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Chapter 1 YOU ARE NOT YOUR MIND
第一章 你不是你的头脑
THE GREATEST OBSTACLE TO ENLIGHTENMENT
开悟的最大障碍
Enlightenment — what is that?
开悟——到底是什么？
A beggar had been sitting by the side of a road for over thirty years. One day a stranger walked by. "Spare some change?" mumbled the beggar, mechanically holding out his old baseball cap. "I have nothing to give you," said the stranger. Then he asked: "What's that you are sitting on? " " Nothing," replied the beggar. "Just an old box. I have been sitting on it for as long as I can remember. " " Ever looked inside?" asked the stranger. "No," said the beggar. "What's the point? There's nothing in there." "Have a look inside," insisted the stranger. The beggar managed to pry open the lid. With astonishment, disbelief, and elation, he saw that the box was filled with gold.
有一个乞丐在路边行乞了三十年。有一天一个路人经过。“赏我几个零钱吧？” 乞丐喃喃地说，顺手伸出了他那顶老旧的球帽。“我没有东西可以给你，”路人回答说。接着就问道：“你屁股坐着的是什么？” “没什么，”乞丐回答。“只是口旧箱子，从我有记忆以来，就一直坐在上面。”“你打开看过吗？” “没有，”乞丐说。“何必呢？里边啥也没有。” “打开看一下，”路人坚持着说。乞丐勉为其难地撬开了箱子，这时他喜出望外，满脸狐疑，因为他看到箱子里装满了黄金。
I am that stranger who has nothing to give you and who is telling you to look inside. Not inside any box, as in the parable, but somewhere even closer, inside yourself.
我就是那个没有什么可以给你，却叫你看宝箱里面的路人。我指的不是这个寓言里有形的箱子，而是与你更贴身的宝箱——你的内在。
"But I am not a beggar," I can hear you say.
“可是我并不是乞丐呀，” 我知道你会抗议。
Those who have not found their true wealth, which is the radiant joy of Being and the deep, unshakable peace that comes with it, are beggars, even if they have great material wealth. They are looking outside for scraps of pleasure or fulfillment, for validation, security, or love, while they have a treasure within that not only includes all those things but is infinitely greater than anything the world can offer.
凡是还没有找到他们内在真正的财富，也就是存在灿烂的喜悦，和伴随而来不可动摇的平安的人，就是乞丐，即使他们拥有庞大的物质财富。他们无视于内在已经拥有的，不仅包含，而且还远超过世间财的无限量的宝藏。他们向外攀援，追寻片面的享乐或满足、肯定、安全感或爱。
The word enlightenment conjures up the idea of some superhuman accomplishment, and the ego likes to keep it that way, but it is simply your natural state of felt oneness with Being. It is a state of connectedness with something immeasurable and indestructible, something that, almost paradoxically, is essentially you and yet is much greater than you. It is finding your true nature beyond name and form. The inability to feel this connectedness gives rise to the illusion of separation, from yourself and from the world around you. You then perceive yourself, consciously or unconsciously, as an isolated fragment. Fear arises, and conflict within and without becomes the norm.
一提起开悟这个字，我们便会在观念中产生超人成就式的幻觉，我执喜欢保持这样的方式，可是开悟只不过是与存在合一时觉受到的自然状态罢了。它是一种与不可蠡测、不可摧毁的东西联系的状态。那个东西，说来几乎是矛盾的，它既是你，却又远超过你，它在名相之外能够找到你的本性。这份联系感的丧失，滋生了你和你自己以及你和世界分裂的幻相。你便会有意识或无意识地感知自己是一个孤离的碎片。恐惧因此而生，内在和外在的冲突变成了常态。
I love the Buddha's simple definition of enlightenment as "the end of suffering." There is nothing superhuman in that, is there? Of course, as a definition, it is incomplete. It only tells you what enlightenment is not: no suffering. But what's left when there is no more suffering? The Buddha is silent on that, and his silence implies that you'll have to find out for yourself. He uses a negative definition so that the mind cannot make it into something to believe in or into a superhuman accomplishment, a goal that is impossible for you to attain. Despite this precaution, the majority of Buddhists still believe that enlightenment is for the Buddha, not for them, at least not in this lifetime.
我甚爱佛陀用“离苦”这么简单的两个字，把开悟给定义出来。这里面没有任何超人的影子，对吗？当然就定义而言，它并不完整。因为它只告诉了你开悟不是什么：不是受苦。然而却没有说明受苦之后，剩下的又是什么呢？这一点佛陀却避而不谈，他的沉默暗示了你必须自己去找出来。他使用反义，为的是不让你的头脑把它制造成一个可以去相信，或者一个超人般的成就，一个你无法企及的目标。可惜绝大部份的佛教徒无视于佛陀的苦心孤诣，却一迳地相信开悟非佛陀莫属，与他们无缘，至少这一辈子甭想。
You used the word Being. Can you explain what you mean by that?
你提到“存在”（Being）这个字，你可以解释它的意思吗？
Being is the eternal, ever-present One Life beyond the myriad forms of life that are subject to birth and death. However, Being is not only beyond but also deep within every form as its innermost invisible and indestructible essence. This means that it is accessible to you now as your own deepest self, your true nature. But don't seek to grasp it with your mind. Don't try to understand it. You can know it only when the mind is still. When you are present, when your attention is fully and intensely in the Now, Being can be felt, but it can never be understood mentally. To regain awareness of Being and to abide in that state of "feeling-realization" is enlightenment.
存在就是永恒的，无所不在的一体生命，它超越那个充斥着无数形相且受制于生死的生命。然而本体不仅超越形相，也以最内在无形且不灭的本质，存在于每一个形相的内在深处。这意谓着它是你当下就可以触及的最深处的自我和自性。不过你不要企求透过头脑去掌握它。不要试图去了解它。只有当头脑静止的时候，你才能知道它。当你临在，当你全然而深刻地专注在当下的时候，存在才能被感觉到。不过它绝不可能被心智头脑所了解。如果能够对存在的觉知失而复得，并且安住在那个“觉受的体悟”的状态，就是开悟。
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When you say Being, are you talking about God? If you are, then why don't you say it?
你说的“存在”指的是神吗？如果是的话为什么你不直说？
The word God has become empty of meaning through thousands of years of misuse. I use it sometimes, but I do so sparingly. By misuse, I mean that people who have never even glimpsed the realm of the sacred, the infinite vastness behind that word, use it with great conviction, as if they knew what they are talking about. Or they argue against it, as if they knew what it is that they are denying. This misuse gives rise to absurd beliefs, assertions, and egoic delusions, such as "My or our God is the only true God, and your God is false," or Nietzsche's famous statement "God is dead."
