你想要做出偉大的工作嗎？(2/2)

原文：https://www.paulgraham.com/greatwork.html

又是好奇心

好奇心和原創性密切相關。好奇心通過給原創性提供新的東西來工作來滋養原創性。但是它們之間的關係不僅僅是這樣。好奇心本身就是一種原創性；它大致相當於問題的原創性，而原創性相當於答案的原創性。而且由於問題在最好的情況下是答案的一個重要組成部分，所以好奇心在最好的情況下也是一種創造性的力量。

Curiosity and originality are closely related. Curiosity feeds originality by giving it new things to work on. But the relationship is closer than that. Curiosity is itself a kind of originality; it's roughly to questions what originality is to answers. And since questions at their best are a big component of answers, curiosity at its best is a creative force.

打破規則

一個好的新想法對大多數人來說必須似乎不好,否則別人早就探索過了。所以,你要尋找的就是似乎瘋狂的想法,但是正確的瘋狂。你如何識別這些想法?你無法確定。通常似乎不好的想法確實不好。但正確的瘋狂想法往往令人興奮;它們富有含義;而僅僅不好的想法往往令人沮喪。

有兩種方式可以舒服地打破規則:享受打破規則和對規則漠不關心。我稱這兩種情況為積極和被動獨立思考。

Indeed, if you think about it, a good new idea has to seem bad to most people, or someone would have already explored it. So what you're looking for is ideas that seem crazy, but the right kind of crazy. How do you recognize these? You can't with certainty. Often ideas that seem bad are bad. But ideas that are the right kind of crazy tend to be exciting; they're rich in implications; whereas ideas that are merely bad tend to be depressing.

There are two ways to be comfortable breaking rules: to enjoy breaking them, and to be indifferent to them. I call these two cases being aggressively and passively independent-minded.

反向思考

每個受寵但錯誤的原則周圍都有一片死區,裡面有許多未被探索的有價值的想法,因為它們與之矛盾。

Every cherished but mistaken principle is surrounded by a dead zone of valuable ideas that are unexplored because they contradict it.

人們在什麼方面像宗教一樣過於執著於某些原則,這些原則可能並不像他們想像的那麼不言自明?如果放棄它,什麼會變得可能?

What are people in your field religious about, in the sense of being too attached to some principle that might not be as self-evident as they think? What becomes possible if you discard it?

大量的嘗試

多產是被低估的。你嘗試的東西越多，發現新東西的機會就越大。不過要明白，嘗試很多東西意味著嘗試很多不起作用的東西。你不可能有很多好主意而不同時有很多壞主意。

Being prolific is underrated. The more different things you try, the greater the chance of discovering something new. Understand, though, that trying lots of things will mean trying lots of things that don't work. You can't have a lot of good ideas without also having a lot of bad ones.

被低估是一種好兆頭

一個新項目的早期版本有時會被輕視為玩具。當人們這樣做時，這是一個好兆頭。這意味著它除了規模之外，擁有一個新想法需要的一切，而規模往往會隨之而來。

從小做起，然後逐步發展，這是一種選擇。另一種選擇是提前計畫好你要做什麼。計畫通常看起來是更負責任的選擇。說“我們要先做x，然後做y，再做z”聽起來比說“我們要試試x，看看會發生什麼”更有條理。而且它確實更有條理；只是效果不太好。

An early version of a new project will sometimes be dismissed as a toy. It's a good sign when people do this. That means it has everything a new idea needs except scale, and that tends to follow.

The alternative to starting with something small and evolving it is to plan in advance what you're going to do. And planning does usually seem the more responsible choice. It sounds more organized to say "we're going to do x and then y and then z" than "we're going to try x and see what happens." And it is more organized; it just doesn't work as well.

風險與回報

承擔你能承受得起的風險。在一個有效的市場中，風險與回報成正比，所以不要尋求確定性，而要尋求一個期望值高的賭注。如果你偶爾不失敗，你可能太保守了。

Take as much risk as you can afford. In an efficient market, risk is proportionate to reward, so don't look for certainty, but for a bet with high expected value. If you're not failing occasionally, you're probably being too conservative.

關於同事

同事質量比數量更重要。擁有一兩個優秀的同事比擁有一棟樓裡滿是還不錯的同事要好得多。事實上，這不僅僅是更好，而且是必要的，從歷史上看：偉大的工作發生在叢集中的程度表明，你的同事往往是做出偉大工作與否之間的區別。

你怎麼知道你有足夠好的同事呢？根據我的經驗，當你有了，你就知道了。這意味著如果你不確定，你可能沒有。但也許可以給出一個比這更具體的答案。這裡是一個嘗試：足夠好的同事能提供令人驚訝的洞察力。他們能看到和做到你不能做到的事情。

Quality is more important than quantity in colleagues. It's better to have one or two great ones than a building full of pretty good ones. In fact it's not merely better, but necessary, judging from history: the degree to which great work happens in clusters suggests that one's colleagues often make the difference between doing great work and not.

How do you know when you have sufficiently good colleagues? In my experience, when you do, you know. Which means if you're unsure, you probably don't. But it may be possible to give a more concrete answer than that. Here's an attempt: sufficiently good colleagues offer surprising insights. They can see and do things that you can't. So if you have a handful of colleagues good enough to keep you on your toes in this sense, you're probably over the threshold.

士氣

保護你的士氣。當你從事雄心勃勃的項目時，這是一切的基礎。你必須像呵護和保護一個活的有機體一樣呵護和保護它。

你花時間在一起的人也會對你的士氣產生很大的影響。你會發現有些人會增加你的精力，有些人會減少你的精力，而某個人產生的效果並不總是你所期望的。尋找那些能增加你精力的人，並避開那些能減少你精力的人。

Morale starts with your view of life. You're more likely to do great work if you're an optimist, and more likely to if you think of yourself as lucky than if you think of yourself as a victim.

The people you spend time with will also have a big effect on your morale. You'll find there are some who increase your energy and others who decrease it, and the effect someone has is not always what you'd expect. Seek out the people who increase your energy and avoid those who decrease it.

還是好奇心

好奇心是最好的指導。你的好奇心永遠不會說謊，而且它比你更知道什麼值得關注。

Curiosity is the best guide. Your curiosity never lies, and it knows more than you do about what's worth paying attention to.

文末

信不信由你，我試著讓這篇文章儘可能短。但它的長度至少意味著它起到了一個過濾器的作用。如果你堅持到了這裡，你一定對做出偉大的工作感興趣。如果是這樣，你已經比你意識到的更進一步了，因為願意想要做出偉大工作的人群很小。

Believe it or not, I tried to make this essay as short as I could. But its length at least means it acts as a filter. If you made it this far, you must be interested in doing great work. And if so you're already further along than you might realize, because the set of people willing to want to is small.

最後心得

Paul Graham 最後刻意地提到，這篇長文本身也是個過濾器，如果你認真的看完它了，代表你對作出為大的工作「足夠」感興趣。

做出偉大成就的關鍵在於有野心、努力工作還有好奇心。要做出偉大成就，需要努力、專注和不斷探索。不要讓競爭和他人的意見左右自己的決定，要相信自己的能力和直覺。能做出偉大成就的人並不多，但只有你能決定自己是否想要成為其中之一。

你想要做出偉大的工作嗎？現在你必須有意識地決定。

Do you want to do great work, or not? Now you have to decide consciously.