给学校的信，1983年10月15日- 平庸
什么样的能量能使我们脱离庸俗？What we are the world is. In the family, in society, we have made this world with its brutality, cruelty and coarseness, its vulgarity and destruction of each other. We also destroy each other psychologically, exploiting one another for our desires and gratifications. We never seem to realize, unless each one of us undergoes a radical change, that the world will continue as it has for thousands of years, maiming each other, killing each other and despoiling the earth. If our house is not in order we cannot possibly expect society and our relationships to one another to be in order. It is all so obvious that we neglect it. We discard it as being not only simple but too arduous, so we accept things as they are, fall into the habit of acceptance and carry on.
我们是什么样的,世界就是什么样的。在家庭里，在社会上，我们创造了这个世界，以及它的粗俗，残忍，冷酷和低劣，并相互毁灭。同样我们也在心理上相互毁灭，为了自我的欲望和满足而剥削别人。我们仿佛从未意识到，如果我们每个人不经历一种彻底地改变的话，这世界将会延续几千年来的样子，我们彼此残害，相互杀戮并对地球不断地掠夺。如果我们自己的房子里都没有秩序，那么我们就不可能期望社会以及我们与他人的关系是有序的。这是如此的显而易见以至于我们都忽视了它。我们对它弃之不顾，不仅是因为它简单，而且也是因为它太难了，所以我们接受事物现有的样子，陷入了接受的习惯里，并不断地继续下去。
This is the essence of mediocrity. One may have a literary gift, recognised by the few, and work towards popularity; one may be a painter, a poet or a great musician, but in our daily lives we are not concerned with the whole of existence. We may perhaps be adding to the great confusion and misery of man. Each one wants to express his own little talent and be satisfied with it, forgetting or neglecting the whole complexity of man's trouble and sorrow. This again we accept and this has become the normal way of life. We are never an outsider and remain outside. We feel ourselves incapable of remaining outside or are afraid not to be in the current of the commonplace.
这就是平庸的实质。你可能有着文学上的天赋，被少数人所认可，并努力去赢得大众名声；你可能是一个画家，诗人或者是一个伟大的音乐家；但在现实生活里我们从未关心过这个生命的整体。我们可能还是在为人类那巨大混乱和苦难添砖加瓦。每个人都想要展示自己那点小天赋，并对此津津乐道，却忘记了或忽略了人类的困扰和苦难的整个的复杂性。我们只是接受，而这已成为我们常规的生活方式。我们从未作为一个旁观者，并待在圈外；我们感觉我们无法保持旁观，或者害怕离开世俗的洪流。
As parents and educators, we make the family and the school of what we are. Mediocrity really means going only half-way up the mountain and never reaching the top. We want to be like everybody else and of course if we want to be slightly different we keep it carefully hidden. We are not talking of eccentricity: that is another form of self-expression, which is what everyone is doing in his own little way. Eccentricity is tolerated only if you are well-to-do or gifted, but if you are poor and act peculiarly you are snubbed and ignored. But few of us are talented; we are workers carrying on with our particular profession.
作为家长和教育者，我们将家庭和学校弄成我们自己的样子。平庸的意思就是在攀登的过程中半途而废，而从不去达到顶峰。我们想要和其他所有人都一样，或者如果想要略微有所不同的话，也会小心地将它隐藏起来。我们说的不是要标新立异，那是另外一种形式的自我表现，而这正是所有人都在以自己的方式所做的。只有当你是富人或是天才的时候，标新立异才会被容忍，但当你是穷人而行为特异时，那就只会被冷落和忽略。不过，我们当中没有几个天才，我们只是从事着我们特定职业的工作的人。
The world is becoming more and more mediocre. Our education, our occupation, our superficial acceptance of traditional religion are making us mediocre and rather sloppy. We are concerned here with our daily life, not with the expression of talent or some capacity. As educators, which includes parents, can we break away from this plodding, mechanical way of living? Is it the unconscious fear of loneliness that makes us fall into habits: habit of work, habit of thought, the habit of general acceptance of things as they are? We establish a routine for ourselves and live as closely as possible to that habit, so gradually the brain becomes mechanical and this mechanical way of living is mediocrity. The countries that live on established traditions are generally mediocre. So we are asking ourselves in what way can mechanical mediocrity end and not form another pattern which will gradually become mediocre too?
