..续本文上一页na we can see what”s happening with others; we can see when they”ve been hooked. Then we can give the situation some space. One way to do that is by opening up the space on the spot, through meditation. Be quiet and place your mind on your breath. Hold your mind in place with great openness and curiosity toward the other person. Asking a question is another way of creating space around that sticky feeling. So is postponing your discussion to another time.

　　At the abbey, we”re very fortunate that everybody is excited about working with shenpa. So many words I”ve tried using become ammunition that people use against themselves. But we feel some kind of gladness about working with shenpa, perhaps because the word is unfamiliar. We can acknowledge what”s happening with clear seeing, without aiming it at ourselves. Since no one particularly likes to have his shenpa pointed out, people at the Abbey make deals like, "When you see me getting hooked, just pull your earlobe, and if I see you getting hooked, I”ll do the same. Or if you see it in yourself, and I”m not picking up on it, at least give some little sign that maybe this isn”t the time to continue this discussion." This is how we help each other cultivate prajna, clear seeing.

　　We could think of this whole process in terms of four R”s: recognizing the shenpa, refraining from scratching, relaxing into the underlying urge to scratch and then resolving to continue to interrupt our habitual patterns like this for the rest of our lives. What do you do when you don”t do the habitual thing

　　 You”re left with your urge. That”s how you become more in touch with the craving and the wanting to move away. You learn to relax with it. Then you resolve to keep practicing this way.

　　Working with shenpa softens us up. Once we see how we get hooked and how we get swept along by the momentum, there”s no way to be arrogant. The trick is to keep seeing. Don”t let the softening and humility turn into self-denigration. That”s just another hook. Because we”ve been strengthening the whole habituated situation for a long, long time, we can”t expect to undo it overnight. It”s not a one-shot deal. It takes loving-kindness to recognize; it takes practice to refrain; it takes willingness to relax; it takes determination to keep training this way. It helps to remember that we may experience two billion kinds of itches and seven quadrillion types of scratching, but there is really only one root shenpa—ego-clinging. We experience it as tightening and self-absorption. It has degrees of intensity. The branch shenpas are all our different styles of scratching that itch.

　　I recently saw a cartoon of three fish swimming around a hook. One fish is saying to the other, "The secret is non-attachment." That”s a shenpa cartoon: the secret is—don”t bite that hook. If we can catch ourselves at that place where the urge to bite is strong, we can at least get a bigger perspective on what”s happening. As we practice this way, we gain confidence in our own wisdom. It begins to guide us toward the fundamental aspect of our being—spaciousness, warmth and spontaneity.

《How We Get Hooked and How We Get Unhooked》全文阅读结束。