People love to imagine a worst-case scenario. Especially when it comes time to quit doing what they hate and start doing what they love instead…
人们总爱想象最糟糕的状况，尤其是在，放弃厌恶的工作开始做点自己喜欢做的事情的时候……

Cindi is a very bright young friend of mine with a great career in front of her. She’s about twenty-six, and she’s been working her tail off in New York in the graphic design industry since she graduated from college a few years ago.
Cindi是我的一个朋友，年轻聪明，有份很棒的工作。她今年26岁，自从几年前从大学毕业就一直从事平面设计工作，玩了命地奋斗在纽约。

Cindi grew up in a single-parent household, so there was never a lot of money around. That’s OK; her mom was one smart, fun, tough cookie, and Cindi and her siblings always got good grades at school, so it all worked out rather well.
Cindi在单亲家庭长大，小时候家里的钱从没有过富余，不过没关系，她的妈妈聪明风趣又坚强，Cindi他们这帮小孩子们成绩一直都很好，所以一切都挺好的。

While she was getting her degree, Cindi had to pay her way through college. Happily she found this job (a) she really liked (b) was really good at, and (c) paid really good money: waiting tables at this fancy restaurant in Manhattan. She held down that job for years.
上大学以后，Cindi得挣钱给自己付学费。令人高兴的是，她找到了一份工作，一份（a）她喜欢（b）又干得不错的工作，（c）而且薪水很高：在曼哈顿的一家高级餐厅作侍应生。这份工作她干了好几年。

When I met her, Cindi was working for this small but kinda-sorta successful design agency, call it Acme Design (not its real name). It was founded by a pretty smart entrepreneur type, call him Joe Acme (not his real name, either).
我认识她的时候，Cindi正在一家有点小但是挺成功的设计公司工作，公司叫Acme Design（化名）。创立者是个聪明的有企业家特质的家伙，我们就叫他Joe Acme吧。（还是化名）

When I met her, she was working all hours, doing a really good job. Busting ass, to put it plainly.
那时候，她一天24小时地工作，干得棒极了。

A few months ago, the phone rings. It’s Cindi.
几个月后，Cindi打电话给我：

“I’m thinking of quitting Acme,” she says.
“我想辞职了，”她说。

“But I thought you really liked your job?”
“我还以为你很喜欢你的工作呢？”

“I did at first,” she says. “But I don’t think the company’s growing anymore. Plus, I think Joe’s gotten more interested in his new, far-too-young girlfriend than he is in growing the company. The same week he told us we weren’t getting any new pay raises this year, he bought the chick a brand-new Audi coupe.”
“一开始我是很喜欢，”她说。“但是我现在觉得这家公司没前途。而且，我觉得Joe对他那个新的年轻的小女朋友的兴趣，比对发展公司的兴趣大多了。他告诉我们今年不加薪，就在同一个礼拜，他给他的妞买了一辆全新的奥迪Coupe。”

“Besides,” she continues, “I think I might want to start my own thing. I’m starting to get nibbles from potential clients wanting to work with me.”
“而且，”Cindi接着说，“我想或许我会有兴趣自己创业。已经有客户有兴趣和我合作了。”

“I just want to pick your brain,” she says. “What do you think I ought to do?”
“我想听听你的想法，”她说。“你认为我该怎么办？”

“Sounds like a good time to move on,” I say.
“听起来不错啊，”我说。

“Yeah, but I’m kinda nervous about it.”
“恩，但我紧张。”

“Sure, but that’s normal. . . .”
“这很正常……”

So I gave her my two cents:
接下来我给她讲了我的一些看法：

1. Her mother is very supportive of her idea to move on.
她妈妈很支持她。

Besides, they get on very well. So she can always move back home to the suburbs if she needs to save money.
而且Cindi和妈妈关系很好，如果需要省钱她总能搬回到郊区的家里住。

2. Acme Design is going nowhere, I can already tell. When a man starts trying to shtup his way out of a midlife crisis, you know there’s trouble afoot.
Acm设计公司没有发展前途，我现在已经能判定了。如果一个男人试图绕开而不是正面中年危机，那么他就有麻烦了。

3. Cindi tells me she has no worries about going back and working for the restaurant. Not only was the money insanely great and she liked her job, she only quit her job at the restaurant because Joe Acme told her to.
Cindi告诉我说，如果不行回去餐厅打工也没关系。在那家餐厅打工不光工资高而且其实她也很喜欢那份工作。当初辞职只是因为Joe Acme作为老板要求她。