神这个字经过数千年的滥用，它的意义已经荡然无存了。我偶而会用，不过情况极少。我说的滥用，指的是那些无缘一窥神所蕴含的那个无限灵性的人，一副自以为是的样子，信誓旦旦地使用它。再不然，就以一副“予岂好辩哉”的态度，与人争辩。这种滥用导致了荒谬的信念、主张、和我执的幻相，比如说“我的或我们的神才是唯一的真神，你的神是假的。”再不然就如尼采所宣称的，“上帝已死。”
The word God has become a closed concept. The moment the word is uttered, a mental image is created, no longer, perhaps, of an old man with a white beard, but still a mental representation of someone or something outside you, and, yes, almost inevitably a male someone or something.
神这个字已经变成了一个封闭的概念。只要这个字脱口而出，就立刻创造了一个形象出来。或许，出现的不再是那个白须的老者，却依然是个自外于你的某个人或某个物的形象，当然，这个某人或某物几乎千篇一律的是男性。
Neither God nor Being nor any other word can define or explain the ineffable reality behind the word, so the only important question is whether the word is a help or a hindrance in enabling you to experience That toward which it points. Does it point beyond itself to that transcendental reality, or does it lend itself too easily to becoming no more than an idea in your head that you believe in, a mental idol?
这个字所蕴含的不变实相，绝不是神或存在，或任何文字可以定义或诠释的。所以唯一重要的一个问题在于这个字所指涉的那个（That），对你的体验究竟是一个助力亦或障碍？它是否指向一个超越它自己的超验实相？还是它太过于便给，反而落入你头脑里的一个概念，好让你相信它，奉为心理的偶像呢？
The word Being explains nothing, but nor does God. Being, however, has the advantage that it is an open concept. It does not reduce the infinite invisible to a finite entity. It is impossible to form a mental image of it. Nobody can claim exclusive possession of Being. It is your very essence, and it is immediately accessible to you as the feeling of your own presence, the realization I am that is prior to I am this or I am that. So it is only a small step from the word Being to the experience of Being.
存在这个字无从解释起，神这个字也一样。然而，存在的优势是它是一个开放的概念。它不把那不可限量的无形，化约成一个有限的实体。你不可能用它塑造出一个形象出来。它不为任何人所独占。它是你的本质。它就像你本身的临在一样，当下就可以触及的。它是先于我是这个，或我是那个之前的我是。因此由存在这个字到存在的经验之间，只隔着一小步。
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What is the greatest obstacle to experiencing this reality?
体验这个实相的最大障碍是什么？
Identification with your mind, which causes thought to become compulsive. Not to be able to stop thinking is a dreadful affliction, but we don't realize this because almost everybody is suffering from it, so it is considered normal. This incessant mental noise prevents you from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable from Being. It also creates a false mind-made self that casts a shadow of fear and suffering. We will look at all that in more detail later.
是我们对心智头脑的认同。它使思想变成强迫性。无法停止思想是一种可怕的痛苦。可是几乎每个人都饱受这种痛苦，但是反而视为平常而习焉不察。这种持续不断的思想噪音，阻挡着你，使你无从发现那个与存在不可分割的内在宁静。它也创造了一个心造的假我，因而投下恐惧和受苦的阴影。这方面稍后再做更详细的审视。
The philosopher Descartes believed that he had found the most fundamental truth when he made his famous statement: "I think, therefore I am." He had, in fact, given expression to the most basic error, to equate thinking with Being and identity with thinking. The compulsive thinker, which means almost everyone, lives in a state of apparent separateness, in an insanely complex world of continuous problems and conflict, a world that reflects the ever-increasing fragmentation of the mind. Enlightenment is a state of wholeness, of being "at one" and therefore at peace. At one with life in its manifested aspect, the world, as well as with your deepest self and life unmanifested — at one with Being. Enlightenment is not only the end of suffering and of continuous conflict within and without, but also the end of the dreadful enslavement to incessant thinking. What an incredible liberation this is!
哲学家笛卡儿在提出他的名句：“我思，故我在。”的时候，自信已经找到了最根本的真理。事实上，他表达的是最基本的谬思：把思考等同于存在，并且把身份认同等同于思考。强迫性思考者，这几乎是每一个人的写照，活在一个明显的孤离状态，活在一个问题与冲突不断，一个疯狂而复杂，一个反映了心智头脑不断支离的世界里。开悟是一个圆满的状态，是一个由“合一”而达到平安的状态。也就是与生命的外显层面——这个世界，以及你最深处的自我合一，并且与生命的隐含层面（原始状态）——存在的合一。开悟不仅只是受苦和内外冲突的了断，也是不断思考苦牢的终结。这样的解脱简直不可思议！
Identification with your mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, images, words, judgments, and definitions that blocks all true relationship. It comes between you and yourself, between you and your fellow man and woman, between you and nature, between you and God. It is this screen of thought that creates the illusion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a totally separate "other." You then forget the essential fact that, underneath the level of physical appearances and separate forms, you are one with all that is. By "forget," I mean that you can no longer feel this oneness as self-evident reality. You may believe it to be true, but you no longer know it to be true. A belief may be comforting. Only through your own experience, however, does it become liberating.
心智认同创造了一个由概念、标签、形象、文字、批判、和定义所组成的不透光屏幕。它阻绝了所有真正的亲密关系。它隔阂了你和你自己，你和你的同胞，你和大自然，你和神的关系。这一道思想的屏幕，创造了孤离的幻相——那个造成了你和“他人”是完全独立的区隔的幻相。这也使你遗忘了一个核心的事实，就是在外形和各自不同的形式层面之下，你与万有皆是一体的事实。我所谓的“遗忘”，指的是你不再感觉你和这个不言自明的事实合一了。也许你相信它是真的，可是你不再知道它是真的。信念固然可以带来宽慰，可是只有透过亲身的体验，它才能释放你。
Thinking has become a disease. Disease happens when things get out of balance. For example, there is nothing wrong with cells dividing and multiplying in the body, but when this process continues in disregard of the total organism, cells proliferate and we have disease.
思考已经变成了一种疾病。当事情失去平衡的时候，疾病便因应而生。例如：身体里的细胞分裂和增殖是正常的，可是当这个过程无视于整个有机体，而持续地快速增生的话，我们便生病了。
The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. To put it more accurately, it is not so much that you use your mind wrongly — you usually don't use it at all. It uses you. This is the disease. You believe that you are your mind. This is the delusion. The instrument has taken you over.
注：心智如果运用得当，是一个超级利器。然而如果误用了心智的话，却极具摧毁力。更正确的说法是：问题不在于你使用了你的心智——一般而言你根本没有使用它，而是它在使用你。这就是疾病。你相信你就是你的心智头脑。这是一个幻相。这个工具已经反客为主掌控你了。
I don't quite agree. It is true that I do a lot of aimless thinking, like most people, but I can still choose to use my mind to get and accomplish things, and I do that all the time.
