Mindfulness In Plain English - Chapter 1: Meditation: Why Bother?

Mindfulness In Plain English

佛教禪修直解

by Mahathera Henepola Gunaratana

德寶法師著作 梁國雄居士譯

Chapter 1: Meditation: Why Bother?

第一章 為什麼要禪修

Meditation is not easy. It takes time and it takes energy. It also takes grit, determination and discipline. It requires a host of personal qualities which we normally regard as unpleasant and which we like to avoid whenever possible. We can sum it all up in the American word ‘gumption’. Meditation takes ‘gumption’. It is certainly a great deal easier just to kick back and watch television. So why bother? Why waste all that time and energy when you could be out enjoying yourself? Why bother? Simple. Because you are human. And just because of the simple fact that you are human, you find yourself heir to an inherent unsatisfactoriness in life which simply will not go away. You can suppress it from your awareness for a time. You can distract yourself for hours on end, but it always comes back–usually when you least expect it. All of a sudden, seemingly out of the blue, you sit up, take stock, and realize your actual situation in life.

禪修並不容易，它需要時間與精力，更需要膽識、決心與自律。它要求許多個人難以做得到的特質，而那些特質又是人人常會找機會逃避的。我們可以用Gumption(精明能干)這一美國字來概括那些特質，禪修就需要這個字的內涵特質：即機智、應變力、魄力與進取心等可令人成功的要素。靠坐在椅子里觀看電視，肯定比禪修輕易千萬倍。那麼，干嘛要自找麻煩？干嘛要浪費時間與精力去禪修，放棄眼前垂手可得的享受？為什麼？很簡單，因為你是人，就因為你是人這一簡單事實，你發覺自己必須承受生命中內在的、揮之不去的缺憾與不滿(Unsatisfactoriness) ── 例如：老病死，愛別離，怨憎會，求不得等令人苦惱、不安、逼迫等不如意事情。你可以在意識中暫時把它壓抑住一陣子，或令自己分散注意，在幾小時內都意識不到它，可是，它總會走回來的，而且，往往是在你最不想它出現的時候！到時你會突然間坐起來，評估一下現狀，然後意外地了解到自己的人生實況。

There you are, and you suddenly realize that you are spending your whole life just barely getting by. You keep up a good front. You manage to make ends meed somehow and look OK from the outside. But those periods of desperation, those times when you feel everything caving in on you, you keep those to yourself. You are a mess. And you know it. But you hide it beautifully. Meanwhile, way down under all that you just know there has got be some other way to live, some better way to look at the world, some way to touch life more fully. You click into it by chance now and then. You get a good job. You fall in love. You win the game. and for a while, things are different. Life takes on a richness and clarity that makes all the bad times and humdrum fade away. The whole texture of your experience changes and you say to yourself, “OK, now I’ve made it; now I will be happy”. But then that fades, too, like smoke in the wind. You are left with just a memory. That and a vague awareness that something is wrong.

就這樣，你驚覺自己的一生，只是勉強應付過去罷了。你的門面裝得好，勉強可以維持生計，表面上你過得去，可是，那些絕望、沮喪的時刻，那些感到一切都與自己作對的時刻，你就秘而不宣了。其實你是一團糟，自己也知道的，可是，你把它掩飾得天衣無縫。同時，你雖身陷困境，仍能確知：一定還有其他生活方式，一種看待世界更好的方式，或是一種更能全面接觸人生的方式。偶爾你會走運，例如：你找到一份好工作、遇上情投意合的對象、或是贏了一場比賽。這一陣子，世界轉變了，生命顯得非常有趣和清晰，過去的壞日子與枯燥無味也消失了，你的感受也全然變了質，于是你對自己說：「好了！現在我成功了！以後我快樂無憂了。」可是，這亦會消逝的，就像風中的煙霧一樣，最後只留給你一片迷惘的記憶，你模糊地意識到有些不對勁。

But there is really another whole realm of depth and sensitivity available in life, somehow, you are just not seeing it. You wind up feeling cut off. You feel insulated from the sweetness of experience by some sort of sensory cotton. You are not really touching life. You are not making it again. And then even that vague awareness fades away, and you are back to the same old reality. The world looks like the usual foul place, which is boring at best. It is an emotional roller coaster, and you spend a lot of your time down at the bottom of the ramp, yearning for the heights.

