..续本文上一页the willingness not to act on it. This business of not acting out is called refraining. Traditionally it”s called renunciation. What we renounce or refrain from isn”t food, sex, work or relationships per se. We renounce and refrain from the shenpa. When we talk about refraining from the shenpa, we”re not talking about trying to cast it out; we”re talking about trying to see the shenpa clearly and experiencing it. If we can see shenpa just as we”re starting to close down, when we feel the tightening, there”s the possibility of catching the urge to do the habitual thing, and not doing it.

　　Without meditation practice, this is almost impossible to do. Generally speaking, we don”t catch the tightening until we”ve indulged the urge to scratch our itch in some habitual way. And unless we equate refraining with loving-kindness and friendliness towards ourselves, refraining feels like putting on a straitjacket. We struggle against it. The Tibetan word for renunciation is shenlok, which means turning shenpa upside-down, shaking it up. When we feel the tightening, somehow we have to know how to open up the space without getting hooked into our habitual pattern.

　　In practicing with shenpa, first we try to recognize it. The best place to do this is on the meditation cushion. Sitting practice teaches us how to open and relax to whatever arises, without picking and choosing. It teaches us to experience the uneasiness and the urge fully, and to interrupt the momentum that usually follows. We do this by not following after the thoughts and learning to come back to the present moment. We learn to stay with the uneasiness, the tightening, the itch of shenpa. We train in sitting still with our desire to scratch. This is how we learn to stop the chain reaction of habitual patterns that otherwise will rule our lives. This is how we weaken the patterns that keep us hooked into discomfort that we mistake as comfort. We label the spinoff "thinking" and return to the present moment. Yet even in meditation, we experience shenpa.

　　Let”s say, for example, that in meditation you felt settled and open. Thoughts came and went, but they didn”t hook you. They were like clouds in the sky that dissolved when you acknowledged them. You were able to return to the moment without a sense of struggle. Afterwards, you”re hooked on that very pleasant experience: "I did it right, I got it right. That”s how it should always be, that”s the model." Getting caught like that builds arrogance, and conversely it builds poverty, because your next session is nothing like that. In fact, your "bad" session is even worse now because you”re hooked on the "good" one. You sat there and you were discursive: you were obsessing about something at home, at work. You worried and you fretted; you got caught up in fear or anger. At the end of the session, you feel discouraged—it was "bad," and there”s only you to blame.

　　Is there something inherently wrong or right with either meditation experience

　　 Only the shenpa. The shenpa we feel toward "good" meditation hooks us into how it”s "supposed" to be, and that sets us up for shenpa towards how it”s not "supposed" to be. Yet the meditation is just what it is. We get caught in our idea of it: that”s the shenpa. That stickiness is the root shenpa. We call it ego-clinging or self-absorption. When we”re hooked on the idea of good experience, self-absorption gets stronger; when we”re hooked on the idea of bad experience, self-absorption gets stronger. This is why we, as practitioners, are taught not to judge ourselves, not to get caught in good or bad.

　　What we really need to do is address things just as they are. Learning to recognize shenpa teaches us the meaning of not being attached to this world. Not being attached has nothing to do with this w…

《How We Get Hooked and How We Get Unhooked》全文未完，请进入下页继续阅读…