神马文学网译言网 | 当下的艺术：6步活在当下
来源：百度文库 编辑：神马文学网 时间：2024/04/29 22:34:52
我们生活在一个注意力分散的时代。但是生活中最明显的似非而是的说法之一是：你最光明的未来依赖于你专注于现在的能力。
By Jay Dixit
作者：Jay Dixit（杰伊·迪克西特）
A friend was walking in the desert when he found the telephone to God. The setting was Burning Man, an electronic arts and music festival for which 50,000 people descend on Black Rock City, Nevada, for eight days of "radical self-expression"—dancing, socializing, meditating, and debauchery.
一个朋友正行走在沙漠中时，发现了通向上帝的电话。这个情形的背景是烧人节（Burning Man），一个电子艺术和音乐的节日，50,000人涌入内华达州黑岩市（Black Rock City, Nevada），以“激进的自我表现”的方式度过8天——跳舞、社交、冥想和纵情声色。
A phone booth in the middle of the desert with a sign that said "Talk to God" was a surreal sight even at Burning Man. The idea was that you picked up the phone, and God—or someone claiming to be God—would be at the other end to ease your pain.
在沙漠中间有一个电话亭，上面有一标牌写着“与上帝通话”，即使是在烧人节上，这也是一道超现实主义的风景。这个构想是你拎起电话，上帝——或声称是上帝的某个人——会在另一头减轻你的痛苦。
So when God came on the line asking how he could help, my friend was ready. "How can I live more in the moment?" he asked. Too often, he felt, the beautiful moments of his life were drowned out by a cacophony of self-consciousness and anxiety. What could he do to hush the buzzing of his mind?
所以当上帝接通电话问他能帮到什么时，我的朋友已准备好了。“我如何能更多地生活在当下时刻？”他问。他时常感到生活中的美好时刻被自我意识和焦虑的杂音淹没。怎么做才能使他脑海中的嗡嗡声安静下来？
"Breathe," replied a soothing male voice.
“呼吸，”一个使人镇静的男声回答道。
My friend flinched at the tired new-age mantra, then reminded himself to keep an open mind. When God talks, you listen.
对这个老套的新时代咒语，我朋友退缩了，然后他提醒自己要保持一个开放的心态。当上帝说话时，你听。
"Whenever you feel anxious about your future or your past, just breathe," continued God. "Try it with me a few times right now. Breathe in... breathe out." And despite himself, my friend began to relax.
“每当你对自己的未来或过去感到焦虑时，只要呼吸，”上帝继续说。“现在试着和我一起做几次。吸入...呼出。”我朋友不由自主地开始放松了。
You Are Not Your Thoughts
你不是你脑海里的念头
Life unfolds in the present. But so often, we let the present slip away, allowing time to rush past unobserved and unseized, and squandering the precious seconds of our lives as we worry about the future and ruminate about what's past. "We're living in a world that contributes in a major way to mental fragmentation, disintegration, distraction, decoherence," says Buddhist scholar B. Alan Wallace. We're always doing something, and we allow little time to practice stillness and calm.
生活在当下展开，但我们常常让当下溜走。不经意间没有抓住时间，让它匆匆流过；在我们担忧将来和反思过去时浪费我们生命中宝贵的分分秒秒。“我们生活在一个大幅度地促成精神分裂、瓦解、分散和脱散的世界，”佛教学者B·艾伦·华莱士（B. Alan Wallace）说。我们总是在做一些事情，很少留出时间来实行静止和平静。
When we're at work, we fantasize about being on vacation; on vacation, we worry about the work piling up on our desks. We dwell on intrusive memories of the past or fret about what may or may not happen in the future. We don't appreciate the living present because our "monkey minds," as Buddhists call them, vault from thought to thought like monkeys swinging from tree to tree.
我们工作时幻想着在度假；度假时，我们担心堆积在办公桌上的工作。我们的注意力集中在闯进来的对过去的记忆或者为将来可能会或可能不会发生的事而烦恼。我们不重视当前的生活，因为我们的如佛教徒所称的“猿猴心”，像猴子从一棵树荡到另一棵树一样，从一个念头跳到另一个念头。
Most of us don't undertake our thoughts in awareness. Rather, our thoughts control us. "Ordinary thoughts course through our mind like a deafening waterfall," writes Jon Kabat-Zinn, the biomedical scientist who introduced meditation into mainstream medicine. In order to feel more in control of our minds and our lives, to find the sense of balance that eludes us, we need to step out of this current, to pause, and, as Kabat-Zinn puts it, to "rest in stillness—to stop doing and focus on just being."
