好英语网在美国，有些人开始“躺平”
“I recently learned about this term called ‘quiet quitting’ where you’re not outright quitting your job, but you’re quitting the idea of going above and beyond,” says Zaiad Khan, a TikTok user with over 10,000 followers, in a soothing voice, juxtaposed with a video of the New York City subway. “You are still performing your duties, but you are no longer subscribing to the hustle culture mentally that work has to be our life.”
“我最近了解到一个叫做‘躺平’(quiet quitting)的说法，它的意思是，虽然没有直接离职，但放弃了努力进取的想法，”在一段以纽约市地铁为背景的视频中，有上万关注者的TikTok用户扎伊亚德·汗用舒缓的声音说道。“你仍在履行职责，但你心里不再认同工作就是生活的全部这种奋斗文化。”
Clayton Farris, a TikTok user with 48,000 followers, who posted about the trend days later, says in his own video: “I don’t stress and internally rip myself to shreds.”
几天后，有4.8万关注者的TikTok用户克莱顿·法里斯就这个热议话题发表了视频，他在视频中说：“我不给自己压力，也不会在内心折磨自己。”
The phrase went mainstream from there. “If Your Co-Workers Are ‘Quiet Quitting,’ Here’s What That Means,” read a headline in a Wall Street Journal article on Aug. 12. The Guardian went with: “Quiet Quitting: Why Doing the Bare Minimum at Work Has Gone Global.” The term was defined and redefined. For some, it was mentally checking out from work. For others, it became about not accepting additional work without additional pay.
此后这句话就变成了主流。8月12日，《华尔街日报》发表文章《如果你的同事在‘躺平’，这样做是什么意思》。卫报的标题则是《躺平：为什么以最低限度完成工作成为全球趋势》。这个词被定义、再定义。对一些人来说，这是在精神上退出工作。对于其他人来说，它变成了如果没有额外报酬就不接受额外工作。
Many people feel perplexed: Why do you need a term to describe something as ordinary as going to work and doing your job, even if it’s not well? Some people feel validated for never raising their hands at work, or judged because they actually like being overachievers.
很多人感到困惑：为什么要用一个名词来形容上班、做好本职工作这样普通的事情，哪怕这些你做得不好？有些人因此觉得自己在工作中从不出头是对的。而有些人觉得自己的积极进取受到了评判。
Then there are those who are envious: They wish they could quietly quit, but believe they could never get away with it because of their race or gender. (There are also some professions that make it less easy. Who wants their doctor or child’s teacher to take the easy way out?)
还有一些人表达了羡慕：他们希望自己可以“躺平”，但由于种族或性别的原因，他们认为自己永远无法做到。（也有一些职业不那么容易做到。谁希望自己的医生或孩子的老师选择躺平呢？）
Gabrielle Judge, 25, who works in customer success for a tech company and lives in Denver, sees people on social media talking about quietly quitting without any regard for how it affects others. “Some people are taking quiet quitting as in passive aggressively withdrawing, and that doesn’t win for everyone,” she said. “It isn’t always about you. You’re on a team, you’re in a department.”
25岁的嘉布里埃尔·贾奇住在丹佛，在一家科技公司从事客户关系工作，她看到社交媒体上的人们谈论躺平，却丝毫不考虑这会对他人造成怎样的影响。“有些人将躺平视为一种带有消极攻击性质的退出，但这并不适合所有人，”她说。“事情并不是永远围着你转。你还有团队，你还有部门。”
Still, she supports communicating healthy boundaries, as long as it’s done responsibly. “I’m all about balance,” she said. “As long as our work is being done, and we don’t need each other, we can do whatever.”
尽管如此，她赞成通过沟通达成一个健康的边界，前提是用责任的方式。“我很注重平衡，”她说。“只要我们的工作有人在做，而且我们不需要彼此，我们怎么做都可以。”
Alex Bauer, 26, a material handler in a book warehouse in Appleton, Wis., said that her first thought “when I heard about quiet quitting was, ‘Oh God, that’s me. It’s been something I’ve been practicing, but I didn’t have a name for it up until now.”
26岁的亚历克斯·鲍尔在威斯康星州阿普尔顿的一家图书仓库做物料处理工作。“当我听说躺平时，”她说她的第一反应是，“天哪，说的就是我。这是我一直在实践的事情，但直到现在我才知道它有这样一个名字。”
Ms. Bauer started her job — she works eight-hour shifts five days a week — four months ago. She chose it because it wouldn’t require her to commit emotional energy. “To be given a list of so many things to do and tick them off one by one, it’s fulfilling,” she said. “I like the go-go-go, but I don’t have anxiety attacks. I am good at my job, but then I go home and don’t think about it.” She even has a side business: editing short stories, mostly in the fantasy genre.
鲍尔四个月前开始做现在这份工作——她每周工作五天，轮班工作八小时。她选择这份工作是因为不需要投入情绪能量。“拿到一份清单，上面列出了这么多要做的事情，做完一个划掉一个，让人感到很充实，”她说。“我喜欢马不停蹄，但我不会焦虑发作。我很擅长我的工作，但我在回家后就不再想着工作了。”她甚至还有一项副业：编辑短篇小说，主要是奇幻小说。
In previous roles she worked in restaurants where she had to cook under pressure and manage kitchen staff who regularly called in sick. “You couldn’t check out of that kind of job. You had to keep going at a certain pace, or you will fall behind,” she said. “I got so burnt out, I got physically sick. I thought I had Covid because I couldn’t walk from the front to the back of the restaurant without seeing spots.”