我不苟同这种说法。我跟大多数人一样，有很多漫无目标的思考，这是真的。不过我仍然能够选择运用我的心智头脑而有所得和有所成就，而且我经常这么做。
Just because you can solve a crossword puzzle or build an atom bomb doesn't mean that you use your mind. Just as dogs love to chew bones, the mind loves to get its teeth into problems. That's why it does crossword puzzles and builds atom bombs. You have no interest in either. Let me ask you this: can you be free of your mind whenever you want to? Have you found the "off" button?
会解谜语或是制造原子弹，并不表示你会运用你的心智头脑。头脑就像喜欢啃骨头的狗一样，喜欢啃问题。这也是它能够解谜语和制造原子弹的原因。这两者你都没有兴趣。我请教你：你能够随心所欲地摆脱你的头脑吗？你找到了控制头脑的“开关”吗？
You mean stop thinking altogether? No, I can't, except maybe for a moment or two.
你是指停止全部的思考？没有，我不能。只除了极短暂的一刻。
Then the mind is using you. You are unconsciously identified with it, so you don't even know that you are its slave. It's almost as if you were possessed without knowing it, and so you take the possessing entity to be yourself. The beginning of freedom is the realization that you are not the possessing entity — the thinker. Knowing this enables you to observe the entity. The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all the things that truly matter — beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace — arise from beyond the mind. You begin to awaken.
那么头脑就在使用你。你无意识地与它认同了，因此你甚至不知道你是它的奴役。这几乎就像你不知不觉地被附了身一样。你错把附身的实体当做自己。当你明白你不是那个附身的实体——思考者的时候，就是自由的开始。知道这一点使你能够观察这个实体。你开始观察思考者的那一刻，便启动了一个更高的意识层面。然后你就开始明白，还有一个超越思想，而且更宽阔的智能境界。相较之下，心智头脑只是这个智力的沧海一粟罢了。你还会明白所有真正重要的事物——美、爱、创造、喜乐、内在的平安——都来自于头脑之外。你便开始觉醒了。
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FREEING YOURSELF FROM YOUR MIND
挣脱心智的牢笼
What exactly do you mean by "watching the thinker"?
“观察思考者”是什么意思？
When someone goes to the doctor and says, "I hear a voice in my head," he or she will most likely be sent to a psychiatrist. The fact is that, in a very similar way, virtually everyone hears a voice, or several voices, in their head all the time: the involuntary thought processes that you don't realize you have the power to stop. Continuous monologues or dialogues.
如果有人告诉医生：“我听到脑袋里有个声音。”这个人八成会被送进精神病院。事实上，几几乎每一个人都以相当类似的方式，听到头脑里有一个或好几个声音：那个不由自主的思想过程。而却不明白你拥有停止这个持续不断的独白或对话的力量。
You have probably come across "mad" people in the street incessantly talking or muttering to themselves. Well, that's not much different from what you and all other "normal" people do, except that you don't do it out loud. The voice comments, speculates, judges, compares, complains, likes, dislikes, and so on. The voice isn't necessarily relevant to the situation you find yourself in at the time; it may be reviving the recent or distant past or rehearsing or imagining possible future situations. Here it often imagines things going wrong and negative outcomes; this is called worry. Sometimes this soundtrack is accompanied by visual images or "mental movies." Even if the voice is relevant to the situation at hand, it will interpret it in terms of the past. This is because the voice belongs to your conditioned mind, which is the result of all your past history as well as of the collective cultural mind-set you inherited. So you see and judge the present through the eyes of the past and get a totally distorted view of it. It is not uncommon for the voice to be a person's own worst enemy. Many people live with a tormentor in their head that continuously attacks and punishes them and drains them of vital energy. It is the cause of untold misery and unhappiness, as well as of disease.
你或许在街上碰过这种滔滔不绝或自言自语的“疯”人。其实你和所有其他的“正常”人，跟他都是半斤八两。差别在于你是无声式的。你做的是无声的评论、猜测、批判、比较、抱怨、好恶喜厌等等。声音不见得与你当时所置身的情境有关，它可能是在回忆过往，或者预演、想像未来可能发生的情况。经常想像事情出了差错，或者出现负面的结果，这叫做杞人忧天。往往这一条音轨里还伴随着影像，或者“心里电影”。即便这个思想的声音与你处身的现况有关，也会被它以过去之名迳加诠释。这是因为思想的声音，属于你被制约了的头脑。而你的头脑是你所有过往的历史，和承袭得来的集体文化心智头脑模组的结晶。所以你就透过历史的眼光来看待和批判现在，而得到了一个完全被扭曲了的观点。说这个声音是一个人最可怕的敌人并不为过。许多人在脑袋的折磨下度过一生，饱受它有增无已的攻击、惩罚、终至耗尽生命的能量。这就是许多不足为外人所道的悲惨、不快乐、和疾病的根源。
The good news is that you can free yourself from your mind. This is the only true liberation. You can take the first step right now. Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can. Pay particular attention to any repetitive thought patterns, those old gramophone records that have been playing in your head perhaps for many years. This is what I mean by "watching the thinker," which is another way of saying: listen to the voice in your head, be there as the witnessing presence.
好消息是你能够把自己从你的心智牢笼里挣脱出来。这才是独一无二的真解脱。你现在就可以踏上第一步。开始尽可能地倾听你脑袋里的声音。特别注意任何一再重覆的思想模式，多少年来一直在你脑袋里重弹的老调子。我说“观察思考者”正是这个意思。原来的说法应该是：倾听你脑袋里的声音，在那里出庭见证。
When you listen to that voice, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. Do not judge or condemn what you hear, for doing so would mean that the same voice has come in again through the back door. You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind.
当你倾听的时候，要没有分别心地听。也就是说不要批判，对你所听到的不加批判或谴责。因为你一开始批判，就意谓着同一个声音打从后门趁虚而入了。你很快就体会到：声音在那里，而我是在这里，倾听它，观察它。这个对“我是“（I am）的体会，这个对你自己临在的感知不是一个思想。它源自于头脑之外。
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So when you listen to a thought, you are aware not only of the thought but also of yourself as the witness of the thought. A new dimension of consciousness has come in. As you listen to the thought, you feel a conscious presence — your deeper self— behind or underneath the thought, as it were. The thought then loses its power over you and quickly subsides, because you are no longer energizing the mind through identification with it. This is the beginning of the end of involuntary and compulsive thinking.
因此当你倾听一个思想的时候，你觉知的不仅是这个思想，也觉知到那个做为思想见证人的你自己。一个新的意识向度进来了。在你倾听思想的同时，你感觉到一个意识的临在，那个一直都在思想之后或之下的深处自我。思想随即丧失了掌控你的力量，而急速地止息。这是因为你已经不再透过头脑的认同，而付予它能量的缘故。这就是不自主和强迫性思考终结的开始。
When a thought subsides, you experience a discontinuity in the mental stream — a gap of "no-mind."
