In China this April, a 31-year-old former factory worker named Luo Huazhong drew the curtains and crawled into bed. Then he posted a picture of himself there to the Chinese website Baidu along with a message: “Lying Flat Is Justice.”

“Lying flat is my sophistic movement,” Mr. Luo wrote, tipping his hat to Diogenes the Cynic, a Greek philosopher who is said to have lived inside a barrel to criticize the excesses of Athenian aristocrats. On Chinese social media, Mr. Luo’s manifesto, and his assertion that he has a “right to choose a slow lifestyle” of reading, exercising and doing odd jobs to get by, quickly went viral. Sympathizers shared versions of a belief that is gaining global resonance: Work has become intolerable. Rest is resistance.

「躺平就是我的智者運動，」駱華忠寫道，他向犬儒主義哲學家第歐根尼致敬。據說這位希臘哲學家住在木桶裡批評雅典貴族的無度。在中國的社群媒體上，駱華忠的宣言，以及他聲稱有「選擇自己慢節奏生活的權利」——閱讀、鍛煉、靠打零工維持生計——迅速走紅。支持者們分享了一個在全球引起共鳴的信念：工作變得無法忍受。休息是一種抵抗。

By June, American news outlets were describing the “lying flat” trend as a natural consequence of China’s hypercompetitive middle-class culture, where employees often report working “996” weeks — 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week — a lifestyle praised by the founder of the online shopping giant Alibaba, Jack Ma, and other captains of commerce.

It’s not just Chinese millennials who are figuring out that work is a false idol. I should know because I’m lying flat too, holed up in my parents’ house in West Virginia. Earlier this year I quit my job producing an NPR program in Boston, and I haven’t been able to stomach rejoining the cacophony of the 24-hour news cycle. I’m far from the only one: A recent tweet that proclaimed “i do not want to have a career” racked up over 400,000 likes. Instead, proclaimed the tweeter, @hollabekgrl, “i want to sit on the porch.”

不僅是中國的千禧一代發現工作是一座虛假的神像。我也應該知道，因為我也在躺平，躲在西維吉尼亞州我父母的房子裡。今年早些時候，我辭去了在波士頓為NPR製作節目的工作，我無法忍受重新加入24小時新聞週期的喧囂。我遠不是唯一一個這樣想的人：最近有一條推文宣稱「我不想有事業」，獲得了40多萬個贊。發推的用戶@hollabekgrl宣稱，相反，「我想坐在門廊上。」

Here in the hills, the new silence of my days, deepened by the solitude of the pandemic, has allowed me to observe the state of our planet in the year 2021 — and it looks to be on fire, as our oligarchs take to space. From my view down here on the carpet, I see a system that, even if it bounces back to “normal,” I have no interest in rejoining, a system that is beginning to come undone.

在山裡，我新生活裡的沉默因大流行的孤獨而加深，這使我得以觀察我們的地球在2021年的狀況——隨著商業大亨們飛向太空，它彷彿在燃燒。躺在我的毯子上，我看到了一個正在開始解體的系統，即使它恢復到「正常」狀態，我也沒有興趣重新加入。

The lying flat movement, or tangping as it’s known in Mandarin, is just one expression of this global unraveling. Another is the current worker shortage in the United States. As of June, there were more than 10 million job openings in the United States, according to the most recent figures from the Labor Department — the highest number since the government began tracking the data two decades ago. While conservatives blame juiced-up pandemic unemployment benefits, liberals counter that people do want to work, just not for the paltry wages they were making before the pandemic.

Both might be true. But if low wages were all that’s at play, we would expect to see reluctant workers at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder, and content workers at the top. Instead, there are murmurs of dissent at every rung, including from the inner sanctums of Goldman Sachs, where salaries for investment bankers start at $150,000. According to a leaked internal survey, entry-level analysts at the investment bank report they’re facing “inhumane” conditions, working an average of 98 hours a week, forgoing showers and sleep. “I’ve been through foster care,” said one respondent. “This is arguably worse.”

兩者可能都是正確的。但如果低工資是唯一的原因，我們就會看到不情願的工人處於社會經濟階梯的底層，滿意的工人位於這個階梯的頂層。取而代之的是，每個階層都有異議的雜音，包括在高盛(Goldman Sachs)內部，那裡投資銀行工作者的起步工資是15萬美元。根據一份洩漏的內部調查，這家投資銀行的初級分析師報告稱他們面臨著「不人道」的工作條件，平均每週工作98小時，沒法洗澡和睡覺。「我可是經歷過寄養生活的，」一位受訪者說。「現在的生活可以說是更糟糕。」

In the United States, Black activists, writers and thinkers are among the clearest voices articulating this spiritual malaise and its solutions, perhaps because they’ve borne the brunt of capitalism more than other groups of Americans. Tricia Hersey, a performance artist and the founder of the Nap Ministry, an Atlanta-based organization, is one of them. Ms. Hersey says she discovered the power of naps during a draining year of graduate school at Emory University, an experience that inspired her to bring the gospel of sleep to fellow African Americans whose enslaved and persecuted ancestors were never able to properly rest. She argues that rest is not only resistance, it is also reparation.

