Having been married for more than 40 years, I can attest¹ to the truth of the following statement: to excel in the art of domestic argument, one must master the art of losing.

做为一个结婚40余年的人，我可以证明下面这个说法完全正确：想要在家庭争执中得满分，首先要掌握认输的艺术。

Modern psychologists are taken with the “win-win” solution. But in marriage, success resides more in “lose-lose” solutions. Out of these, both parties can win. For in the love configuration², losing gives a gift that always returns.

现代心理学家们都醉心于“一赢再赢”的解决办法，而在婚姻里头，成功往往在于采取“一输再输”的策略。因为这样，双方都可以是赢家。在爱情的天地里，认输实际上永远是一份有回报的礼物。

One day shortly after my wife and I were married, we set about picking new living-room wallpaper from a book of samples. My taste and hers were at odds³.

婚后不久的一天，我和妻子着手从一本样品手册中挑选起居室的壁纸。我们的爱好有了矛盾。

“I like this one,” she said. “That looks like a section of a diseased liver.” “How can you say that? This is a classical pattern that goes all the way back to the Venetian.” “The Venetian were blind. They named blinds after them, remember? I like this one.” “I wouldn’t hang that in hell if I were the devil.”

“我喜欢这一张。” “这张简直就像一块有病的猪肝。” “你怎么能这样说？这可是一幅古典的古威尼斯风格的图案。” “威尼斯人都瞎眼了，后来的瞎子也都是因威尼斯人得名，记得吗？我喜欢这一张。” “我死也不会挂那一张的。”

As the argument went on, my wife suddenly slammed the book shut. “There are over two hundred samples in this book,” she declared. “I say we spend our energy finding one that suits us both, instead of bickering⁴ over the ones we don’t like.”

在争吵中，我妻子突然用力把书一合，大声说：“这本书中有200张样品，我们应该把精力用在找到一张我们都喜欢的样品，而不是用来争吵那些我们不喜欢的。”

And that’s how we settled it. Eventually we found a pattern we both liked. The “wallpaper book” became our symbol for settling the myriad⁵ issues that arise in marriage. “Well,” she’d say when we couldn’t agree on furniture or a place to vacation, “there are plenty of samples in the wallpaper book.”

我们就这样解决了争执。最后我们终于找到了一个我们共同喜欢的图案。壁纸样品手册成了我们解决婚姻中遇到的无数争执的一个象征。当我们在要什么家具或去什么地方休假的意见不一时，我的妻子就说：“在壁纸样品手册里有的是样品呢！”

7]The issues that people argue over most in marriage, such as how to spend money, often aren’t the real ones. The key issue is: who is going to be in control? When I was younger, my need to control arose out of fear, a lack of trust, insecurity. The day I finally realized I didn’t need to control my wife—that, indeed, I ought not control her, that I couldn’t control her, and that if I tried to, I would destroy our marriage—was the day our marriage began.

人们在婚姻中争吵的那些事情诸如怎样花钱之类，往往并不是争执的真正所在。争执的关键是谁来控制。当我年青的时候，我想去控制是因为出于恐惧，是缺乏信任和安全感。当我终于认识到我不必控制我的妻子的时候，我们的婚姻才算真正开始。确实，我不应该控制我的妻子，我也不能去控制她，如果我要这样去做，我就会毁坏我们的婚姻。

Giving up control is often confused with weakness. But the winner in a domestic argument is never really the winner. When you win a battle and your partner submits, you have, paradoxically, lost.

放弃控制对方常常与软弱相混淆。其实家庭内争吵的赢家永远不可能是真正的赢家。当你赢得了一场口角，使你的另一半屈服了，你其实恰恰相反，是输家了。

What is it we want most from a marriage? To love and be loved. To be happy and secure. To grow, to discover. A love relationship is the garden in which we plant, cultivate and harvest the most precious of crops, our own self, and in which our spouse⁶ is provided the same rich soil in which to bloom.

我们在婚姻中最想得到的是什么？是爱与被爱，是幸福与安定，是不断的成长与发现。爱情的关系就是一个花园，在这个花园里我们种植、培养和收获最宝贵的庄稼，这就是我们自己；在这个花园里，我们要给我们的爱人提供同样肥沃的土壤，让她茁壮成长。