当一个思想止息的时候，你经验到一个心智流的中断——一个“无心”的间隙。
At first, the gaps will be short, a few seconds perhaps, but gradually they will become longer. When these gaps occur, you feel a certain stillness and peace inside you. This is the beginning of your natural state of felt oneness with Being, which is usually obscured by the mind. With practice, the sense of stillness and peace will deepen. In fact, there is no end to its depth. You will also feel a subtle emanation of joy arising from deep within: the joy of Being.
这个间隙一开始很短，或许只有几秒钟，可是它会逐渐延长。当这个间隙发生的时候，你便感觉到一种内在的宁静和和平。这是你感觉与存在合一的自然状态的开始。通常这种状态会受到头脑的蒙蔽而模糊。如果加以练习的话，宁静感和和平感就会加深。事实上，它的深度是无底的。你也会感觉由你内在深处升起一股微妙的喜悦之流：存在的喜悦。
It is not a trancelike state. Not at all. There is no loss of consciousness here. The opposite is the case. If the price of peace were a lowering of your consciousness, and the price of stillness a lack of vitality and alertness, then they would not be worth having. In this state of inner connectedness, you are much more alert, more awake than in the mind-identified state. You are fully present. It also raises the vibrational frequency of the energy field that gives life to the physical body.
它不是一种类似恍惚的状态。完全不是。你的意识不但没有丧失，情况正好相反。如果和平的代价是意识的低落；如果定静的代价是生命力与警觉性的缺乏，那么便不值得拥有。在这种内在的联系状态之下，你会比在头脑认同状态下更加机警和觉知。你是全然的临在。它同时也提升了我们能量塲的波动频率，它赋予生命给我们的肉体。
As you go more deeply into this realm of no-mind, as it is sometimes called in the East, you realize the state of pure consciousness. In that state, you feel your own presence with such intensity and such joy that all thinking, all emotions, your physical body, as well as the whole external world become relatively insignificant in comparison to it. And yet this is not a selfish but a selfless state. It takes you beyond what you previously thought of as "your self." That presence is essentially you and at the same time inconceivably greater than you. What I am trying to convey here may sound paradoxical or even contradictory, but there is no other way that I can express it.
当你更深入这个被东方称之为无心的境界时，你就体会到纯意识的状态了。你在那个状态中感觉自己的临在充满了无比的喜悦和强度。你所有的思考、情感、你的肉体和外在的世界，相较之下变得无足轻重了。不过这是一个无我的状态，并非自私（有我）的状态。它把你带到一个超越过去你所认为的“你的自我”的境界。那个临在实质上就是你，却同时又无以名状地大过于你。我试着要传达给你的，听起来也许矛盾百出，甚至于自相抵触，不过我没有其他的方式能加以表达了。
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Instead of "watching the thinker," you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the Now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment. This is a deeply satisfying thing to do. In this way, you draw consciousness away from mind activity and create a gap of no-mind in which you are highly alert and aware but not thinking. This is the essence of meditation.
你除了使用“观察思考者”的方式之外，也可以把注意力的焦点引导到当下，来创造一个心智流的间隙。你只要深刻地意识到当下这一刻就可以了。这是一个有深度满足感的修习。你借着这种方式，把意识由头脑的活动上引开，而创造了一个无心的间隙。你在这个间隙里，处于高度的机警和觉知之中，却没有思考。这就是冥想的精髓。
In your everyday life, you can practice this by taking any routine activity that normally is only a means to an end and giving it your fullest attention, so that it becomes an end in itself. For example, every time you walk up and down the stairs in your house or place of work, pay close attention to every step, every movement, even your breathing. Be totally present. Or when you wash your hands, pay attention to all the sense perceptions associated with the activity: the sound and feel of the water, the movement of your hands, the scent of the soap, and so on. Or when you get into your car, after you close the door, pause for a few seconds and observe the flow of your breath. Become aware of a silent but powerful sense of presence. There is one certain criterion by which you can measure your success in this practice: the degree of peace that you feel within.
你可以在日常生活中，找一项例行的活动，来做这个练习。把你全副的注意力，摆在一个通常只是一个过程的活动上，让这个过程变成一个目的。举例来说，每当你在家里或公司上下楼梯的时候，密切注意你的每一个步伐和动作，甚至于你的呼吸。全然地临在。再不然，洗手的时候注意每一个相关联的感官知觉：水的声音和感觉，你手部的动作，肥皂的气味诸如此类的。甚或在你上车的时候，关好车门之后暂停一会，观察你呼吸的进出。觉知到那个宁静却威力十足的临在感。有一个标准可以用来度量你这个练习的成功与否，那就是：你感觉到内在和平的程度。
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So the single most vital step on your journey toward enlightenment is this: learn to disidentify from your mind. Every time you create a gap in the stream of mind, the light of your consciousness grows stronger.
所以在你的开悟之旅中，最重要的一个步骤就是：学习不认同你的头脑。你每创造一个心智流间隙的时候，开悟之光就变得更强。
One day you may catch yourself smiling at the voice in your head, as you would smile at the antics of a child. This means that you no longer take the content of your mind all that seriously, as your sense of self does not depend on it.
有朝一日，你会像看到一个耍宝的孩子一样，对你头脑里的声音莞尔一笑。这意谓着你不再把你心智的内容看得那么认真了。因为你的自我感并不依附它而存在。
ENLIGHTENMENT: RISING ABOVE THOUGHT
开悟：超越思想
Isn't thinking essential in order to survive in this world?
难道思考不是在世界上求存的要件吗？
Your mind is an instrument, a tool. It is there to be used for a specific task, and when the task is completed, you lay it down. As it is, I would say about 8o to 90 percent of most people's thinking is not only repetitive and useless, but because of its dysfunctional and often negative nature, much of it is also harmful. Observe your mind and you will find this to be true. It causes a serious leakage of vital energy.
心智头脑是一个仪器，一个工具。它是为了一项特别的任务而用的，一旦任务完成，就要把它搁下。由此看来，我敢说大多数人的思考中，有百分之八十到九十，都是翻来覆去、一无是处的东西。而且更因为思考的失能和负面的性质，而使得大部份的思考都有百害而无一利。你只要观测你的头脑，就会发觉此一说法的真实性。它造成生命能量严重的耗损。
This kind of compulsive thinking is actually an addiction. What characterizes an addiction? Quite simply this: you no longer feel that you have the choice to stop. It seems stronger than you. It also gives you a false sense of pleasure, pleasure that invariably turns into pain.
