Or, rather—here I am. I am in Rome, and I am in trouble. The goons of Depression and Loneliness have barged into my life again, and I just took my last Wellbutrin three days ago. There are more pills in my bottom drawer, but I don't want them. I want to be free of them forever. But I don't want Depression or Loneliness around, either, so I don't know what to do, and I'm spiraling in panic, like I always spiral when I don't know what to do. So what I do for tonight is reach for my most private notebook, which I keep next to my bed in case I'm ever in emergency trouble. I open it up. I find the first blank page. I write:

或者该说——我就在这儿。我在罗马，陷入麻烦抑郁和寂寞两个暴徒再次闯入我的生活，而我三天前才服了最后一次的Wellbutrin。我的底层抽屉还有药丸，但我不需要它们。我要永远摆脱它们。但我也不想让抑郁和寂寞赖在身边，因此不知所措，惊慌得原地打转；每当我不知所措时，总是原地打转。因此今晚我要做的事是伸手去拿我的私人笔记本，把它放在我的床边，以应付紧急时刻。我打开本子，找到空白页。

"I need your help."

我写道：我需要你的协助。

Then I wait. After a little while, a response comes, in my own handwriting:

之后我等着。过一会儿，回应来了，由我亲笔写下：

I'm right here. What can I do for you?

我在这里。我能为你做什么？

And here recommences my strangest and most secret conversation.

最奇特、最隐密的对话就此再度展开。

Here, in this most private notebook, is where I talk to myself. I talk to that same voice I met that night on my bathroom floor when I first prayed to God in tears for help, when something (or somebody) had said, "Go back to bed, Liz." In the years since then, I've found that voice again in times of code-orange distress, and have learned that the best way for me to reach it is written conversation. I've been surprised to find that I can almost always access that voice, too, no matter how black my anguish may be. Even during the worst of suffering, that calm, compassionate, affectionate and infinitely wise voice (who is maybe me, or maybe not exactly me) is always available for a conversation on paper at any time of day or night.

在这本最私人的笔记本中，我和自己展开对话。我跟那一晚在浴室地板首次向神泣诉遇上的同一个声音讲话，当时某个东西（有某个人）开口说：回床上去，小莉。此后的几年内，我在极端悲痛的时候，再度发现这个声音，得知与它联系的最佳方式即是书面对话。我也惊讶地发现，我几乎可以随时取得这个声音，无论多么痛苦沮丧。即使在最糟的时刻，那平静、慈悲、友善、无穷睿智的声音（可能是我，也可能不完全是我 ）总是在纸上与我对话，无论昼夜。

I've decided to let myself off the hook from worrying that conversing with myself on paper means I'm a schizo. Maybe the voice I am reaching for is God, or maybe it's my Guru speaking through me, or maybe it's the angel who was assigned to my case, or maybe it's my Highest Self, or maybe it is indeed just a construct of my subconscious, invented in order to protect me from my own torment. Saint Teresa called such divine internal voices locutions—words from the supernatural that enter the mind spontaneously, translated into your own language and offering you heavenly consolation. I do know what Freud would have said about such spiritual consolations, of course—that they are irrational and "deserve no trust. Experience teaches us that the world is no nursery." I agree—the world isn't a nursery. But the very fact that this world is so challenging is exactly why you sometimes must reach out of its jurisdiction for help, appealing to a higher authority in order to find your comfort.

我决定让自己不去担心跟自己在纸上对话是精神分裂症的行为。或许这伸手可及的声音是神，或许是透过我开口说话的导师，或是分派给我的天使，或是我的至高自我，或只是潜意识中的某个概念， 为了保护我自己免受折磨而被创造出来的。泰瑞莎修女将这些神圣的内在声音称为叙语（locutions）——来自超自然的语词，自发地进入你的心灵，转译成你自己的语言，给予你天堂的慰藉。我知道佛洛伊德对于这种心灵慰藉会怎么说——毫无理性，而且不该相信。经验告诉我们，世界可不是育幼院。我同意——世界不是育幼院。但正是因为世界如此复杂，才偶尔需要跳出它的管辖寻求协助，吁请高层权威助你找到安慰。

At the beginning of my spiritual experiment, I didn't always have such faith in this internal voice of wisdom. I remember once reaching for my private notebook in a bitter fury of rage and sorrow, and scrawling a message to my inner voice—to my divine interior comfort—that took up an entire page of capital letters:

在心灵试验的初期，并非始终对于这种睿智的内在声音坚信不疑。记得有一回，我既愤怒又悲伤地拿起笔记本，匆匆写下信息给我的内在声音——给我神圣的内在慰藉——以大写字母占据整个页面：

"I DO NOT FUCKING BELIEVE IN YOU!!!!!!!!"

我他妈的不相信你！！！！！