我们大多数人不是有意识地开始我们的念头。相反地，我们的念头控制我们。把冥想引入主流医学的生物医学科学家乔·卡巴金（Jon Kabat-Zinn）写道：“平常的念头犹如一道震耳欲聋的瀑布奔流过我们的脑海。”为了感到我们的心智和生活更多地处于控制之中，找到躲离我们的平衡感，我们需要迈出这股洪流、暂停下来，并且如卡巴金所说，“保持静止状态——停止做并且只集中于存在。”
We need to live more in the moment. Living in the moment—also called mindfulness—is a state of active, open, intentional attention on the present. When you become mindful, you realize that you are not your thoughts; you become an observer of your thoughts from moment to moment without judging them. Mindfulness involves being with your thoughts as they are, neither grasping at them nor pushing them away. Instead of letting your life go by without living it, you awaken to experience.
我们需要更多地活在当下。活在当下——也叫正念——是一种对当下时刻积极的、开放的、有意的关注状态。当你变得正念时，你认识到你不是你的念头；你每时每刻都变成了你的念头的观察者，并且对它们不予评判。正念包括让念头保持原来的状态，既不想抓住它们也不把它们推开。不要让生命流逝而没有活过，你要苏醒过来去体验。
Cultivating a nonjudgmental awareness of the present bestows a host of benefits. Mindfulness reduces stress, boosts immune functioning, reduces chronic pain, lowers blood pressure, and helps patients cope with cancer. By alleviating stress, spending a few minutes a day actively focusing on living in the moment reduces the risk of heart disease. Mindfulness may even slow the progression of HIV.
培养对当下不予评判的意识带来很多好处。正念减轻压力、增强免疫机能、减少慢性疼痛、降低血压，并帮助病人对抗癌症。通过减轻压力、每天花几分钟时间积极地专注于活在当下减少罹患心脏病的风险。正念甚至可以减缓艾滋病毒的进展。
Mindful people are happier, more exuberant, more empathetic, and more secure. They have higher self-esteem and are more accepting of their own weaknesses. Anchoring awareness in the here and now reduces the kinds of impulsivity and reactivity that underlie depression, binge eating, and attention problems. Mindful people can hear negative feedback without feeling threatened. They fight less with their romantic partners and are more accommodating and less defensive. As a result, mindful couples have more satisfying relationships.
正念的人更幸福、更愉悦、更善解人意、更无忧无虑。他们有更高尚的自尊，并且更能接受自己的弱点。把意识锚定在此时此地减少种种引起沮丧、暴饮暴食和注意力问题的冲动和反应。正念的人可以听到负面的回馈而不感到遭受威胁。他们不怎么与自己的情侣冲突，更随和而且不大处于防御状态。结果是，正念的夫妇有更令人满意的婚姻关系。
Mindfulness is at the root of Buddhism, Taoism, and many Native-American traditions, not to mention yoga. It's why Thoreau went to Walden Pond; it's what Emerson and Whitman wrote about in their essays and poems.
正念是佛教、道教和许多美洲原住民的教义的根本，更别说瑜伽了。这就是为什么梭罗（Thoreau）去瓦尔登湖；这就是爱默生（Emerson）和惠特曼（Whitman）在他们的论文和诗里所写的。
"Everyone agrees it's important to live in the moment, but the problem is how," says Ellen Langer, a psychologist at Harvard and author of Mindfulness. "When people are not in the moment, they're not there to know that they're not there." Overriding the distraction reflex and awakening to the present takes intentionality and practice.
“每个人都同意活在当下很重要，但问题是怎么做，”哈佛大学的心理学家及《正念》（Mindfulness）一书的作者埃伦·兰格（Ellen Langer）说。“当人们不在当下时，他们还没有达到明白自己不在当下的地步。”克服分心的本能反应并觉醒到当下要有意向并练习。
Living in the moment involves a profound paradox: You can't pursue it for its benefits. That's because the expectation of reward launches a future-oriented mindset, which subverts the entire process. Instead, you just have to trust that the rewards will come. There are many paths to mindfulness—and at the core of each is a paradox. Ironically, letting go of what you want is the only way to get it. Here are a few tricks to help you along.