这种强迫性的思考，其实是一个瘾头。瘾头的特性是什么？很简单：你没有停止它的选择。它似乎比你还强。它还给你一个虚假的享乐感，那种以痛苦收场的享乐。
Why should we be addicted to thinking?
我们何以会上了思考的瘾头？
Because you are identified with it, which means that you derive your sense of self from the content and activity of your mind. Because you believe that you would cease to be if you stopped thinking. As you grow up, you form a mental image of who you are, based on your personal and cultural conditioning. We may call this phantom self the ego. It consists of mind activity and can only be kept going through constant thinking. The term ego means different things to different people, but when I use it here it means a false self, created by unconscious identification with the mind.
因为你跟思考认同。也就是说，你由头脑的活动和内容中，汲取你的自我感。因为你相信只要一停止思考，你就马上停止存在。你在成长的过程中，根据个人和文化的制约，逐步架构出你是谁的心像图。我们不妨把这个虚幻的自我，称为我执（ego）。我执由心智活动所组成，它只能透过不断的思考而苟存。我执的意思因人而异，我在这里的用意指的是一个虚假的自我。它是我们与心智无意识的认同而创造出来的。
To the ego, the present moment hardly exists. Only past and future are considered important. This total reversal of the truth accounts for the fact that in the ego mode the mind is so dysfunctional. It is always concerned with keeping the past alive, because without it — who are you? It constantly projects itself into the future to ensure its continued survival and to seek some kind of release or fulfillment there. It says: "One day, when this, that, or the other happens, I am going to be okay, happy, at peace." Even when the ego seems to be concerned with the present, it is not the present that it sees: It misperceives it completely because it looks at it through the eyes of the past. Or it reduces the present to a means to an end, an end that always lies in the mind-projected future. Observe your mind and you'll see that this is how it works.
对我执而言，当下这一刻几乎不存在。只有过去和未来被认为是重要的。这整个真理的逆转，说明了一个事实：心智在我执的模式里运作不良。它自始至终只关切着如何让过去起死回生。因为没有了过去你又是谁呢？我执为了确保它的存续，为了从未来寻求纾解和实现，便不断地把自己投射到未来。它说：“有朝一日，等这个、那个发生的时候，我就会快乐、和平、万事如意了。”即使我执好像在关切当下的时候，那也不是它所看到的当下：由于它透过过去的眼睛在看当下，所以它把当下完全曲解了。再不然就是把当下贬至达成目的的一种手段，而这个目的，始终都铺呈在心智所投射出的未来。只要观察你的心智就不难明白。这就是它一惯的伎俩。
The present moment holds the key to liberation. But you cannot find the present moment as long as you are your mind.
当下这一刻掌握着通往解脱的钥匙。可是只要你仍然是你的心智头脑，你就找不到当下这一刻。
I don't want to lose my ability to analyze and discriminate. I wouldn't mind learning to think more clearly, in a more focused way, but I don't want to lose my mind. The gift of thought is the most precious thing we have. Without it, we would just be another species of animal.
我不想失去分析和察办的能力。我宁可学着让自己用更专注的方式思考得更清晰，也不要失去我的心智。思想是我们最珍贵的天赋。人没有了思想，只是变成另一种动物罢了。
The predominance of mind is no more than a stage in the evolution of consciousness. We need to go on to the next stage now as a matter of urgency; otherwise, we will be destroyed by the mind, which has grown into a monster. I will talk about this in more detail later. Thinking and consciousness are not synonymous. Thinking is only a small aspect of consciousness. Thought cannot exist without consciousness, but consciousness does not need thought.
心智的优势，只不过是意识进化过程中的一个阶段而已。我们的当务之急，是进入下一个阶段，否则，被我们豢养成怪兽的心智，迟早会把我们给毁灭。这方面容我稍后再详谈。思考和意识不是同义词。思考只是意识的微小部份而已。思想没有意识无法存在，意识却不需要思想。
Enlightenment means rising above thought, not filling back to a level below thought, the level of an animal or a plant. In the enlightened state, you still use your thinking mind when needed, but in a much more focused and effective way than before. You use it mostly for practical purposes, but you are free of the involuntary internal dialogue, and there is inner stillness. When you do use your mind, and particularly when a creative solution is needed, you oscillate every few minutes or so between thought and stillness, between mind and no-mind. No-mind is consciousness without thought. Only in that way is it possible to think creatively, because only in that way does thought have any real power. Thought alone, when it is no longer connected with the much vaster realm of consciousness, quickly becomes barren, insane, destructive.
开悟意谓着超越思想，而不是掉入思想之下的另一个属于动物或植物的层面。在开悟的状态里，你仍然会在必要的时候，使用你的心智进行思考，可是却以比以前更专注、更有效率的方式进行。你多半只为了实用性的目的而思考。你摆脱了不自主的内在对话，你多了一份内在的宁静。一旦你需要用到心智的时候，特别是需要创造性的方案时，你会以几分钟的间隔，摆荡在思想和静止、心智和无-心之间。无心就是没有思想的意识。唯有以这样的方式，创造性的思考才有可能。这是因为思想唯有在这种方式之下，才拥有真正的力量。当思想不再与更广阔的意识领域接轨的时候，它便会快速地枯竭、疯狂、而产生破坏力。
The mind is essentially a survival machine. Attack and defense against other minds, gathering, storing, and analyzing information — this is what it is good at, but it is not at all creative. All true artists, whether they know it or not, create from a place of no-mind, from inner stillness. The mind then gives form to the creative impulse or insight. Even the great scientists have reported that their creative breakthroughs came at a time of mental quietude. The surprising result of a nation-wide inquiry among America's most eminent mathematicians, including Einstein, to find out their working methods, was that thinking "plays only a subordinate part in the brief, decisive phase of the creative act itself." So I would say that the simple reason why the majority of scientists are not creative is not because they don't know how to think but because they don't know how to stop thinking!
心智头脑实际上是一部求生机器。它对别的心智发动攻击、进行自我防卫、搜集、储存、并分析资讯——这是它的拿手绝活，不过这根本不是创造。所有真正的艺术家，无论他们知道与否，那个创造的灵感都来自一个无-心的地方，都来自内在的宁静。然后再由心智，把创造的驱力和洞见形之于外。即使最伟大的科学家，也宣称他们是在心理的寂静中，产生了创造性的突破。对全美知名数学家，包括爱因斯坦在内，进行的一项研究方法问卷调查，结果令人惊讶。调查发现“在创造性行为短暂而具决定性的阶段中，思考只扮演了次要的角色”。因此，我敢断言，大多数科学家不具创意的原因很简单：并不是因为他们不知道如何思考，而是他们不知道如何停止思考。
It wasn't through the mind, through thinking, that the miracle that is life on earth or your body were created and are being sustained. There is clearly an intelligence at work that is far greater than the mind. How can a single human cell measuring 1/1,000 of an inch across contain instructions within its DNA that would fill 1,000 books of 600 pages each? The more we learn about the workings of the body, the more we realize just how vast is the intelligence at work within it and how little we know. When the mind reconnects with that, it becomes a most wonderful tool. It then serves something greater than itself.
