---
title: 外塵和心 Sense Objects and the Mind
description: "We do not examine ourselves; we just follow desire, caught in endless rounds of grasping and fearing, wanting to do just"
---

Sense Objects and the Mind

　　外塵和心

We do not examine ourselves; we just follow desire, caught in endless rounds of grasping and fearing, wanting to do just as we please. Whatever we do, we want it to be at our ease. If we are not able to have comfort and pleasure any longer, we are unhappy, anger and aversion arise, and we suffer, trapped by our mind.

　　我們不去檢視自己，而只去追逐欲望，被無盡的貪婪和懼怕所束縛，只想做我們所喜的事。不論我們做什　，只想得到我們的安逸。如果不能繼續擁有舒適和快樂，我們就不高興，並生嗔恨心，我們于是受到心的欺騙而痛苦不已。

For the most part, our thinking follows sense objects, and, wherever thought leads us, we follow. However, thinking and wisdom are different; in wisdom, the mind becomes still, unmoving, and we are simply aware, simply acknowledging. Normally, when sense objects come, we think about, dwell on, discourse over, and worry about them. Yet none of those objects is substantial; all are impermanent, unsatisfactory, and empty. Just cut them short and dissect them into these three common characteristics. When you sit again, they will arise again, but just keep observing them, keep checking them out.

　　最要緊的是，我們的思想追隨著外塵，不管念頭把我們帶到那里，我們都會追隨。總之，思想和智慧是不同的：在智慧之中，心變得寧靜、不浮動──我們只是覺知。通常，當外塵出現時，我們會一再的深思、探究、談論並擔憂它們。然而，沒有任何外塵是真實的，它們全是無常、不圓滿(苦)、空的。只要截住它們，將它們分析成這三個普遍的性質。當你再靜坐時，它們就會再生起，可是，你只須持續地觀察它們、審視它們。

This practice is like caring for a buffalo and a rice field. The mind is like the buffalo that wants to eat the rice plants, sense objects; the one who knows is the owner. Consider the comparison. When you tend a buffalo, you let it go free but you keep watch over it. You cannot be heedless. If it goes close to the rice plants, you shout at it and it retreats. If it is stubborn and will not obey your voice, you take a stick and hit it. Do not fall asleep in the daytime and let everything go. If you do, you will have no rice plants left, for sure.

　　當你在觀察你的心時，覺知者會繼續覺察一切。正如經上所言：「一個對自己內心有所警戒的人，將逃離惡魔的羅網。」心雖是心，但是誰在觀察呢?心是一回事，覺知者是另一回事。在同一個時間里，心是在思惟也是在覺知。去覺知心──覺知它與外塵接觸時是如何的?覺知它與外塵分開時又是如何?當覺知者如此地去觀察心時，智慧便隨之生起。

When you are observing your mind, the one who knows constantly notices all. As the sutras say, "He who watches over his mind shall escape the snares of Mara the Evil One." Mind is mind, but who is it that observes it? Mind is one thing, the one who knows is another. At the same time the mind is both the thinking process and the knowing. Know the mind-know how it is when it meets sense objects and how it is when it is apart from them. When the one who knows observes the mind in this way, wisdom arises. If it meets an object, it gets involved, just like the buffalo. Wherever it goes, you must watch it. When it goes near the rice plants, shout at it. If it will not obey, just give it the stick.

　　當心經驗外塵時，就會緊緊地抓住外塵。當它緊抓不放時，覺知者一定要教導它──解釋什麼是好的、什麼是壞的，指出因與果的定律，顯示出任何它所執著的事物都將帶來不好的後果──直到心恢復理智、直到心放下。如此一來，訓練將會見效，而心也會平靜下來。

When the mind experiences sense contact, it grabs hold. When it grabs hold, the one who knows must, teach it-explaining what is good and what is bad, pointing out the workings of cause and effect, showing that anything it holds on to will bring undesirable results until mind becomes reasonable, until it lets go. In this way, the training will take effect, and the mind will become tranquil.

The Buddha taught us to lay everything down, not like a cow or a buffalo but knowingly, with awareness. In order for us to know, he taught us to practice much, develop much, rest firmly on the principles of the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, and apply them directly to our own life.

　　佛陀教導我們要放下一切，不要像只母牛或水牛一般，反倒要時時覺知。為了使我們明白，他教我們要多修行、多培養，堅定地安住于佛、法、僧的宗旨上，直接將它們實踐在我們的生活之中。

From the beginning I have practiced like this. In teaching my disciples, I teach like this. We want to see the truth not in a book or as an ideal but in our own minds. If the mind is not yet free, contemplate the cause and effect of each situation until the mind sees clearly and can free itself from its own conditioning. As the mind becomes attached again, examine each new situation-do not stop looking, keep at it, drive the point home. Then attachment will find no where to rest. This is the way I myself have practiced.

　　我一開始就是如此修行的，在教導我的弟子時，我也是這　教的。我不希望只在書中看見真理，或僅是一個理想，而是在我們的內心中。如果心還未解脫，觀(思惟)每一個情況的因果，直到心看清並能從自身的情形之中解脫出來。如果心又去執著時，再去審視新的情況──絕不要停止覺察，繼續保持下去，引導至家，于是執著將會無處可逃。這就是我自己曾修行的方法。

If you practice like this, true tranquility is found in activity, in the midst of sense objects. At first, when you are working on your mind and sense objects come, you cling to them or avoid them. You are therefore disturbed, not peaceful. When you sit and wish not to have sense contact, not to have thinking the very wish not to have is desire. The more you struggle with your thinking, the stronger it becomes. Just forget about it and continue to practice. When you make contact with sense objects, contemplate: impermanent, unsatisfactory, not self. Throw everything into these three pigeonholes, file everything under these three categories, and keep contemplating.

　　如果你這樣修行，那　真正的寧靜是在活動中、在外塵中被找到的。剛開始，當你在心上用功而外塵出現時，你會執著它們或逃避它們，于是你便被干擾了，而不得平靜。當你在靜坐時，期望不要有感官的接觸，不要有思想，而這種期望就是欲望啊!你愈是和思想掙扎，它就會變得愈強。只要把它忘了，繼續修行下去，當你再與外塵接觸時，便觀想：無常、苦、無我。把一切丟入這三法印之中，把一切都歸入這三個的范疇之中，然後繼續觀。