她过去曾在餐馆工作，必须要在巨大的压力下烹饪，还要管理一帮动不动就请病假的员工。“那种工作你没法就这样打卡下班。你必须以一定的速度继续做下去，否则你会赶不上进度，”她说。“我已经筋疲力尽了，身体不舒服。我以为我得了新冠，因为在餐厅里忙前忙后的时候，我总能看见眼前有些点点。”
She’s excited that the rest of the world has caught up to her way of thinking, rather than judging her desire to work a more simple job. “It’s validating,” she said. “It’s very refreshing to approach a job like I do, and it’s really nice to see there is a growing movement around something I do.”
她很高兴世界上有很多人都有和她相似的想法，而不是评价她想做更简单工作的愿望。“这验证了我的想法，”她说。“我对待工作的这种方式非常令人耳目一新，看到我这种做法成为了一个不断壮大的运动真好。”
Nikki Miles, 34, works as a human resource specialist for an entertainment company in Austin, Texas. “When I first read about quiet quitting I thought it was ridiculous,” she said.
34岁的尼基·迈尔斯在德克萨斯州奥斯汀的一家娱乐公司担任人力资源专员。“当我第一次读到关于躺平的说法时，我觉得这很荒谬，”她说。
Ms. Miles knows what it is like to work hard at her job. “I am a bit of a perfectionist,” she said. “I get these ideas, and I run with them.” She is especially interested in projects involving diversity, equity and inclusion, and she is helping her company develop better policies and programs.
迈尔斯知道在工作中努力做事是什么感觉。“我有点完美主义者，”她说。“我理解这些想法，我能接受。”她对涉及多元化、公平和包容性的项目特别感兴趣，她正在帮助她的公司制定更好的政策和计划。
But she has never understood people who make additional work for themselves, especially if it is outside their job description, just to look good or gain attention at work. “I am going to do my job, and do it well, and do things that actually interest me,” she said. “But besides that, I am already underpaid, so I am definitely not going to take on more.”
但她从不理解那些为自己制造额外工作的人，特别是如果这超出了他们的工作范围，只是为了看上去很优秀或在工作中获得关注。“我会做我的工作，把它做好，做我真正感兴趣的事情，”她说。“但除此之外，我的工资已经很低了，所以我肯定不会再承担更多工作了。”
She’s confused by this trend that in her view simply consists of people putting their foot down … to do their job.
她对这种趋势感到困惑，在她看来，这无非是一些人下决心……去做自己分内的事。
“It means that the expectation is for you to do more than the company actually compensates you for, and that will work out well for you,” she said. “That doesn’t make sense to me. You do the work you are compensated for, and if you want to go above and beyond, good for you, but that shouldn’t be a requirement.”
“它意味着，对你的期待是你要做的比公司实际付给你的报酬要多，而且这对你有好处，”她说。“在我看来这没什么道理。你做工作并得到相应的报酬，如果你想做的更多，这很好，但这不应该是一个要求。”
“This is the most worthless term,” she added.
“这是个毫无意义的词，”她还说。
Matt Spielman, a career coach in New York City and author of the book “Inflection Points: How to Work and Live With Purpose,” understands why some people may want to scale back at work. “If somebody really is burnt out or at the end of his or her rope or having personal issues, I think dialing the knob back from 10 to 7 or 6 or 5 makes sense,” he said.
马特·斯皮尔曼是纽约市的一名职业发展指导师，著有《拐点——如何带着目标去工作和生活》(Inflection Points: How to Work and Live With Purpose)，他理解为什么有些人可能希望缩减工作。他说：“如果某人真的感到倦怠、走投无路或有个人问题，我认为把工作时长从10调到7、6或5是合理的。”
He believes the urge is stronger with remote work. “With remote work it is far easier to feel less involved, less part of a team, and it’s easier for managers to break up with employees and vice versa,” he said. “There are fewer boundaries of when work starts and when work stops.”
他认为，在远程工作中，这种冲动更加强烈。“远程工作容易让人感觉参与感更低，更不属于团队，管理者更容易与员工决裂，反之亦然，”他说。“工作何时开始、何时结束的界限也更少。”
But he worries about people engaging in quiet quitting as a means of getting revenge on a company. “Quiet quitting seems very passive aggressive,” he said. “If somebody is burnt out, there should be a candid conversation about that, and it should be both ways. Just saying, ‘I am going to do the absolute minimum because I am entitled to it or I have issues’ — it doesn’t really help anybody.”
但他担心人们会把躺平作为报复公司的手段。“躺平似乎是一种消极的攻击，”他说。“如果有人感到疲惫，就应该坦诚地谈论这个问题，而且应该是双向的。只是说，‘我要做绝对最低限度的工作，因为我有权利这样做，或者我遇到了问题’——这对任何人都没有帮助。”
Above all, Mr. Spielman believes that quiet quitting prevents people from finding jobs they love, which provide them with a sense of meaning and belonging.
最重要的是，斯皮尔曼认为，躺平会妨碍人们找到自己喜爱、能给自己带来意义和归属感的工作。
“You work four, five, six, sometimes seven days a week,” he said. “There is no sadder thing to waste all this time in your life trying not to enjoy and be engaged and being excited in the work you are doing.”
“你一周工作四天、五天、六天，有时候是七天，”他说。“浪费生命中的这么多时间，却努力不去享受、不去投入你正在做的工作，也不为它感到兴奋，没有什么比这更可悲的了。”