你感到實應另有境界，那里的人生更為有深度和靈敏度；由于諸種原因，你就是看不到。結果，你感到與世隔絕，感官好像被棉紗罩住，令你無法享受到甜美的經驗，你接觸不到人生，于是，你又失敗了。到那模糊的意識也消失時，你又回到往日的現實之中，世界一如往常的不淨和恐怖，它像一列驚心動魄、急轉突變的過山車(Roller Coaster)，你大部分時間都處在斜坡的底部，期望著再闖高峰。

So what is wrong with you? Are you a freak? No. You are just human. And you suffer from the same malady that infects every human being. It is a monster in side all of us, and it has many arms: Chronic tension, lack of genuine compassion for others, including the people closest to you, feelings being blocked up, and emotional deadness. Many, many arms. None of us is entirely free from it. We may deny it. We try to suppress it. We build a whole culture around hiding from it, pretending it is not there, and distracting ourselves from it with goals and projects and status. But it never goes away. It is a constant undercurrent in every thought and every perception; a little wordless voice at the back of the head saying, “Not good enough yet. Got to have more. Got to make it better. Got to be better.” It is a monster, a monster that manifests everywhere in subtle forms.

那麼，你出了什麼問題？你是怪物嗎？不！你只是一個凡人，與其他人一樣患上相同的弊病。它是一只妖怪，躲在所有人的內部，它有許多手臂：如慢性緊張、對人(包括自己或親屬)缺乏真誠的慈悲、冷漠、無情等。誰也不能完全擺脫它，我們可以否認它、嘗試抑制它、在周圍建立起一套文化來躲避它、假裝著它並不存在、甚至不斷為自己設立目標、實踐計劃、或追求重要的身份/地位/資格來分散注意力。可是，它從來就沒有離開過，它是一股斷不了的潛流，存在于每一個念頭和知覺之中，它是心底里的一個細小聲音，經常在說：「還不夠好，得要更多！做好一些，要不斷改善！」它是一只妖怪，一只以微妙方式顯現在所有地方的妖怪。

Go to a party. Listen to the laughter, that brittle-tongued voice that says fun on the surface and fear underneath. Feel the tension, feel the pressure. Nobody really relaxes. They are faking it. Go to a ball game. Watch the fan in the stand. Watch the irrational fit of anger. Watch the uncontrolled frustration bubbling forth from people that masquerades under the guise of enthusiasm, or team spirit. Booing, cat-calls and unbridled egotism in the name of team loyalty. Drunkenness, fights in the stands. These are the people trying desperately to release tension from within. These are not people who are at peace with themselves. Watch the news on TV. Listen to the lyrics in popular songs. You find the same theme repeated over and over in variations. Jealousy, suffering, discontent and stress.

去參加一個聚會，聽聽里面的笑聲，在談笑風生的表面樂趣中，實掩蓋不了內心的恐懼；再感受一下那里的緊張和壓力，沒有人是真正輕松的，大家都在假裝而已。去觀看一場球賽，留意一下看台上的球迷，看看那些非理性的憤怒表現，留意一下在熱情與團隊精神的偽裝下，不時冒出的那些失控的挫敗感。例如：喝倒采、嘲罵、在忠于球隊名義下的自我放縱、酗酒、在看台上打架等球迷，全都是不顧一切地想緩解內在緊張的人，全都不是內心安穩、和平的人。看看電視新聞，聽聽流行歌曲的歌詞，你會發現，同樣的情況：嫉妒、苦惱、不滿和壓力，正以不同的方式一遍又一遍地在重複著。

Life seems to be a perpetual struggle, some enormous effort against staggering odds. And what is our solution to all this dissatisfaction? We get stuck in the ’ If only’ syndrome. If only I had more money, then I would be happy. If only I can find somebody who really loves me, if only I can lose 20 pounds, if only I had a color TV, Jacuzzi, and curly hair, and on and on forever. So where does all this junk come from and more important, what can we do about it? It comes from the conditions of our own minds. It is deep, subtle and pervasive set of mental habits, a Gordian knot which we have built up bit by bit and we can unravel just the same way, one piece at a time. We can tune up our awareness, dredge up each separate piece and bring it out into the light. We can make the unconscious conscious, slowly, one piece at a time.