在美國，黑人活動人士、作家和思想家發出了最清晰的聲音，表達了這種精神不安及其解決方案，或許是因為他們比美國其他群體承受了更多資本主義的衝擊。行為藝術家、亞特蘭大組織「小睡部」(Nap Ministry)的創始人特莉西亞·赫西(Tricia Hersey)就是其中之一。赫西說，她在埃默裡大學(Emory University)讀研究生的那一年裡發現了小睡的力量，那段經歷鼓勵她把睡眠的福音傳播給非裔美國人，他們的祖先曾被奴役和迫害，一直無法好好休息。她認為休息不僅是抵抗，也是補償。

Ms. Hersey now leads events across the country focused on the transformative power of rest, and she has influenced other Black intellectuals, including Casey Gerald, the author of the transcendent essay “The Black Art of Escape.” In it, Mr. Gerald reflects on a year he spent in what he calls a “disappearing act,” lying flat in Texas, ignoring the calls of friends and admirers to join them in the fray of protest politics, which he’d come to view as a sure path to self-annihilation. “Claim your inheritance,” Mr. Gerald enjoins. “Miss the moment. Go mad, go missing, take a nap, take the day, drop a tab. You’re free!”

赫西現在領導著全國範圍內的活動，重點關注休息的變革力量，她還影響了其他黑人知識分子，包括著名文章《逃避的黑藝術》(The Black Art of Escape)的作者凱西·傑拉爾德(Casey Gerald)。在文中，傑拉爾德回憶了他在得克薩斯州度過的一年，他稱之為「消失行動」，那一年他在得州躺平，無視朋友和崇拜者要求他加入抗議政治戰鬥的呼籲，他認為這種戰鬥是通往自我毀滅的必然之路。「去獲取你的遺產，」傑拉爾德叮囑道。「錯過時機。發瘋、玩消失、睡一覺、休息一天、再睡一覺。你是自由的！」

On Juneteenth this year, Mr. Gerald stayed true to his argument. “I ain’t writing nothing for Juneteenth,” he tweeted. “I’m gonna be drunk on the beach in Galveston with my boyfriend. Love to the ancestors, lemme know when the reparations check arrives. Good luck! ”

今年的6月節解放黑奴紀念日(Juneteenth)，傑拉爾德仍然說到做到。「我不會為6月節寫任何東西，」他發推說。「我要和男朋友在加爾維斯頓的海灘上喝個爛醉。我愛祖先們，賠款支票來了告訴我一聲。祝你們好運！」

His words read like a wink to Audre Lorde, another queer Black writer, whose 1978 essay “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power” foreshadowed the lying flat movement and the Nap Ministry both. Ms. Lorde wrote that “when we begin to live from within outward, in touch with the power of the erotic within ourselves, and allowing that power to inform and illuminate our actions upon the world around us, then we begin to be responsible to ourselves in the deepest sense.” For Ms. Lorde, the erotic doesn’t necessarily mean sex. Maybe the erotic sounds like a banjo. Maybe the erotic tastes like cilantro. Maybe it feels like fixing the washing machine. We’ll know it, promises Ms. Lorde, by what makes us exclaim “Yes!” to ourselves.

他的話像是在向另一位同性戀黑人作家奧德雷·洛德(Audre Lorde)致意。1978年，洛德發表了一篇文章，題為《情色的使用：作為力量的情色》(Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power)，成為「躺平運動」和「小睡部」的預演。「當我們開始從內心向外生活，接觸到自己內心的情愛力量，並允許這種力量告知和照亮我們對周圍世界的行動，我們就開始在最深的意義上對自己負責，」洛德寫道。對洛德來說，情色並不一定意味著性。班卓琴的聲音也許會很情色。香菜的味道也許會很情色。修洗衣機的感覺也許會很情色。我們能體會到，洛德承諾，當我們對自己讚歎「太棒了！」的時候，我們會了解它。

Which brings us back to Diogenes. In his time, a Cynic was someone who eschewed money, power and fame, and instead sought to live self-sufficiently and in tune with nature. Hence, Diogenes in his barrel. Luo Huazhong in his bed. Casey Gerald on the beach.

這就把我們帶回到第歐根尼。在他那個時代，犬儒主義者是那種遠離金錢、權力和名譽，尋求自給自足、與自然和諧相處的人。因此，第歐根尼在木桶裡。駱華忠躺在床上。凱西·傑拉爾德在海邊。

Me, now, in the hills.

而我，現在在山上。

To be clear, there is immense privilege in lying flat. But it’s worth noting that Mr. Luo acknowledged the necessity of making a living, and @hollabekgrl didn’t say she never wanted to work at a job or hone a craft; she said she doesn’t want a “career,” a corporate-flavored word that conjures images of PowerPoints and power suits. While jobs are sustenance, careers are altars upon which all else is sacrificed.

坦白地說，躺平是一種極大的特權。但值得注意的是，駱華忠承認謀生的必要性，@hollabekgrl並沒有說她從來不想工作或是磨練手藝；她是說她不想要「事業」——這是一個帶有公司色彩的詞，讓人聯想到PPT和職業套裝。工作是生計，但事業是祭壇，其他一切都要犧牲。

In her poem “The Summer Day,” Mary Oliver asks, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do/ with your one wild and precious life?”

My reply, for now, is simple: Sit on the porch.

目前，我的回答很簡單：坐在門廊上。

It’s not half-bad. For what is the porch if not a place to chat with neighbors, to marvel at the hummingbird at the feeder, to listen to the wind in the chimes? An altar for cynics, an altar for the erotic, an altar for the future.

這也不是什麼壞事。如果門廊不是一個可以和鄰居聊天的地方，一個可以在餵食器旁欣賞蜂鳥的地方，一個可以伴隨風鈴聆聽風聲的地方，那它又算得了什麼呢？它是犬儒主義者的祭壇，是情色的祭壇，是未來的祭壇。