4. The money at Acme stinks. Pretty much everybody who works there is broke by month’s end. Which makes it hard to stand up to Joe Acme when he’s having a bad day or having a bad idea. She was making plenty of money and still doing her job at Acme before Joe made her quit the restaurant. And since she had to give up that job, she feels a lot more powerless than she used to—without any increase in revenue. Just the opposite, in fact.
Acme的工资少得可怜。几乎公司的每个人都是“月光族”。手里没积蓄，Joe Acme发脾气或者想出什么馊主意的时候，大家都没底气反对他。在Joe要求她辞掉餐厅的工作之前，CIndi一边在Acme上班一边在餐厅赚着大笔工资。辞掉餐厅那份工之后，她不像以前那样充满力量感了，工资不涨，花的越来越多。

5. Cindi doesn’t mind the idea of going back to the restaurant. I tell her to do it. At the very least, she can save some money that way. A young woman with an extra ten or twenty thousand in her pocket has a lot more room to maneuver than a girl who’s broke at the end of every month.
Cindi不介意回餐厅工作，我支持她这么做。至少这样能存点钱。口袋里揣着万把块钱的年轻女人可选择的生活空间，比一个每月底都口袋空空的姑娘大多了。

So a simple game plan emerges: She goes and gets her old restaurant job back, she moves back in with mom to save money, she quits her job at Acme, and then she works in the mornings and afternoons for her new design clients, since her restaurant shift begins at five p.m.
一个简单的计划就是这样：干回侍应生的工作，和妈妈一块住省点钱，辞掉Acme的工作，早上和下午为客户们干设计的活儿，因为餐厅的轮班下午5点才开始。

When she gets off work she goes straight back home—she doesn’t bother with the after-hours thing with the guys and the gals at the restaurant. No late-night booze, drugs, and club sessions for this girl. No, she’s on a mission. Her colleagues at the restaurant, sadly, are not. They’re too busy being young, fun, and too coked-up to tie their shoelaces, let alone do something interesting in the long-term.
每当下班Cindi就会直接回家，不去和餐厅的姑娘们小伙子们业余打闹。不喝酒到深夜，不嗑药，不泡吧。Cindi不会这么做，她有她该做的事情。遗憾的是她的餐厅里的同事们没有，他们忙着年轻忙着玩闹，涣散地连鞋带也不系，更别提那些用长远的眼光来看有趣的事情。

She’s still young. A couple more years of waiting tables won’t kill her—not if she’s saving money and using her off-time wisely to build her design business slowly and surely. I’d bet after a year or two, a girl with that talent and drive would easily be able to leave her waitressing job and start looking after her design clients for much better money, easily. And she’d still be well under thirty. What’s the worst that can happen?
Cindi任然年轻，只要她懂得节约钱，明智地用业余时间去建立她的设计事业，过程缓慢却也稳定，那么在餐厅里作几年侍应生不会毁了她。我敢打赌，一两年后，这个有天分有干劲的姑娘能辞掉的侍应生的工作，专心她的事业更轻松地赚更多的钱，到那时候，她也不到三十岁，能有什么糟糕的事情呢？

Some of Cindi’s twentysomething peers raised their eyebrows a little bit, though. “Going back to waitressing? Isn’t that a backwards career move?” they said.
可是一些和Cindi一样二十来岁的年轻人不认可我的想法。“回去做侍应生？这不是在事业前途的道路上往后退？”他们会说。

No, it isn’t, actually. She’s still young and what she’s doing is consistent with what she wants to do long-term. There’s no disgrace in waiting tables if it’s part of a long-term strategy. If she were just doing it because she had no earthly clue what else to do with her life, that would be different. But she’s not.
不是的。Cindi还年轻，她现在做的事情符合她的长期目标。如果“做侍应生”是在一项长远的策略中的一步棋，那可没什么不光彩的。如果Cindi做侍应生只是因为她不知道她还能什么其他的，那又是另外一回事。Cindi可不是。

“The good news is,” I say to her, when she was just beginning to hatch this Evil Plan of hers, “you won’t die.”
“好在，”在Cindi胡斯乱想些坏结果的时候我告诉她，“你死不了的。”

So she went through with her Evil Plan. I was so proud. And the really good news is, she didn’t have to waitress or live with her mom for very long. Three months and she was gone. Three months and she managed to bag half a dozen high-paying clients for her business. Last time I saw her, she was wearing very expensive shoes and had moved into this very hip apartment in Brooklyn. Like I said, I was so proud.
Cindi开始实施她的计划，我为她骄傲。而且真正的好消息是，和妈妈住以及去餐厅做侍应生的日子她没过多久。三个月后她辞去了餐厅的工作，在这三个月中，她接到了6个大单子。上次我见她时，她穿着超贵的鞋子，而且已经住进了布鲁克林的一间时髦的公寓。就像我说的，我为她骄傲。

And her colleagues back at the restaurant? They’re still there. Choices were made.
Cindi在餐厅的同事？他们还待在哪儿。一切都在抉择中。