你身体的奇迹、生命的奇迹，都不是透过心智与思考而创造和维系的。显而易见的是，有一个远超过心智，比心智更伟大的智能在运作。一个纵长只有千分之一寸的细胞，它的DNA里，何以蕴藏着足以填满六十万张书页这么多的指令？我们对身体的作用知道得越多，使我们越能体会身体内在运作的智能有多么庞大，而我们知道的又是多么微不足道。心智一旦与它重新联系，就会变成一个神奇无比的工具。然后它教会甘拜下风，效劳于一个比它更大的层面。
EMOTION: THE BODY'S REACTION TO YOUR MIND
情绪：身体对心智的反应
What about emotions? I get caught up in my emotions more than I do in my mind.
情绪又是怎么回事？我陷在情绪里的时候，比陷在心智的时候多。
Mind, in the way I use the word, is not just thought. It includes your emotions as well as all unconscious mental-emotional reactive patterns. Emotion arises at the place where mind and body meet. It is the body's reaction to your mind — or you might say, a reflection of your mind in the body. For example, an attack thought or a hostile thought will create a build-up of energy in the body that we call anger The body is getting ready to fight. The thought that you are being threatened, physically or psychologically, causes the body to contract, and this is the physical side of what we call fear. Research has shown that strong emotions even cause changes in the biochemistry of the body. These biochemical changes represent the physical or material aspect of the emotion. Of course, you are not usually conscious of all your thought patterns, and it is often only through watching your emotions that you can bring them into awareness.
我使用心智这个字，代表的不只是思想。它还包括了你的情绪，和无意识的心理-情绪反应模式。情绪在心智和身体的交会处生起。它是身体对心智的反应或者说，是你的心智在身体里的反射。例如：一个攻击性的思想或敌意性的思想，会在身体里创造出能量的累聚，我们称它为愤怒。身体开始准备战斗。你在生理、心理上受到威胁的念头，导致身体的收缩，这就是我们所说的恐惧的生理面。研究显示，强烈的情绪甚至会造成身体的生化改变。生化改变代表了情绪的生理面或物质面向。当然，通常而言，你并不会意识到你所有的思想模式，往往只能透过观察情绪，你才能把它们带进意识之中。
The more you are identified with your thinking, your likes and dislikes, judgments and interpretations, which is to say the less present you are as the watching consciousness, the stronger the emotional energy charge will be, whether you are aware of it or not. If you cannot feel your emotions, if you are cut off from them, you will eventually experience them on a purely physical level, as a physical problem or symptom. A great deal has been written about this in recent years, so we don't need to go into it here. A strong unconscious emotional pattern may even manifest as an external event that appears to just happen to you. For example, I have observed that people who carry a lot of anger inside without being aware of it and without expressing it are more likely to be attacked, verbally or even physically, by other angry people, and often for no apparent reason. They have a strong emanation of anger that certain people pick up subliminally and that triggers their own latent anger.
你越认同你的思考、好恶、批判、言诠，也就是说，你越不能以观察意识的情况临在，你情绪的能量电荷就越强，无论你觉察与否。如果你无法感觉到你的情绪，如果你断绝了与情绪的联系，它迟早会以一个生理问题或病症的形式或事件，让你在一个纯生理的层面经验到它。晚近有关这方面的论著已经很多，我们无需在此多所着墨。一个强烈的无意识情绪模式，可能会以一个外显的事件，巧合地发生在你身上。例如，我观察到某人携带了大量的愤怒，他没有察觉，也没有表达出来，那么他很可能会遭致其他愤怒者莫名其妙的言词或肢体的攻击。这是因为他们散发出强烈的愤怒波动，而被某人在潜意识里接收，因而引爆了他潜伏在内的愤怒。
If you have difficulty feeling your emotions, start by focusing attention on the inner energy field of your body. Feel the body from within. This will also put you in touch with your emotions. We will explore this in more detail later.
如果你在情绪的感觉上有困难，不妨先把注意力焦集在你身体内在的能量场上。从内在去感觉你的身体。这么做也会让你触及到你的情绪。这方面我们稍后再加详谈。
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You sap that an emotion is the mind's reflection in the body. But sometimes there is a conflict between the two: the mind saps "no" while the emotion saps "yes,' or the other way around.
你说情绪是心智在身体里的反射。可是这两者之间往往会发生冲突：心智说“不”而感受却说“好”，或者相反的情况。
If you really want to know your mind, the body will always give you a truthful reflection, so look at the emotion or rather feel it in your body. If there is an apparent conflict between them, the thought will be the lie, the emotion will be the truth. Not the ultimate truth of who you are, but the relative truth of your state of mind at that time.
如果你真的想了解你的心智，身体会给你最忠实的反映。所以要审视你的情绪，最好是在你的身体里感觉它。如果它们之间有很明显的冲突，那么思想是谎言，而感受才是真理。它虽然不是有关你是谁的至终真理，却是你当时心智状态的相对真理。
Conflict between surface thoughts and unconscious mental processes is certainly common. You may not yet be able to bring your unconscious mind activity into awareness as thoughts, but it will always be reflected in the body as an emotion, and of this you can become aware. To watch an emotion in this way is basically the same as listening to or watching a thought, which I described earlier. The only difference is that, while a thought is in your head, an emotion has a strong physical component and so is primarily felt in the body. You can then allow the emotion to be there without being controlled by it. You no longer are the emotion; you are the watcher, the observing presence. If you practice this, all that is unconscious in you will be brought into the light of consciousness.
表相的思想和无意识心理过程之间的冲突，是习以为常的事。你也许还没有办法把无意识的心智活动，当做思想一样带入觉知里。可是，它总是会以一个感受的方式，反映在身体里面，好让你能够觉察。用这种方式观察情绪，基本上就像我先前提过的倾听或观察思想是一样的。唯一的差别在于：思想在你的头脑里，而情绪却具有强烈的生理成份，因此它主要是在身体里面感觉到。你可以在不被情绪掌控的情况下，容许它存在那里。这时候的你，已经不再是这个情绪了，你是观察者，那个观测的临在。做这个练习，会让你所有无意识的部份被带进意识的光照之下。
So observing our emotions is as important as observing our thoughts?
这样说来，观察自己的情绪和观察自己的思想同样重要了？
Yes. Make it a habit to ask yourself. What's going on inside me at this moment? That question will point you in the right direction. But don't analyze, just watch. Focus your attention within. Feel the energy of the emotion. If there is no emotion present, take your attention more deeply into the inner energy field of your body. It is the doorway into Being.
