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给学校的信,1979年5月1日 - 欲望和混乱

没有欲望的介入,感觉能否极为活跃?

After all, the school is a place where one learns not only the knowledge required for daily life but also the art of living with all its complexities and subtleties. We seem to forget this and become totally caught up in the superficiality of knowledge. Knowledge is always superficial and learning the art of living is not thought necessary.Living is not considered an art.

学校不仅是你学习日常生活必备知识的地方,你还要在那里学习生活的艺术,包括它所有的复杂性和微妙性。我们似乎忘记了这点,而变得完全沉湎于知识的肤浅中。知识总是肤浅的。我们不认为学习生活的艺术是必要的,我们没有把生活看做一门艺术。

When one leaves school one stops learning and continues to live on that which one has accumulated as knowledge. We never consider that life is a whole process of learning. As one observes life, daily living is a constant change and movement and one's mind is not quick and sensitive enough to follow its subtleties. One comes to it with ready-made reactions and fixations. Can this be prevented in these schools? It does not mean that one must have an open mind. Generally the open mind is like a sieve retaining little or nothing. But a mind that is capable of quick perception and action is necessary. That is why we went into the question of insight with its immediacy of action.Insight does not leave the scar of memory. Generally experience, as it is understood,leaves its residue as memory and from this residue one acts. Thus action strengthens the residue and so action becomes mechanical. Insight is not a mechanistic activity.

当一个人离开学校的时候,他就停止了学习,然后靠他积蓄的知识继续生活。我们从来不认为生活是一个完整的学习过程。当你去观察生活时,你会发现每一天都在不断的变化和运动,而你的心却没有足够的迅速和敏锐来跟随它的微妙之处。你用陈旧的反应和执着来面对它。在这些学校里,这种情况能够被防止吗?这不意味着你必须拥有一颗开放的心。一般说来,开放的心就象漏勺一样留不住什么。真正需要的是一颗能够迅速感知与行动的心。这就是我们讨论“洞见和它带来的立即行动”这个主题的原因。洞见不会留下记忆的伤痕。按照通常的理解,经验留下它的痕迹而成为记忆,人就是从这个记忆来行动的。行动强化了这个记忆,因而变得机械。洞见不是一种机械的活动。

So can it be taught in the school that daily life is a constant process of learning and action in relationship without strengthening the residue which is memory? With most of us the scar becomes all-important and we lose the swift current of life.

在学校里,能不能不去强化这个记忆,而是教导学生,日常生活是一个在关系中不断学习和行动的过程?对我们大多数人来说,记忆的伤痕变得非常重要,因而我们失去了对生活的迅速反应。

     Both the student and the educator live in a state of confusion and disorder, both outwardly and inwardly. One may not be aware of this fact and if one is, one quickly puts order into outward things but one is rarely aware of inner confusion and disorder.

学生和教师都生活在一种困惑和混乱的状态中,无论外表还是内心。你可能没有意识到这个事实。当你意识到的时候,你会迅速地把外在的事情秩序化,但是你很少意识到内在的困惑和混乱。

     God is disorder. Consider the innumerable gods man has invented, or the one god, the one saviour, and observe the confusion this has created in the world, the wars it has brought about, the innumerable divisions, the separating beliefs, symbols and images. Isn't this confusion and disorder? We have become accustomed to this, we accept it readily, for our life is so wearisome with boredom and pain that we seek comfort in the gods that thought has conjured up. This has been our way of life for thousands of years. Every civilization has invented gods and they have been the source of great tyranny, wars and destruction. Their buildings may be extraordinarily beautiful but inside there is darkness and the source of confusion.

神就是混乱。想一想人类发明的数不清的神,或者惟一的上帝,惟一的救主,观察这在世界上制造的困惑,它带来了战争、无数的分歧、不断分裂的信仰、符号和形象。这些不就是困惑和混乱吗?我们对此已经习以为常,我们欣然接受它,因为生活中的无聊和痛苦是如此的令人厌烦,以至于我们在思想制造的神明中寻找安慰。这就是我们数千年来的生活方式。每一种文明都发明了神,它们成为巨大的暴虐、战争和破坏的源头。他们的建筑或许极为美丽,但内在却是黑暗的,是混乱的根源。

     Can one put aside these gods? One must if one is to consider why the human mind accepts and lives in disorder politically, religiously and economically. What is the source of this disorder, the actuality of it, not the theological reason? Can one put aside the concepts of disorder and be free to enquire into the actual daily source of our disorder, not into what order is but disorder? We can only find out what is absolute order when we have thoroughly investigated disorder and its source. We are so eager to find out what order is, so impatient with disorder that we are apt to suppress it, thinking thereby to bring about order. Here we are not only asking if there can be absolute order in our daily life but also whether this confusion can end. So our first concern is with disorder and what is its source. Is it thought? Is it contradictory desires? Is it fear and the search for security? Is it the constant demand for pleasure? Is thought one of the sources or the main reason for the disorder?

你能把这些神抛到一边吗?如果你关心为什么人类的心灵会认同政治的、宗教的和经济的混乱并生活在其中,你就必须抛开它们。这些混乱的根源是什么,实际的而非神学上的原因?你能否撇开混乱这个概念,自由地去探索导致混乱的每日的实际根源?不是探索什么是秩序,而是混乱。只有在彻底检查了混乱和它的根源时,我们才能发现什么是绝对的秩序。我们是如此地渴望发现什么是秩序,对于混乱却如此不耐烦,以至于总是倾向于压制它,认为由此能带来秩序。这里,我们不只在问我们的日常生活中有没有可能存在绝对的秩序,还包括困惑是否能够结束。因此我们首先关心混乱和它的根源。它是思想吗?它是矛盾的欲望吗?它是恐惧和对安全的寻求吗?它是对快感的持续要求吗?思想是混乱的根源之一或主要原因吗?