人生好像一場無休止的掙扎，一場極端不利自己的奮斗。對所有這些不滿，我們有解決的辦法嗎？我們往往陷于「只要…… 我就……」的想法而不能自拔，例如：只要我有多一些錢，我就可以快樂了；只要我能找到真正愛我的人就好了；只要我能減少二十磅就好了；只要我有一台彩色電視、熱水缸、卷曲的頭髮…… 等等數之不盡的事物就好了。這些無意義的妄念是從哪里來的？更重要的是，我們可以對之做些什麼？它來自我們的內心習性，它是一組深層、隱微、遍布各處的心理習性，一個我們不斷纏繞而成的、棘手的結，一個我們可以用同樣的方法，漸進式地，慢慢可以解開的結。我們可以調升自己的覺察力(Awareness)，向內先挖出一小塊，讓它曝光；我們可以讓覺察不到的「無意識[1]」里的東西變成「意識」里可以覺察得到的東西，慢慢地一次一小塊。

The essence of our experience is change. Change is incessant. Moment by moment life flows by and it is never the same. Perpetual alteration is the essence of the perceptual universe. A thought springs up in you head and half a second later, it is gone. In comes another one, and that is gone too. A sound strikes your ears and then silence. Open your eyes and the world pours in, blink and it is gone. People come into your life and they leave again. Friends go, relatives die. Your fortunes go up and they go down. Sometimes you win and just as often you lose. It is incessant: change, change, change. No two moments ever the same.

經驗的本質是變化，永無間斷的變化。生命時刻流逝，從來就不會重複，永恆的變動原來就是感知世界的本質。在腦子里冒起的念頭，半秒後即會消失，隨後生起的念頭，同樣也會消失。一個聲音敲擊你的耳朵，跟著便沉靜下來。張開你的眼睛，世界頓時湧入，眨眼間，它又消失了。人們進入你的生命後，很快就會離開── 朋友會離開，親屬會死亡。你的命運時好時壞，有時候贏，有時候輸。它總是永無休止地變化、變化、變化…… ，從未有兩個片刻是相同的。

There is not a thing wrong with this. It is the nature of the universe. But human culture has taught u some odd responses to this endless flowing. We categorize experiences. We try to stick each perception, every mental change in this endless flow into one of three mental pigeon holes. It is good, or it is bad, or it is neutral. Then, according to which box we stick it in, we perceive with a set of fixed habitual mental responses. If a particular perception has been labeled ‘good’, then we try to freeze time right there. We grab onto that particular thought, we fondle it, we hold it, we try to keep it from escaping. When that does not work, we go all-out in an effort to repeat the experience which caused that thought. Let us call this mental habit ‘grasping’.

這情況其實沒有任何問題，宇宙的本性就是如此── 不斷的遷流變化，只是人類的文化教我們對之作出奇怪的反應而已。我們將經驗分類，試圖把變遷中的每個感受、每個心理變化塞進分類架中的三個分類小間隔內：好的、壞的或中性的；接著視乎不同的分類小間隔，我們就會作出不同的一組習性心理反應。如果某感受是好的，我們就在那里凍結時間，抓住那個心念，愛撫著它、緊握著它、不讓它逃跑；如果失敗了，我們就會竭盡全力去重複產生那個念頭的經驗。讓我們稱此心理習性為「執著(Grasping)」吧。

Over on the other side of the mind lies the box labeled ‘bad’. When we perceive something ‘bad’, we try to push it away. We try to deny it, reject it, get rid of it any way we can. We fight against our own experience. We run from pieces of ourselves. Let us call this mental habit ‘rejecting’. Between these two reactions lies the neutral box. Here we place the experiences which are neither good nor bad. They are tepid, neutral, uninteresting and boring. We pack experience away in the neutral box so that we can ignore it and thus return jour attention to where the action is, namely our endless round of desire and aversion. This category of experience gets robbed of its fair share of our attention. Let us call this mental habit ‘ignoring’. The direct result of all this lunacy is a perpetual treadmill race to nowhere, endlessly pounding after pleasure, endlessly fleeing from pain, endlessly ignoring 90 percent of our experience. Than wondering why life tastes so flat. In the final analysis, it’s a system that does not work.

心內的另一端還有一個壞的分類小間隔。當我們感受到壞的東西時，我們會嘗試推開它、否定它、拒絕它、甚至用盡方法去消除它。我們與自己的感受搏斗，想離開本屬自己的那些部分。讓我們稱此心理習性為「排斥(Rejecting)」吧。好與壞之間有一個中性的分類小間隔，在這里我們會放進不好亦不壞的東西，它們是不冷不熱的、中性的、沒有趣味的，我們把感受放入中性的分類小間隔內，讓我們可以不理它，然後回過頭來，繼續照顧那些無休止的愛憎活動。因此，這些感受並沒有得到應得的注意。讓我們稱此心理習性為「忽略(Ignoring)」吧。這些愚蠢行為的直接結果是：單調乏味、無休止的追求快樂與逃避痛苦、以及忽略我們約百分之九十的經驗。接著，我們質疑：「為什麼生活如斯乏味！」分析到最後，這些反應方式是行不通的。

No matter how hard you pursue pleasure and success, there are times when you fail. No matter how fast you flee, there are times when pain catches up with you. And in between those times, life is so boring you could scream. Our minds are full of opinions and criticisms. We have built walls all around ourselves and we are trapped with the prison of our own lies and dislikes. We suffer.

