..续本文上一页e is no longer straight. You”ve worn it down too much in one spot. There are a lot of things you have to watch out for, simply in the act of sharpening a blade. But if you have that skill in your repertoire, then when the time comes to meditate, it”s easier to relate to what you”re doing: that same kind of consistency, that same evenness of pressure, the continual mindfulness and alertness that are needed to maintain the proper pressure. 佛陀给修定赋予的形象，常常把它比作诸种技能。技能的培养需要时间，他是在教导那些已经花时间学会许多有用技能的人。在泰国，人们仍然用沙石磨刀。怎样在磨刀时不损坏它，是一门需要学习的技能。如果你失去耐心，一味图快，就会破坏刀锋的锐利和平直。因此你必须相当地静止。心必须静止。磨刃时你还必须维持那股恰到好处的压力。起初像是什么也没有发生，然而慢慢地，刀刃就会越来越锋利。你施压的稳定，是保证刀刃不在某个地方缺刻的原因——所谓缺刻就是某处太锐利，另一处又不够锐利。你把某处磨过了头，造成卷口。单单磨刀的动作，就有许多需要注意的地方。不过，如果你的库存当中有那个技能，等到禅定时，就容易对应自己正在做的事，联想到那个技能: 同样的持恒、同样的均匀施压、维持适当的压度所必要的那种连续的念住和警醒。

　　Another skill sometimes used as an analogy is that of a hunter. A hunter has to be very quiet so as not to scare the animals off, and at the same time very alert so as not to miss when a particular animal comes by. In the same way, we as meditators have to be careful not to slip off in either direction: into too much stillness or too much mental activity. You have to find the proper balance. I was once talking to an anthropologist who said that of all the skills in primitive societies that anthropologists try to lean, the hardest is hunting. It requires the strongest concentration, the most sensitivity. So here we”re not hunting animals, but we”re hunting concentration, which is even more subtle and requires even more stillness and alertness. 另一个有时用来比喻修定的技能是狩猎。猎人必须极其静止，才不会把动物吓跑，同时又必须极其警觉，才不会在某个猎物近前时，把它放过。同样地，我们作为禅修者，必须极其仔细，不朝两个方向滑陷: 一个是过度的寂止，一个是过度的心动。你必须找到适当的平衡。有一次，我同一位人类学家交谈，他说，人类学家们尝试学习的原始社会所有技能当中，难度最高的是狩猎。它需要的定力和敏感度最高。因此我们在这里，不是猎兽，我们是在猎定，它更加精细，要求更高的寂止和警醒。

　　Sometimes we in the West think that we come to the Dhamma with an advantage: We”ve got so much education, we”re so well-read. But we have a major disadvantage in that we lack the patience and consistency that come with mastering a skill. So keep that in mind as you”re meditating, when you find yourself getting impatient for results. You have to be watchful and consistent. You need that sense of being bathed by the breath, being open to the breathing sensations in all parts of the body down to every little pore of your skin. Then you learn the sensitivity that”s required, the consistency that”s required, to maintain that. That way the sense of fullness can grow and grow and grow until it becomes really gratifying, really satisfying, to give your concentration the kind of strength, the sense of refreshment, the sense of nourishment it needs in order to keep going. 有时候，我们西方人以为自己是带着优势来学法的: 我们受过这么多教育，我们如此博览。不过，我们有一大劣势，那就是缺乏伴随的一门技能的掌握而带来的耐心与恒心。因此，你修禅定，发现自己为求果报失去耐心时，要记得这一点。你需要那股浴于气中的感觉，那股对全身各处乃至每个皮肤细孔的气感开通的感觉。那时你就学会了必要的敏感、必要的持恒。那样，充沛感才会增长、增长、增长，直到它变得极其享受，极其满足，给你的定赋予继续下去所需要的那股力量、那股清新感、那股滋养感。

　　Ajaan Fuang once said that without this sense of fullness, refreshment, or rapture, your meditation gets dry. You need this lubricant to keep things smooth and running: the sense of well-being and refreshment, the immediate visceral pleasure of being in a concentrated state. 阿姜放曾经说，没有这股充沛、清新、或者说喜乐感，你的禅定就会变得枯燥。你需要这付润滑剂——也就是那股安适、清新之感，那股住于定境的直接、切身的恬愉感——才能保持禅修的平稳与进行。

　　At the same time, it heals all our mental wounds: any sense of tiredness, of being stressed-out, mistreated, abused. It”s like medicine for these mental wounds. Now, medicine often takes time to work, especially soothing and reconstituting medicine. Think of the creams you put on chapped skin. The skin isn”t immediately cured when you first rub on the cream. It takes time. The skin has to be exposed to the cream for long periods of time to allow the cream to do its work. The same with concentration. It”s a treatment that takes time. Your nervous sys…

《浴于气中》全文未完，请进入下页继续阅读…