活在当下包含一个深奥的似非而是的论点：你不能为了它的好处而追求它。那是因为对回报的期望开启了一个以未来为导向的心态，这搅乱了整个过程。反之，你只须相信回报会来的。有很多条路通向正念——每一条的核心都是一个似非而是的论点。讽刺的是，放开你想要的是得到它的唯一方法。这里有几个诀窍助你前行。
1: To improve your performance, stop thinking about it (unselfconsciousness).
1. 改进你的表现，停止思考（非自我意识）
I've never felt comfortable on a dance floor. My movements feel awkward. I feel like people are judging me. I never know what to do with my arms. I want to let go, but I can't, because I know I look ridiculous.
我从未在舞池里感到轻松过。我的动作显得笨拙，我感到人们在评判我，我从不知道我的手臂该怎么做。我想放开，但我不能，因为我知道自己看起来很可笑。
"Loosen up, no one's watching you," people always say. "Everyone's too busy worrying about themselves." So how come they always make fun of my dancing the next day?
“放松，没人在看你，”人们总是说。“每个人都在忙着担忧自己呢。”那为什么第二天他们总是取笑我的舞蹈？
The dance world has a term for people like me: "absolute beginner." Which is why my dance teacher, Jessica Hayden, the owner of Shockra Studio in Manhattan, started at the beginning, sitting me down on a bench and having me tap my feet to the beat as Jay-Z thumped away in the background. We spent the rest of the class doing "isolations"—moving just our shoulders, ribs, or hips—to build "body awareness."
舞蹈界对像我这样的人有一个术语：“完全初学者。”这就是为什么我的舞蹈老师、位于曼哈顿的肖克拉舞蹈室（Shockra Studio）的所有者杰西卡·海登（Jessica Hayden）在开始时叫我坐在长椅上，当杰斯（Jay-Z）在背景音乐中有节奏地跳动之时，让我合着节拍轻轻地踏着脚。这节课余下的时间里我们做“分解动作”——只动我们的肩膀、肋骨或臀部——以建立“身体意识”。
But even more important than body awareness, Hayden said, was present-moment awareness. "Be right here right now!" she'd say. "Just let go and let yourself be in the moment."
但是海登说，比身体意识更重要的是当下时刻的意识。“就在此时此地！”她会说。“只是放开并让自己处在当下时刻。”
That's the first paradox of living in the moment: Thinking too hard about what you're doing actually makes you do worse. If you're in a situation that makes you anxious—giving a speech, introducing yourself to a stranger, dancing—focusing on your anxiety tends to heighten it. "When I say, 'be here with me now,' I mean don't zone out or get too in-your-head—instead, follow my energy, my movements," says Hayden. "Focus less on what's going on in your mind and more on what's going on in the room, less on your mental chatter and more on yourself as part of something." To be most myself, I needed to focus on things outside myself, like the music or the people around me.
这是活在当下的第一个似非而是的论点：过多地考虑你正在做的事实际上使你做得更差。如果你处在一个使你焦虑不安的情形中——发表演讲、向陌生人介绍自己、跳舞——集中注意力在你的焦虑上往往使你更加焦虑。“当我说‘现在跟我一起来’时，我的意思是不要走神或脑子里想太多——而不是仿效我的活力、我的动作，”海登说。“少关注你的头脑里在进行着什么，多关注房间里正在进行着什么；少关注你脑子里喋喋不休的谈话，多关注作为某些事物一部分的你自己的本身。”为最大程度地做我自己，我需要关注我自身以外的事，像音乐或我周围的人。
Indeed, mindfulness blurs the line between self and other, explains Michael Kernis, a psychologist at the University of Georgia. "When people are mindful, they're more likely to experience themselves as part of humanity, as part of a greater universe." That's why highly mindful people such as Buddhist monks talk about being "one with everything."