無論你如何努力爭取快樂與成功，總會有時候失敗的；無論你逃跑得多快，總會有時候被痛苦追上的；而處于兩者之間的生活，又令你煩悶得尖聲大叫。我們的內心又充滿種種主張與批評，在自己周圍建造牆壁，把自己困在自建的愛憎牢獄之中，從而令自己苦惱不堪。

Suffering is big word in Buddhist thought. It is a key term and it should be thoroughly understood. The Pali word is ‘dukkha’, and it does not just mean the agony of the body. It means the deep, subtle sense of unsatisfactoriness which is a part of every mental treadmill. The essence of life is suffering, said the Buddha. At first glance this seems exceedingly morbid and pessimistic. It even seems untrue. After all, there are plenty of times when we are happy. Aren’t there? No, there are not. It just seems that way. Take any moment when you feel really fulfilled and examine it closely. Down under the joy, you will find that subtle, all-pervasive undercurrent of tension, that no matter how great the moment is, it is going to end. No matter how much you just gained, you are either going to lose some of it or spend the rest of your days guarding what you have got and scheming how to get more. And in the end, you are going to die. In the end, you lose everything. It is all transitory.

在佛教思想中，「苦」是一個重要的字眼。它是一個關鍵詞，必須被徹底了解。它的巴利文是Dukkha，不但包括身苦，還包括內心深處隱微的不如意感(Dissatisfaction)，此不如意感念念都有，是心念不斷生起的結果。佛陀曾說：生命的本質是苦。乍看起來，這說法似乎極為病態和悲觀，甚至不可能是真的。畢竟我們有很多時候是快樂的，不是嗎？不！沒有，似是而非而已。隨便選一個你真正感到滿意的時刻來審查吧，在喜悅底下，你總會找到一些潛伏、隱微、普遍存在的不安，即無論任何美好時光，總會有消逝的一天。無論你剛得到多少(名利、成就等)，總難免會損失一部分，或要用下半生日子去守護著它，同時計劃著怎樣可以得到更多。到最後，你總會死去的，到最後，你總會失去一切所有的。一切事物就是那麼無常，轉瞬即逝。

Sounds pretty bleak, doesn’t it? Luckily it’s not; not at all. It only sounds bleak when you view it from the level of ordinary mental perspective, the very level at which the treadmill mechanism operates. Down under that level lies another whole perspective, a completely different way to look at the universe. It is a level of functioning where the mind does not try to freeze time, where we do not grasp onto our experience as it flows by, where we do not try to block things out and ignore them. It is a level of experience beyond good and bad, beyond pleasure and pain. It is a lovely way to perceive the world, and it is a learnable skill. It is not easy, but is learnable.

聽起來很淒涼，不是嗎？幸運地，不，一點也不淒涼。只有用世俗人的眼光去看才會覺得淒涼，因為那是世俗人的慣常心態。在世俗見解底下，實有另一層次的看法，一種完全不同的世界觀。這層次的心理運作，不會試圖凍結時間、不會試圖執著無休止流逝的經驗(感受)、也不會排斥或忽視它們。這層次的體驗，可超越好與壞、苦與樂，它是一種體會世界的美妙方式，它是一種可以學得到的技巧，雖然並不容易，但可以學得到的。

Happiness and peace. Those are really the prime issues in human existence. That is what all of us are seeking. This often is a bit hard to see because we cover up those basic goals with layers of surface objectives. We want food, we want money, we want sex, possessions and respect. We even say to ourselves that the idea of ‘happiness’ is too abstract: “Look, I am practical. Just give me enough money and I will buy all the happiness I need”. Unfortunately, this is an attitude that does not work. Examine each of these goals and you will find they are superficial. You want food. Why? Because I am hungry. So you are hungry, so what? Well if I eat, I won’t be hungry and then I’ll feel good. Ah ha! Feel good! Now there is a real item. What we really seek is not the surface goals. They are just means to an end. What we are really after is the feeling of relief that comes when the drive is satisfied. Relief, relaxation and an end to the tension. Peace, happiness, no more yearning.