对。要习惯性地自问：“这一刻，我的内在发生了什么事？”这个问题会把你导引到正确的方向上。不过，不要分析，只要观察。把你的注意力向内转。感觉情绪的能量。如果没有情绪在，再把你的注意力带入更深的身体能量场里面。这里是通往存在的大门。
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An emotion usually represents an amplified and energized thought pattern, and because of its often overpowering energetic charge, it is not easy initially to stay present enough to be able to watch it. It wants to take you over, and it usually succeeds — unless there is enough presence in you. If you are pulled into unconscious identification with the emotion through lack of presence, which is normal, the emotion temporarily becomes "you." Often a vicious circle builds up between your thinking and the emotion: they feed each other. The thought pattern creates a magnified reflection of itself in the form of an emotion, and the vibrational frequency of the emotion keeps feeding the original thought pattern. By dwelling mentally on the situation, event, or person that is the perceived cause of the emotion, the thought feeds energy to the emotion, which in turn energizes the thought pattern, and so on.
一个情绪通常代表一个被强化，且蓄满能量的思想模式。更由于它蓄势待发的能量，一开始并不容易保持足够的临在以便观察。它想要掌控你，而它通常都会得逞，除非你有足够的临在。如果你因为缺乏足够的临在，而无意识的被拖进跟这个情绪的认同里，这是常态，这个情绪就暂时地变成了“你”。你的思考和情绪之间，往往会形成一个恶性循环：它们彼此喂养。思想模式以一个情绪的形式，为自己创造了一个放大了的映像，而情绪使用它的震动频率，继续豢养这个原初的思想模式。思想在情境、事件、或者被感知为情绪肇因的人身上，把能量喂给了情绪；情绪再把能量反馈给思想模式，如此周而复始。
Basically, all emotions are modifications of one primordial, undifferentiated emotion that has its origin in the loss of awareness of who you are beyond name and form. Because of its undifferentiated nature, it is hard to find a name that precisely describes this emotion. "Fear" comes close, but apart from a continuous sense of threat, it also includes a deep sense of abandonment and incompleteness. It may be best to use a term that is as undifferentiated as that basic emotion and simply call it "pain." One of the main tasks of the mind is to fight or remove that emotional pain, which is one of the reasons for its incessant activity, but all it can ever achieve is to cover it up temporarily. In fact, the harder the mind struggles to get rid of the pain, the greater the pain. The mind can never find the solution, nor can it afford to allow you to find the solution, because it is itself an intrinsic part of the "problem." Imagine a chief of police trying to find an arsonist when the arsonist is the chief of police. You will not be free of that pain until you cease to derive your sense of self from identification with the mind, which is to say from ego. The mind is then toppled from its place of power and Being reveals itself as your true nature.
基本上，所有情绪都是一个最原始而没有差别的情绪的变型。它的根源是来自于失去了对我们那个超越名相的本来面目的觉知。因为它无差别的性质，所以很难找到一个精确的名称，来描述这个情绪。“恐惧”相当贴近，不过除了一个持续性的威胁感之外，它还包含了一个深度的遗弃感和不完整感。也许单纯地把它叫做“痛苦”不失为一个最适当的名称，因为它和这个基本情绪一样无等差分别。去对抗或铲除这个情绪的痛苦，就是心智的重大责任。这也是它疲于奔命的原因之一。可是它充其量也只是暂时地把痛苦给掩盖住而已。事实上，心智越费心尽力地想要摆脱痛苦，痛苦就越强。心智永远找不到解答，它也不容你找到解答，因为它本身就是“问题”的一部份。不妨想像一个追查纵火犯的警官，而实际上，这位警官就是纵火犯。除非你停止从心智的认同里，也就是我执里，汲取你的自我感，你不会有从痛苦中解脱的一天。如此你的心智才会丧失它的权位，而本体便以你真如本性的面目，不请自来。
Yes, I know what you are going to ask.
是的，我知道你要问什么了。
I was going to ask: What about positive emotions such as love and joy?
我要问的是：那么像爱、或喜悦等正面的情感，又怎么说呢？
They are inseparable from your natural state of inner connectedness with Being. Glimpses of love and joy or brief moments of deep peace are possible whenever a gap occurs in the stream of thought. For most people, such gaps happen rarely and only accidentally, in moments when the mind is rendered "speechless," sometimes triggered by great beauty, extreme physical exertion, or even great danger. Suddenly, there is inner stillness. And within that stillness there is a subtle but intense joy, there is love, there is peace.
它们是你与存在有了内在联系后，自然状态中不可分割的一部份。每当你的思想流产生间隙的时候，爱(love)和喜悦(joy)的惊鸿一瞥，或者短暂的深度和平(peace)，便可能来临。对大多数人来讲，只有当殊胜大美当前、体能发挥至极限、甚或生死交关的当头，才会引发出心智的“失语状态”。这样的间隙，才会出奇不意地发生。这时内在的寂静突然来临。在这份寂静中沁沁而出的，是一股微妙又强烈的喜悦、爱和和平。
Usually, such moments are short-lived, as the mind quickly resumes its noise-making activity that we call thinking. Love, joy, and peace cannot flourish until you have freed yourself from mind dominance. But they are not what I would call emotions. They lie beyond the emotions, on a much deeper level. So you need to become fully conscious of your emotions and be able to feel them before you can feel that which lies beyond them. Emotion literally means "disturbance." The word comes from the Latin emovere, meaning "to disturb."
通常这种时刻只是浮光掠影，一闪即逝。因为心智又忙不迭地履行它制造噪音的活动，也就是我们所说的思考。在你没有把自己由心智的铁牢中解脱出来之前，爱、喜悦和和平便不可能滋长。不过它们并不是我所谓的情绪。爱、喜悦和和平，在一个比情绪更深的层面。因此你势必先要全然地意识到你的情绪，并且能够感觉它们之后，才能进一步感觉到那超越情绪的爱、喜悦和和平。情绪这个字的原意是“干扰”，它源自拉丁文的emovere——“打扰”的意思。
Love, joy, and peace are deep states of Being or rather three aspects of the state of inner connectedness with Being. As such, they have no opposite. This is because they arise from beyond the mind. Emotions, on the other hand, being part of the dualistic mind, are subject to the law of opposites. This simply means that you cannot have good without bad. So in the unenlightened, mind-identified condition, what is sometimes wrongly called joy is the usually short-lived pleasure side of the continuously alternating pain/pleasure cycle. Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within. The very thing that gives you pleasure today will give you pain tomorrow, or it will leave you, so its absence will give you pain. And what is often referred to as love may be pleasurable and exciting for a while, but it is an addictive clinging, an extremely needy condition that can turn into its opposite at the flick of a switch. Many "love" relationships, after the initial euphoria has passed, actually oscillate between "love" and hate, attraction and attack.