乔治亚大学的心理学家迈克尔·克尼斯（Michael Kernis）解释说，事实上正念模糊了自我和他人之间的界线。“当人们处在正念状态时，他们更可能把自己当作人类的一部分、更广阔的宇宙的一部分来体验。”这就是为什么高度正念的人，如佛教僧侣，谈论“与万物合一”。
By reducing self-consciousness, mindfulness allows you to witness the passing drama of feelings, social pressures, even of being esteemed or disparaged by others without taking their evaluations personally, explain Richard Ryan and K. W. Brown of the University of Rochester. When you focus on your immediate experience without attaching it to your self-esteem, unpleasant events like social rejection—or your so-called friends making fun of your dancing—seem less threatening.
罗彻斯特大学的理查德·瑞安（Richard Ryan）和K·W·布朗（K. W. Brown）解释说，通过减少自我意识，正念使你能够观察心情上短暂的戏剧性变化、社交压力、甚至被他人不以个人态度评价而受到尊重或贬损。当你把注意力集中在你目前的体验上，而不把它与你的自尊相联系，不愉快的如社会排斥之类的事件——或者你所谓的朋友取笑你的舞蹈——似乎不那么具有威胁性。
Focusing on the present moment also forces you to stop overthinking. "Being present-minded takes away some of that self-evaluation and getting lost in your mind—and in the mind is where we make the evaluations that beat us up," says Stephen Schueller, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania. Instead of getting stuck in your head and worrying, you can let yourself go.
关注当下时刻同样也促使你停止想得过多。宾夕法尼亚大学的心理学家斯蒂芬·舒尔勒（Stephen Schueller）说：“当下意识强减少一些那种自我评价以及迷失在头脑里——头脑是我们做出把自己打败的评价的地方。”不要困在自己的头脑里担忧，你可以使自己放开。
2: To avoid worrying about the future, focus on the present (savoring).
2. 远离对未来的担忧，关注当下（品味）
In her memoir Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert writes about a friend who, whenever she sees a beautiful place, exclaims in a near panic, "It's so beautiful here! I want to come back here someday!" "It takes all my persuasive powers," writes Gilbert, "to try to convince her that she is already here.”
伊丽莎白·吉尔伯特（Elizabeth Gilbert）在她的自传《吃，祈祷和爱》（Eat, Pray, Love）里写到一个朋友，无论何时她看到一个美丽的地方，都要近乎恐慌地大喊：“这里这么美！有一天我要回到这里来！”“用了我所有的说服力，”吉尔伯特写道，“试图使她确信她已经在这里了。”
Often, we're so trapped in thoughts of the future or the past that we forget to experience, let alone enjoy, what's happening right now. We sip coffee and think, "This is not as good as what I had last week." We eat a cookie and think, "I hope I don't run out of cookies."
我们常常过于陷入对未来或过去的思绪，以致于忘记体验，更别说享受当前发生的事。我们小口喝着咖啡想：“这不如我上星期喝的好。”我们吃着一块饼干想：“我希望饼干不要吃光了。”
Instead, relish or luxuriate in whatever you're doing at the present moment—what psychologists call savoring. "This could be while you're eating a pastry, taking a shower, or basking in the sun. You could be savoring a success or savoring music," explains Sonja Lyubomirsky, a psychologist at the University of California at Riverside and author of The How of Happiness. "Usually it involves your senses."
取而代之的是，欣赏或纵情享受你在当下时刻所做的任何事——心理学家称之为品味。“这可能发生在你吃一块糕点、淋浴或晒太阳的时候。你可以品味一个成功或品味音乐，”加州大学滨河分校的心理学家及《幸福的方法》（The How of Happiness）一书的作者索尼娅·柳博米尔斯基（Sonja Lyubomirsky）解释道。“通常这涉及到你的感觉。”
When subjects in a study took a few minutes each day to actively savor something they usually hurried through—eating a meal, drinking a cup of tea, walking to the bus—they began experiencing more joy, happiness, and other positive emotions, and fewer depressive symptoms, Schueller found.
