..續本文上一頁ws them to grow. If you move off to someplace else, if you”re thinking of something else, there will have to be a tensing-up in the body to allow that thought to happen. Whatever sense of fullness might have developed—say, in your arms or your legs, in different parts of the body, down your back—doesn”t have a chance to develop. It gets squeezed off because you”re not paying attention to it any more. 這就是爲什麼，與這些覺受呆在一起的能力如此重要，因爲正是你跟它們呆在一起，才是讓它們增長的原因。如果你挪到了別處，如果你去想其它事，體內必須有一種緊繃，才能那個想法發生。不管已經發展出什麼充沛感——比如在你的胳膊或腿內，在身體的不同部位，沿背而下——就沒有繼續發展的機緣了。它給擠縮了，因爲你對它不再關注。

　　This is why the Buddha talks about concentration as mahaggatam cittam: an enlarged awareness. If your awareness is limited just to one little spot, everything else gets squeezed out, everything else gets blotted out—and what is that if not ignorance

　　 You”re trying to make your awareness 360 degrees, all around in all directions, because the habit of the mind is to focus its awareness in one spot here, then one spot there, moving around, but there”s always the one spot, one spot, one spot. It opens up a little bit and then squeezes off again, opens up a little bit, squeezes off again, and nothing has a chance to grow. But if you allow things to open up throughout the whole body, you realize that if you think about anything at all you destroy that openness. So you”ve got to be very, very careful, very, very still, to allow this open fullness to develop. 這就是爲什麼，佛陀把定說成 mahaggataṃ cittaṃ——大至心——擴大的覺知。如果你的覺知只局限在一個小點上，其它一切都給擠了出去，其它一切都給遮了出去——那不是無明，又是什麼

　　 你在試著使你的覺知達到360度，立體全方位，因爲心的習慣是，把覺知聚焦到這一點，接著聚焦到那一點，但總是只盯那一個點、一個點、一個點。它略略展開，接著又給擠縮，略略展開，又給擠縮，什麼也沒有機緣增長。不過，如果你允許那些東西在全身到處展開，就會意識到，你若是想任何事，就會破壞那股開通性。因此，你不得不極其、極其地仔細，極其、極其地寂止，讓這股開通的充沛繼續展開。

　　So these qualities of consistency, care, and heedfulness are important in allowing this state of concentration to develop. Without them, nothing much seems to happen. You have a little bit of concentration, then you step on it, a little bit of concentration, then you squeeze it off as you go looking at something else, thinking about something else. And so whatever little bits and pieces of concentration you do have, don”t seem very remarkable. They don”t get a chance to be remarkable. Concentration takes time—and our society”s pretty extraordinary in fostering the expectation that things should happen quickly. If anything”s going to be good, it has to happen quickly, it has to be instant. And so, by and large, we”ve lost the ability to stay with things as they develop slowly. We”ve lost the ability to keep chipping away, chipping away, chipping away at a large task that”s going to take time and can”t be speeded up. 因此，爲了讓這個定境展開，持恒、仔細、審慎等這些素質是十分重要的。沒有它們，什麼也不會發生。你有一點定，接著卻踩上它，有一點定，又把它擠掉，因爲你去看別的東西，想別的事。這樣，不管得了什麼細碎的定，它們似乎沒有什麼特別。它們沒有特別起來的機緣。修定是費時的——我們的社會，在鼓勵“事當速成”的期待方面，是超乎尋常的。任何東西，若是好的，則必須速成，必須立得。因此，我們多數人已經失去了對慢慢發展起來的事物不棄不離的跟隨能力。我們已經失去了對一樁耗時長久、不能速成的大型工件，不停地削鑿、 削鑿、 削鑿的能力。

　　When the Buddha gives images for practicing concentration, he often relates them to skills. Skills take time, and he was teaching people who had taken the time to master many useful skills. In Thailand, they still sharpen knives against stones, and it”s a skill you have to learn: how not to ruin the knife as you”re sharpening it. If you get impatient and try to speed things up, you”ll ruin the sharpness, the straightness of the blade. So you have to be very still. The mind has to be still, and you have to maintain just the right amount of pressure constantly as you sharpen the blade. At first it may seem like nothing is happening, but over time the blade does get sharper and sharper. The consistency of your pressure is what guarantees that the blade won”t get worn in one particular spot—too sharp in one spot and not sharp enough in another, too sharp in the sense that the blad…

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