It is not merely the writer but you who are asking these questions, so please bear this in mind all the time. You must discover the source, not be told the source and then verbally repeat.

不只是作者,你也要问这些问题,请一直记住这一点。你必须发现那个根源,而不是由别人告诉你,然后你去重复。

     Thought, as we have pointed out, is finite, limited, and whatever is limited, however wide its activities may be, inevitably brings confusion. That which is limited is divisive and therefore destructive and confusing. We have gone sufficiently into the nature and structure of thought, and to have an insight into the nature of thought is to give it its right place and so it loses its overpowering domination.

正如我们指出过的,思想是有限的。而任何有限的东西,无论它的活动多么广泛,都必然会带来困惑。有限的东西会导致分裂,因而是破坏性的和导致混乱的。我们充分探讨过思想的本质和结构。领悟思想的本质,就是让它回到正确的位置,这样它就会失去压倒性的控制力。

     Is desire and the changing objects of desire one of the causes of our disorder? To suppress desire is to suppress all sensation - which is to paralyse the mind. We think this is the easy and quickest way to end desire but one cannot suppress it; it is much too strong, much too subtle. You cannot grasp it in your hand and twist it according to your wish - which is another desire. We have talked about desire in a previous letter.Desire can never be suppressed or transmuted or corrupted by the right and wrong desire. It remains always sensation and desire, whatever you do about it. Desire for enlightenment and desire for money are the same, though the objects vary.

欲望及其不断变化的目标是不是我们混乱的原因之一?压抑欲望就是压抑所有的感觉,那会使心灵麻痹。我们认为这是迅速和容易地结束欲望的方法,但是你无法压抑它。它太强大,太微妙了。你无法将它抓在手里,按照你的愿望扭曲它——那是另一个欲望。我们在以前的一封信中讨论过欲望。欲望永远不能被作为正确的或错误的来进行压抑、转化或破坏。不管你对它做什么,它依然还是感觉和欲望。对觉悟的欲望和对金钱的欲望是相同的,尽管对象不同。

Can one live without desire? Or to put it differently, can the senses be supremely active without desire coming into it. There are sensory activities both psychological and physical. The body seeks warmth, food, sex; there is physical pain and so on. These sensations are natural but when they enter into the psychological field, the trouble begins. And therein lies our confusion. This is important to understand, especially when we are young. To observe the physical sensations without suppression or exaggeration and to be alert, watchful that they do not seep into the psychological inner realm where they don't belong - therein lies our difficulty. The whole process happens so quickly because we do not see this, have not understood it, have never really examined what actually takes place. There is immediate sensory response to challenge. This response is natural and is not under the domination of thought, of desire. Our difficulty begins when these sensory responses enter into the psychological realm. The challenge may be a woman or man or something pleasant, appetizing; or a lovely garden. The response to this is sensation and when this sensation enters the psychological field desire begins and thought with its images seeks the fulfilment of desire.

你能没有欲望地生活吗?或者换个说法,在没有欲望介入的情况下,感觉能否极为活跃?有两种感觉上的活动,心理上的和生理上的。身体寻求温暖、食物、性,还有身体上的疼痛,等等。这些感觉是自然的,但是当他们进入心理的领域,麻烦就来了。那里是我们困惑的地方。理解这一点是很重要的,尤其是当我们年轻的时候。去观察身体的感受,不要压抑或夸大它;保持警觉,留意它们不要进入内心的领域,它们不属于那里。
那对我们来说是困难的,整个过程的发生太迅速了,因为我们不去看这些,没有理解它,从来没有真正地检查过实际在发生什么。面对挑战有一种立即的感觉反应。这种反应是自然的,不在思想和欲望的控制之下。当这种感觉反应进入心理层面的时候,我们的麻烦就开始了。这个挑战可能是一个女人或男人,或者某种舒适、可口的东西,或者是一个美丽的花园。对这些的反应是感觉,当这种感觉进入心理领域时,欲望就开始了,思想则带着它的形象寻求对欲望的满足。

     Our question is how to prevent the natural physical responses from entering into the psychological? Is this possible? It is possible only when you observe the nature of the challenge with great attention and watch carefully responses. This total attention will prevent the physical responses entering into the inward psyche.

我们的问题是,如何防止自然的身体反应进入心理层面。这可能吗?只有当你以巨大的专注去观察这个挑战的本质,并仔细注视你的反应的时候,它才是可能的。这种完全的专注将阻止身体反应进入内心深处。

     We are concerned with desire and the understanding of it, not the brutalizing factor of suppressing, avoiding or sublimating. You cannot live without desire. When you are hungry you need food. But to understand, which is to investigate the whole activity of desire, is to give it its right place.Thus it will not be a source of disorder in our daily life.

我们关注的是欲望以及对它的理解,而不是压抑、逃避或理想化这些欲望的残酷方式。没有欲望你无法生活,当你饿的时候你需要食物。而理解就是去审视欲望的整个活动,就是给予它适当的位置。那样它就不会成为我们日常生活中混乱的根源。

                                                       绿草园翻译工作室

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