舒尔勒发现，当一项研究中的研究对象每天花几分钟时间积极品味某些他们通常匆匆做完的事——吃一餐饭、喝一杯茶、走向公共汽车——他们开始体验更多的快乐、幸福和其他积极的情绪，而少有郁闷的症状。
Why does living in the moment make people happier—not just at the moment they're tasting molten chocolate pooling on their tongue, but lastingly? Because most negative thoughts concern the past or the future. As Mark Twain said, "I have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened." The hallmark of depression and anxiety is catastrophizing—worrying about something that hasn't happened yet and might not happen at all. Worry, by its very nature, means thinking about the future—and if you hoist yourself into awareness of the present moment, worrying melts away.
为什么活在当下使人们更幸福——他们不仅在当下时刻品尝积聚在他们舌头上的溶化的巧克力，而且还回味无穷？因为大多负面的思想关系到过去或未来。如马克·吐温（Mark Twain）所说：“我知道很多烦恼，但它们大多从未发生过。”沮丧和焦虑的特点是灾难化——担心某些还未发生的和根本不可能发生的事。担心，由于其本身的性质，意味着考虑未来——如果你把自己提升到当下时刻的意识里，担心就化为乌有了。
The flip side of worrying is ruminating, thinking bleakly about events in the past. And again, if you press your focus into the now, rumination ceases. Savoring forces you into the present, so you can't worry about things that aren't there.
担心的另一面是反思，无望地想过去的事。再一次，如果你竭力将自己的注意力放在当下，反思就停止了。品味促使你进入当下，因此你不会担心不存在的事。
3: If you want a future with your significant other, inhabit the present (breathe).
3. 如果你想与你的另一半有一个未来，处于当下（呼吸）
Living consciously with alert interest has a powerful effect on interpersonal life. Mindfulness actually inoculates people against aggressive impulses, say Whitney Heppner and Michael Kernis of the University of Georgia. In a study they conducted, each subject was told that other subjects were forming a group—and taking a vote on whether she could join. Five minutes later, the experimenter announced the results—either the subject had gotten the least number of votes and been rejected or she'd been accepted. Beforehand, half the subjects had undergone a mindfulness exercise in which each slowly ate a raisin, savoring its taste and texture and focusing on each sensation.
带着敏捷的好奇心有意识地生活对人际生活有强大的影响。乔治亚大学的惠特尼·赫普纳（Whitney Heppner）和迈克尔·克尼斯说，正念实际上是给人们注射预防好斗的冲动的疫苗。在他们进行的一项研究中，每一个研究对象都被告知其他研究对象正组成一个团体——并且正在投票决定她是否能加入。5分钟后，研究者宣布结果——研究对象要么得到最少的票数并被拒绝要么被接受。一半的研究对象预先经过了一项正念训练，在这项正念训练里每个人都慢慢地吃一粒葡萄干，品味它的味道和质感，把注意力集中在每一个感觉上。
Later, in what they thought was a separate experiment, subjects had the opportunity to deliver a painful blast of noise to another person. Among subjects who hadn't eaten the raisin, those who were told they'd been rejected by the group became aggressive, inflicting long and painful sonic blasts without provocation. Stung by social rejection, they took it out on other people.
稍后，在他们认为是一个独立分开的试验里，研究对象有机会向其他人爆发一通痛苦的大喊大叫。在没有吃葡萄干的研究对象里，那些被告知被团体拒绝了的人在没有受到刺激的情况下变得好斗，造成持续时间长而痛苦的快速爆发。他们遭到社会排斥而感到痛苦，就拿其他人出气。
But among those who'd eaten the raisin first, it didn't matter whether they'd been ostracized or embraced. Either way, they were serene and unwilling to inflict pain on others—exactly like those who were given word of social acceptance.
但是在那些先吃了葡萄干的人中间，他们是受到排斥或受到欢迎都没关系。在任一种情况下，他们都很平静，不愿对他人造成痛苦——完全像那些收到通知被社会接受的人。
How does being in the moment make you less aggressive? "Mindfulness decreases ego involvement," explains Kernis. "So people are less likely to link their self-esteem to events and more likely to take things at face value." Mindfulness also makes people feel more connected to other people—that empathic feeling of being "at one with the universe."