「快樂與安寧」的確是人生兩件大事，所有人都在追求，但我們通常不易察覺，因為，在這根本目標之上，常常覆蓋著許多表層目標。例如：我們需要食物、財富、性欲、娛樂以及別人的尊重等。我們甚至對自己說：「『快樂』的概念太抽象了，看！我很實際，只要有錢，便可買到我想要的快樂。」不幸地，這種態度是行不通的。只要審查一下這些目標，你就會發覺它們都很膚淺。舉例說：你需要食物，為什麼？因為肚子餓了，對！你是真的餓了，那又怎麼樣？嗯！我吃了東西，就不餓了，我會感到舒服。啊哈！感覺舒服！真正重要的東西出現了，我們真正追求的不是那些表層目標，它們不過是為達目的之手段而已，我們想要的，實是本能需要獲得滿足後的那分舒緩感覺── 即緩解、松弛、緊張結束、平靜、快樂──無欲(不再有任何欲望)。

So what is this happiness? For most of us, the perfect happiness would mean getting everything we wanted, being in control of everything, playing Caesar, making the whole world dance a jig according to our every whim. Once again, it does not work that way. Take a look at the people in history who have actually held this ultimate power. These were not happy people. Most assuredly they were not men at peace with themselves. Why? Because they were driven to control the world totally and absolutely and they could not. They wanted to control all men and there remained men who refused to be controlled. They could not control the stars. They still got sick. They still had to die.

那麼，這種快樂是什麼？對大多數人來說，完美的快樂是：萬事如意，要風得風，要雨得雨，唯我獨尊，天下為我一人所支配、役使。同樣，這是行不通的。看看歷史上曾經擁有那麼大權力的人士吧！他們都不是快樂的人。可以肯定，他們的內心並不安寧，為什麼？因為他們想完全、絕對掌控天下一切的欲望並沒有成功，仍然有不少人不受其所控；這些有權勢的人，仍然無法控制天上的繁星，他們仍然會病、仍然會死。

You can’t ever get everything you want. It is impossible. Luckily, there is another option. You can learn to control your mind, to step outside of this endless cycle of desire and aversion. You can learn to not want what you want, to recognize desires but not be controlled by them. This does not mean that you lie down on the road and invite everybody to walk all over you . It means that you continue to live a very normal-looking life, but live from a whole new viewpoint. You do the things that a person must do, but you are free from that obsessive, compulsive drivenness of your own desires. You want something, but you don’t need to chase after it. You fear something, but you don’t need to stand there quaking in your boots. This sort of mental culture is very difficult. It takes years. But trying to control everything is impossible, and the difficult is preferable to the impossible.

你怎麼可以萬事如意呢！那是不可能的。幸運地，你還有另一個選擇：你可以學習控制自心，走出愛與憎的惡性循環。你可以學習不隨心之所欲，認知生起的愛欲而不受其所控制。這並非要你躺下來任人踐踏，它的目的是要你繼續如常生活，但要用一全新的觀點來生活。你做常人會做的事，但不會讓自己再受欲望的迷惑與驅使，作強迫性的反應；你仍需要東西，但不會追逐它們；你仍會有恐懼，但不會顫抖。這類心智培育是很困難的，要多年努力才有成就。但是，試圖控制一切是不可能的，既然如此，選擇做困難而會成功的事，豈不更為明智嗎？

Wait a minute, though. Peace and happiness! Isn’t that what civilization is all about? We build skyscrapers and freeways. We have paid vacations, TV sets. We provide free hospitals and sick leaves, Social Security and welfare benefits. All of that is aimed at providing some measure of peace and happiness. Yet the rate of mental illness climbs steadily, and the crime rates rise faster. The streets are crawling with delinquents and unstable individuals. Stick you arms outside the safety of your own door and somebody is very likely to steal your watch! Something is not working. A happy man does not feel driven to kill. We like to think that our society is exploiting every area of human knowledge in order to achieve peace and happiness.

等一等！快樂與安寧！那不是人類文明所關注的嗎？我們興建摩天大樓與高速公路，我們享受有薪假期與電視機，我們提供免費醫療與病假、社會安全保障制度與社會福利等，一切都是為了提供某程度的安寧與快樂。可是，心理病患的比率正持續攀升，而罪案比率飆升得更快，街上充滿極具侵略性與心態失常的人，若把手伸出自家屋子安全范圍之外，很可能手表即時被人偷去！一定有些地方出了問題，一個快樂的人是不會偷竊的，一個內心安寧的人是不會想殺人的。我們總喜歡一廂情願地以為：我們的社會正全面利用著人類每一領域的知識，為人類謀求快樂與安寧，但事實並非如此。

We are just beginning to realize that we have overdeveloped the material aspect of existence at the expense of the deeper emotional and spiritual aspect, and we are paying the price for that error. It is one thing to talk about degeneration of moral and spiritual fiber in America today, and another thing to do something about it. The place to start is within ourselves. Look carefully inside, truly and objectively, and each of us will see moments when “I am the punk” and “I am the crazy”. We will learn to see those moments, see them clearly, cleanly and without condemnation, and we will be on our way up and out of being so.

