让我们自信满满，让我们觉得总有办法消除负面的东西，我们没有理由感到消极，我们可以摆脱它们。当我看着那些忙上忙下处理消极情绪的人时，我想告诉他们要静下心来，长长久久的幸福美满是好莱坞影视剧的戏码，有那些感觉都是再自然不过的事，不应该忙着处理所有事情。讽刺的是，这些人中的大多数都在处理“不可能的任务”，却对能解决的问题置之不理。
Life has a funny way of teaching us its 12)essences. Often it is our own struggles that make us struggle. Eventually we realize that the 13)footprints of the 14)crook that we have been chasing are our own. Only by stepping back and examining our own behaviors, can we see the big circle that we were going around and around. In my 20's, that is all I did. Around and around, until I realized that the pursuit of the sense of belonging was what was making me feel lonely and insecure.
生活总以出其不意的方式教会我们其真谛。通常，我们自己瞎折腾只是在折腾自己。最终，我们发现我们一直在追寻着自己的足迹。只有退一步审视自身的行为，我们才得以看清我们一直围着转的圈子。我二十岁的时候就是在做这件事。不断不断地追求，直到我发现寻找归属感正是让我感到孤独与不安的根源。