这世界变得越来越平庸。我们的教育，我们的职业，我们对于传统宗教肤浅的接受，使我们变得平庸并且相当的粗糙。这里我们关心的是我们的日常生活，而不是某种天赋或能力的表现。作为教育者，也包括家长，我们是否能打破这种索然无味的，呆板的生活方式呢？
是否是对于孤独的无意识的恐惧使得我们陷入习惯——工作的习惯，思想的习惯，对于既成事实普遍接受的习惯？我们为自己建立一套程式，并使自己活得尽可能地靠近那些习惯，以至于我们的大脑逐渐变得机械。这种机械式的生活方式就是平庸。那些活在既有传统里的国家通常是平庸的。所以我们问自己：怎样才能结束机械式的平庸，并不再形成另一种也会渐渐变得平庸的模式？
The mechanical usage of thought is the issue: not how to step out of mediocrity, but how man has given complete importance to thought. All our activities and aspirations, our relationships and longings, are based on thought. Thought is common to all mankind, whether the highly talented or the villager without any kind of education. Thought is common to all of us. It is neither of the East nor of the West, the lowlands or the highlands. It is not yours or mine. This is important to understand. We have made it personal and hence still further limited the nature of thought. Thought is limited but when we make it our own we make it still shallower. When we see the truth of this there will be no competition between the ideal thought and everyday thought. The ideal has become all-important and not the thought of action. It is this division which breeds conflict, and to accept conflict is mediocre. It is the politicians and the gurus who nourish and sustain this conflict and so mediocrity.
问题的症结在于对思想的机械使用，而不是如何走出平庸，但人们却给了思想无比的重要性。我们所有的行为和志向，我们所有的关系和渴望都基于思想。思想是大家所共有的，无论是那些极具天赋的人还是没受过任何教育的村民。思想是我们大家所共有的，思想不属于东方或是西方，不属于低地或是高地。它不是你的或我的。理解这点是很重要的。
我们将它变得个人化的，因此也进一步限制了思想的品质。思想是有限的，而当我们将它变成我们个人所有时，它就使得它更为肤浅了。当我们看清了这个事实，理想的思想与日常的思想之间的竞争也将不复存在。理想已经成为首要的了，而不是关于行动的想法。正是这种界分滋生了冲突，而对于冲突的接受则是平庸。正是那些政客和古鲁们培养并维系了这种冲突与平庸。
Again we come to the basic issue: what is the response of the teacher and the parent, which includes all of us, to the coming generation? We may perceive the logic and the sanity of what is said in these letters, but the intellectual comprehension of it does not seem to give us the vital energy to propel us out of our mediocrity. What is that energy which will make us move now, not eventually, out of the commonplace? Surely it is not enthusiasm or the sentimental grasp of some vague perception, but an energy that sustains itself under all circumstances. What is that energy which must be independent of all outside influence? This is a serious question each is asking himself: is there such energy, totally free from all causation?
我们再回到这个基本问题：我们这些教师和家长，这包括了我们所有人，对于下一代的回答是什么？我们可能已经认识到这些信里所说的东西的逻辑性和完整性，但理智上的理解看起来并不能给我们走出平庸的力量。那么，什么样的能量才能使我们脱离——是现在，而不是最终——庸俗呢？显然不是基于某种模糊理解的心血来潮，或感情用事，而是一种在任何环境下都能维持自己的能量。那个能量是什么，它必须能独立于任何外在的影响？这是一个每个人都该问自己的严肃的问题。是否有这样一种能量，它是彻底脱离所有的因果关系的？
Now let us examine it together. Dimension has always an end. Thought is the outcome of cause which is knowledge. That which has a dimension has an end. When we say we understand, it generally means an intellectual or verbal comprehension, but comprehending is to perceive sensitively that which is, and that very perception is the withering away of what is. Perception is this attention that is focussing all energy to watch the movement of that which is. This energy of perception has no cause, as intelligence and love have no cause.
现在让我们一起来审视一下它。思想是某个起因的结果，那个起因就是知识。有维度的东西必然有一个结束。当我们说我们懂了的时候，一般都意味着理智上或言语上的理解，而去理解是敏感地去感知那个“实然”，而正是那个感知使得“实然”枯萎凋零。感知就是一种注意，它是集中你所有的能量去观察“实然”的运动。这种感知的能量没有起因，正如智慧和爱没有起因一样。
绿草园翻译工作室
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