至今我們才開始了解：人類物質生活的過度發展，已經深深傷害了內層的感情與靈性，現正因錯誤而自食苦果。談美國今天的道德淪亡與精神素質低落是一回事，做點事去補救又是另一回事。我們應從自己內部做起，仔細向內觀察，如實和客觀地看，大家將不難在瞬間發現：「我原來是一個流氓」，以及「我原來是一個瘋癲的人」。我們將學懂了解自己的行為表現，清楚地、純淨地看到，沒有責備，那麼，我們就可逐漸好轉與擺脫現況了。

You can’t make radical changes in the pattern of your life until you begin to see yourself exactly as you are now. As soon as you do that, changes flow naturally. You don’t have to force or struggle or obey rules dictated to you by some authority. You just change. It is automatic. But arriving at the initial insight is quite a task. You’ve got to see who you are and how you are, without illusion, judgement or resistance of any kind. You’ve got to see your own place in society and your function as a social being. You’ve got to see your duties and obligations to your fellow human beings, and above all, your responsibility to yourself as an individual living with other individuals. And you’ve got to see all of that clearly and as a unit, a single gestalt of interrelationship. It sounds complex, but it often occurs in a single instant. Mental culture through meditation is without rival in helping you achieve this sort of understanding and serene happiness.

除非如實地看清自己的現況，否則，要根本改變自己的生活模式是不可能的。一旦你做得到，改變將會自然流露，不用你強迫、掙扎或遵守某位權威制定的規條。那是自動自發的，你只是改變。不過，要達到此初步領悟亦頗不容易的，你必須在沒有錯覺、判斷與抗拒的前提下，看清楚「你是誰」，以及「你的現況如何」；你要看到自己在社會里的角色與功能；你要看到自己對人類的責任與義務，尤其是要看到，與別人一起生活時對自己的責任。最後，你要清楚地把上述一切看成是一個整體，一個不可分割的、相互關聯的整體。聽起來似很複雜，但事實上，是有可能在瞬間發生的。通過禪修來培育心智，對于幫你達到此等領悟、安祥與快樂，實是無與倫比的。

The Dhammapada is an ancient Buddhist text which anticipated Freud by thousands of years. It says: “What you are now is the result of what you were. What you will be tomorrow will be the result of what you are now. The consequences of an evil mind will follow you like the cart follows the ox that pulls it. The consequences of a purified mind will follow you like you own shadow. No one can do more for you than your own purified mind– no parent, no relative, no friend, no one. A well-disciplined mind brings happiness”.

《法句經(The Dhammapada)》[2]是一部很古老的佛經，它比佛洛依德[3]還早出二千幾年，其中有言：「你現在的情況是你過去所作所為的結果，你未來的情況是你現在所作所為的結果。行惡之心所帶來的惡果，就像牛車的輪緊跟著拉它的牛一樣。行善之心所帶來的善果，也會如影隨形地跟隨著你的。沒有人比自己淨化了的心更能帶給自己福樂！你的父母不能，你的親屬、朋友也不能，沒有任何人可以！一顆訓練良好的心，才可以帶來福樂。」

Meditation is intended to purify the mind. It cleanses the thought process of what can be called psychic irritants, things like greed, hatred and jealousy, things that keep you snarled up in emotional bondage. It brings the mind to a state of tranquility and awareness, a state of concentration and insight.

禪修是用來淨化心意的。它能清理折磨人的內心煩惱，如貪、瞋與嫉妒等，這些煩惱令你處于不斷咆哮的情緒束縛之中。禪修能導致心境安寧與覺醒── 一種定與慧的狀態。

In our society, we are great believers in education. We believe that knowledge makes a cultured person civilized. Civilization, however, polishes the person superficially. Subject our noble and sophisticated gentleman to stresses of war or economic collapse, and see what happens. It is one thing to obey the law because you know the penalties and fear the consequences. It is something else entirely to obey the law because you have cleansed yourself from the greed that would make you steal and the hatred that would make you kill. Throw a stone into a stream. The running water would smooth the surface, but the inner part remains unchanged. Take that same stone and place it in the intense fires of a forge, and the whole stone changes inside and outside. It all melts. Civilization changes man on the outside. Meditation softens him within, through and through.