爱、喜悦和和平，是存在的深层状态，或者更贴切的说法是：与存在的内在联系状态的三个面向。在这种状况下，它们没有对立。这是因为它们源自于心智之外的缘故。情绪则另当别论，它是二元性心智的一部份。它受制于对立法则。简言之，就是有好必有坏的意思。因此在一个无明的、心智认同的情况下，往往被误称为喜悦的，其实只是痛苦/享乐的交递循环里，短暂的享乐罢了。享乐不同于喜悦的内发，它总是向外攀援而来的。同一个事物，今天带给你享乐，明天却让你痛苦，或者是离你而去，让你在匮乏中痛苦。而那被称之为爱的，也许能带给你一时的欢乐和刺激，可是它毕竟是一个上了瘾的攀缘，在极度需求的情况下，可以瞬间由爱生恨。许多“爱”的关系在蜜月期结束之后，便在爱、恨、吸引、攻击之间摆荡。
Real love doesn't make you suffer. How could it? It doesn't suddenly turn into hate, nor does real joy turn into pain. As I said, even before you are enlightened — before you have freed yourself from your mind — you may get glimpses of true joy, true love, or of a deep inner peace, still but vibrantly alive. These are aspects of your true nature, which is usually obscured by the mind. Even within a "normal'' addictive relationship, there can be moments when the presence of something more genuine, something incorruptible, can be felt. But they will only be glimpses, soon to be covered up again through mind interference. It may then seem that you had something very precious and lost it, or your mind may convince you that it was all an illusion anyway. The truth is that it wasn't an illusion, and you cannot lose it. It is part of your natural state, which can be obscured but can never be destroyed by the mind. Even when the sky is heavily overcast, the sun hasn't disappeared. It's still there on the other side of the clouds.
真爱不会让你受苦。它怎么会呢？它不会在瞬间转爱为恨。真正的喜悦，也不会变成痛苦。我曾经说过，即使在你开悟之前——在你解脱心牢之前——你也许浅尝过真爱、真喜悦，或者深度的内在和平，它虽静止却生机昂然。这些都是你真如本性的面向，却遭到心智的蒙蔽。即使在一个“正常”的爱瘾关系里，也会觉受到一种更纯真、更不可毁灭的片刻。不过它们也只是春光乍现，随即又被心智的干扰遮蔽了。你也许有如失去瑰宝之痛，或者你的心智会说服你说，毕竟这只是一场空幻。事实上，它既不是空幻，你也不可能失去它。它是你自然状态的一部份，它可以被心智遮蔽于一时，却永远无法被摧毁。纵或乌云铺天盖地，太阳却不曾消失。而太阳就在乌云的另一端。
The Buddha says that pain or suffering arises through desire or craving and that to be free of pain we need to cut the bonds of desire.
佛陀说痛苦或受苦，源自于欲望和渴求，所以断欲是离苦的究竟之道。
All cravings are the mind seeking salvation or fulfillment in external things and in the future as a substitute for the joy of Being. As long as I am my mind, I am those cravings, those needs, wants, attachments, and aversions, and apart from them there is no 'I' except as a mere possibility, an unfulfilled potential, a seed that has not yet sprouted. In that state, even my desire to become free or enlightened is just another craving for fulfillment or completion in the future. So don't seek to become free of desire or "achieve" enlightenment. Become present. Be there as the observer of the mind. Instead of quoting the Buddha, be the Buddha, be "the awakened one," which is what the word buddha means.
所有的渴求，全都是心智为了取代存在的喜悦，而向外境和未来寻求救赎或成就。只要我还是我的心智，那么我就是那些渴求、那些需要、那些匮乏，脆弱、和厌离。离开它们，便没有“我”。我只是一个可能性、一个有待实现的潜力、一颗尚未萌芽的种籽。处于这种状态下的我，即使对解脱或开悟的欲求，都只是另一个要在未来付诸实现或完成的渴求。因此，切勿寻求欲望的解脱，或“达成”开悟。要变成临在。以心智观察者的身份临在。而不要套佛陀的话、要当佛陀、要当“觉醒者”——佛陀这个字的本意。
Humans have been in the grip of pain for eons, ever since they fell from the state of grace, entered the realm of time and mind, and lost awareness of Being. At that point, they started to perceive themselves as meaningless fragments in an alien universe, unconnected to the Source and to each other.
自从人类由恩典的状态中坠落，而进入时间和心智的领域，丧失了对存在的觉和，便被痛苦折磨了亿万年之久。人类在痛苦中，视自己为了无意义的断瓦残片，在一个疏离的宇宙中，断绝了自己和源头以及彼此之间的联系。
Pain is inevitable as long as you are identified with your mind, which is to say as long as you are unconscious, spiritually speaking. I am talking here primarily of emotional pain, which is also the main cause of physical pain and physical disease. Resentment, hatred, self-pity, guilt, anger, depression, jealousy, and so on, even the slightest irritation, are all forms of pain. And every pleasure or emotional high contains within itself the seed of pain: its inseparable opposite, which will manifest in time.
只要你与心智认同，也就是说，只要你在灵性上是无意识的，你便难逃痛苦的藩篱。我所谈的主要是指情绪的痛苦。它是生理痛苦和生理疾病的元凶。怨憎、恨、自怜、愧疚、愤怒、沮丧、嫉妒等，甚至最轻微的恼怒，都是痛苦的形式。而每一个享乐或情绪的“high”里都潜伏了痛苦的种籽：它们是一体的两面，必将应时而显。
Anybody who has ever taken drugs to get "high" will know that the high eventually turns into a low, that the pleasure turns into some form of pain. Many people also know from their own experience how easily and quickly an intimate relationship can turn from a source of pleasure to a source of pain. Seen from a higher perspective, both the negative and the positive polarities are faces of the same coin, are both part of the underlying pain that is inseparable from the mind-identified egoic state of consciousness.
任何一个曾经藉毒取“骇”（high）的人，都知道骇的尽头就是漏（low），乐极生痛的道理。也有许多人，由亲身的经验得知，一份亲密关系居然会在反掌之间，由享乐的源头变成了痛苦的渊薮。从一个更高的观点来看，正、负两极都是底层痛苦的一体两面。而这个底层的痛苦，与心智认同的我执意识状态是如影随形、不可分割的。
There are two levels to your pain: the pain that you create now, and the pain from the past that still lives on in your mind and body. Ceasing to create pain in the present and dissolving past pain — this is what I want to talk about now.
你的痛苦有两个层面：一层是你现在创造的痛苦；另一层是仍然活在你的心智和身体里的旧痛。停止制造眼前的痛苦，并且瓦解旧痛——就是我接着要探讨的。