在人類社會中，我們十分信奉教育，我們相信知識可令人文明起來。可是，文明只能修飾人的表面而已，不信的話，可派遣我們高貴、老練的紳士到有戰爭與經濟崩潰的地方去，然後觀察一下結果，即可得知。因為，知道犯法要受懲罰與害怕後果而守法是一回事，而由于清除了內心可導致偷竊的貪心、以及可導致殺人的瞋心而守法又完全是另一回事。拋一塊石頭到河里，流水會把它的表面磨光，但內部是會保持不變的；若把同一塊石頭丟進熔爐的烈焰之中，石塊從內到外都會改變，它會完全溶化。文明只會改變一個人的外表，而禪修則可把人的內心徹底轉化。

Meditation is called the Great Teacher. It is the cleansing crucible fire that works slowly through understanding. The greater your understanding, the more flexible and tolerant you can be. The greater your understanding, the more compassionate you can be. You become like a perfect parent or an ideal teacher. You are ready to forgive and forget. You feel love towards others because you understand them. And you understand others because you have understood yourself. You have looked deeply inside and seen self illusion and your own human failings. You have seen your own humanity and learned to forgive and to love. When you have learned compassion for yourself, compassion for others is automatic. An accomplished meditator has achieved a profound understanding of life, and he inevitably relates to the world with a deep and uncritical love.

「禪修」被稱為「偉大的老師」，它像清淨內心的煉火，穩健地通過理解起作用，慢慢令心通達諸法實相。理解力越高，你的靈活性與容忍力也會越高；理解力越高，你的慈悲心也會越高；你變得像一位完美的父母或理想的老師，你隨時可以寬恕及忘記，你對眾生充滿慈愛，因為你了解他們；而你了解他們是因為你了解自己，你已深入地看清楚和了解到「自我」的謬誤與自己本身的人性弱點，你已了解自己的人性，並學會寬恕和慈愛別人，當你學會對自己慈悲時，對別人的慈悲自會油然而生。有成就的禪修者已對生命達致甚深的了解，而且不可避免地以一種深入、無私的慈愛與世間一切建立起關系。

Meditation is a lot like cultivating a new land. To make a field out of a forest, fist you have to clear the trees and pull out the stumps. Then you till the soil and you fertilize it. Then you sow your seed and you harvest your crops. To cultivate your mind, first you have to clear out the various irritants that are in the way, pull them right out by the root so that they won’t grow back. Then you fertilize. You pump energy and discipline in the mental soil. Then you sow the seed and you harvest your crops of faith, morality , mindfulness and wisdom.

禪修很像開墾荒地。在樹林中要開辟一塊耕地，首先你要砍倒一些樹木、拔掉剩下來的樹根，然後鋤松土地、施放肥料、散播種子，最後才可收割谷物。同樣，要開墾自心的荒地，首先你要折服那些令你煩惱的障礙樹木，然後根除它們，不讓它們復活，跟著在心田施肥，即是說要持戒精進，之後才可播種和收割你的信、戒(道德)、念力(靜觀力或留意觀察能力)和智慧等谷物。

Faith and morality, by the way, have a special meaning in this context. Buddhism does not advocate faith in the sense of believing something because it is written in a book or attributed to a prophet or taught to you by some authority figure. The meaning here is closer to confidence. It is knowing that something is true because you have seen it work, because you have observed that very thing within yourself. In the same way, morality is not a ritualistic obedience to some exterior, imposed code of behavior.

值得一提的是，信與戒(道德)在這里有一特殊的涵義。佛教不太鼓吹源自書本、先知或導師等權威言論的信(Faith)[4]。在這里，信的意思較接近信任(Confidence)， 一種知之為真的心態，因為你見過它的實際效用，且在自心的觀察中得到驗證。同樣，戒(道德)不是對權威人士所訂定的、強制性的行為準則作儀式上的順從，而是因為你認識到它比自己的行為較為殊勝，從而自動自覺地選擇的一種健康的行為習慣模式。

The purpose of meditation is personal transformation. The you that goes in one side of the meditation experience is not the same you that comes out the other side. It changes your character by a process of sensitization, by making you deeply aware of your own thoughts, word, and deeds. Your arrogance evaporated and your antagonism dries up. Your mind becomes still and calm. And your life smoothes out. Thus meditation properly performed prepares you to meet the ups and down of existence. It reduces your tension, your fear, and your worry. Restlessness recedes and passion moderates. Things begin to fall into place and your life becomes a glide instead of a struggle. All of this happens through understanding.

禪修的目的是個人的自我轉化。經過禪修之後，你會判若兩人。禪修改變你的性格是藉由一連串令你變得更為敏銳、更深入覺知自己思想言行的過程。你的傲慢被蒸發了，敵意也枯竭了，你的內心變得平靜、安寧，你的人生問題也會慢慢消除。因此，做得恰當，禪修可令你面對人生的順境與逆境時有備無患，它助你減少壓力、恐懼與煩憂；不安減退，情欲適度。情況變得井然有序，你常要掙扎的生活變得順暢起來，這一切都是通過悟解而生。

Meditation sharpens your concentration and your thinking power. Then, piece by piece, your own subconscious motives and mechanics become clear to you. Your intuition sharpens. The precision of your thought increases and gradually you come to a direct knowledge of things as they really are, without prejudice and without illusion.

禪修增強你的定力與思考力，然後逐漸讓你清楚地，看到自己潛意識里的動機與詭計；你的直覺力也增強了，思想的精確度也提高了，漸漸地，你會直接如實洞悉事物的現實狀況，沒有偏見，也沒有幻想。

So is this reason enough to bother? Scarcely. These are just promises on paper. There is only one way you will ever know if meditation is worth the effort. Learn to do it right, and do it. See for yourself.

那麼，上述理由足夠令你關注禪修嗎？相信不夠，這不過是紙上談兵而已。只有一個方法能令你確知禪修的價值與效用，那就是：學習正確的方法，然後不斷實踐，親自去體會和了解。

【注釋】

[1] 無意識：也稱潛意識或下意識，是指那些在正常情況下根本不能變為意識的東西，比如，內心深處被壓抑而無從意識到的欲望。正是所謂「冰山理論」：人的意識組成就像一座冰山，露出水面的只是一小部分(意識)，但隱藏在水下的絕大部分(無意識)卻對其余部分產生著影響。佛洛伊德認為無意識具有能動作用，它主動地對人的性格和行為施加壓力和影響。佛洛伊德在探究人的精神領域時運用了決定論的原則，認為事出必有因。看來微不足道的事情，如做夢、口誤和筆誤，都是由大腦中潛在原因決定的，只不過是以一種偽裝的形式表現出來。由此，佛洛伊德提出關于無意識精神狀態的假設，將意識劃分為三個層次：意識，前意識和無意識。

[2] 《法句經(The Dhammapada)》： 這里指南傳佛教的《法句經》，是南傳佛教徒的必讀書。本經集合了很多早期佛經的重要偈語，合共四百二十三首，分二十六章，是了解早期佛教思想的一本重要及入門讀物。要看的話，最好能找一本有注釋的來看。北傳佛教也有傳本，稱《法句譬喻經》，有多個版本，內容也很豐富。

[3] 佛洛依德(Sigmund Freud)： 生卒年份為1856 與1939，奧地利的精神病學家，猶太人。精神分析學的創始人，稱為「維也納第一精神分析學派」，以別于後來由此演變出的第二及第三學派。著作有《夢的解析》、《精神分析引論》等。提出「潛意識」、「自我」、「本我」、「超我」、「伊底帕斯情結」、「性沖動、性欲或性的本能(Libido)」等概念。其成就對哲學、心理學、美學甚至社會學、文學等都有深刻的影響，被世人譽為「精神分析之父」。但他的理論自誕生到如今，卻一直飽受爭議。

[4] 信(Faith)：佛教的「信」包括「信仰」，那是還未有經過自己深入了解和驗證的「信」；也包括「信服」或「信任」，那是有邏輯、事實或親身體驗根據的「信」。佛教鼓勵別人敬信「佛法僧」三寶，因為這樣才能「從聞思修，入戒定慧」，最終達致體證的「確信」。佛陀是反對「盲信」的。例如，在南傳藏經《增支部》的《卡拉瑪經》(AN 3.65)中，佛陀對卡拉瑪人說：「是的，卡拉瑪人啊！你們的懷疑、你們的迷茫是正當的；因為對于一件可疑的事，是應當生起懷疑的。卡拉瑪人啊！你們要注意不可被流言、傳說、及傳統所左右，也不可依據宗教典籍，也不可單靠論理或推測，也不可單看事物的表象，也不可溺好由揣測而得的臆見，也不可因某事物之似有可能而信以為實，也不可作如此想：『他是我們的導師。』卡拉瑪人啊！只有在你自己確知某些事是不善、錯誤、邪惡的時候，你才可以革除它們…… 而當你自己確知某事是善良的、美好的，那時你再信受奉行。」