处于当下时刻如何使你更少地具有侵略性？“正念减少自我牵连，”克尼斯解释道。“所以人们不太可能把他们的自尊与事件联系起来，而是更可能以表面现象接受事物。”正念也使人们感到与他人关系更密切——那种“与宇宙合一”的心意相通的感觉。
Mindfulness boosts your awareness of how you interpret and react to what's happening in your mind. It increases the gap between emotional impulse and action, allowing you to do what Buddhists call recognizing the spark before the flame. Focusing on the present reboots your mind so you can respond thoughtfully rather than automatically. Instead of lashing out in anger, backing down in fear, or mindlessly indulging a passing craving, you get the opportunity to say to yourself, "This is the emotion I'm feeling. How should I respond?"
正念增强你如何解释你头脑里发生的事并做出反应的意识。它加大情感冲动与行动之间的差距，可以使你去做佛教徒所说的在烈焰燃烧前先认出火星。关注当下重新启动你的心智，因而你能够考虑周到地作出反应而不是机械地反应。不是愤怒地猛烈抨击、恐惧地让步或盲目地纵容一个一闪而过的欲望，反之你有机会对自己说：“这是我正在感觉到的情绪，我该如何回应？”
Mindfulness increases self-control; since you're not getting thrown by threats to your self-esteem, you're better able to regulate your behavior. That's the other irony: Inhabiting your own mind more fully has a powerful effect on your interactions with others.
正念增加自我控制；既然你不受对自尊的威胁困扰，你能更好地控制自己的行为。这是另一件具有讽刺意味的事：更加完全地处于自己的心智之中对你与他人打交道有巨大的影响。
Of course, during a flare-up with your significant other it's rarely practical to duck out and savor a raisin. But there's a simple exercise you can do anywhere, anytime to induce mindfulness: Breathe. As it turns out, the advice my friend got in the desert was spot-on. There's no better way to bring yourself into the present moment than to focus on your breathing. Because you're placing your awareness on what's happening right now, you propel yourself powerfully into the present moment. For many, focusing on the breath is the preferred method of orienting themselves to the now—not because the breath has some magical property, but because it's always there with you.
当然，在与你的另一半大发雷霆时，避开去品味一粒葡萄干是很不实际的。但有一个你随时随地都能做的简单练习来激发正念：呼吸。如结果所示，我朋友在沙漠里得来的建议是正确的。没有比关注你的呼吸更好的方法来把你自己带到当下时刻。因为你把意识放在当前正发生的事上，你把自己有力地推进当下时刻。对很多人来说，关注呼吸是使自己集中于当下的首选方法——不是因为呼吸有某种神秘的特性，而是因为它总是与你相随相伴。
4: To make the most of time, lose track of it (flow).
4. 充分利用时间，忘记时间（心流）
Perhaps the most complete way of living in the moment is the state of total absorption psychologists call flow. Flow occurs when you're so engrossed in a task that you lose track of everything else around you. Flow embodies an apparent paradox: How can you be living in the moment if you're not even aware of the moment? The depth of engagement absorbs you powerfully, keeping attention so focused that distractions cannot penetrate. You focus so intensely on what you're doing that you're unaware of the passage of time. Hours can pass without you noticing.
可能活在当下最完整的方法是心理学家称之为心流的全身心投入的状态。心流出现在你全神贯注于一项工作因而忘了周围其他的一切时。心流具体表达了一个显而易见的自相矛盾的论点：如果你连当下时刻都没意识到，你还怎么能生活在当下？全神贯注的程度之深有力地占据了你的全部注意力，注意力保持得如此集中使得分心的事不能穿透进来。你极其关注正在做的事，以致于没有觉察到时间的流逝。可能几个小时过去了，你还没注意到。
Flow is an elusive state. As with romance or sleep, you can't just will yourself into it—all you can do is set the stage, creating the optimal conditions for it to occur.
心流是一个难以捉摸的状态。正如浪漫或睡眠一样，你不能只是自己希望进入其中——你所能做的就是做好准备，为它的出现创造最佳的条件。
The first requirement for flow is to set a goal that's challenging but not unattainable—something you have to marshal your resources and stretch yourself to achieve. The task should be matched to your ability level—not so difficult that you'll feel stressed, but not so easy that you'll get bored. In flow, you're firing on all cylinders to rise to a challenge.
心流的第一个必要条件是设定一个具有挑战性但不是难以达到的目标——你必须汇集你的资源并尽最大的努力才能完成的事。任务应该与你的能力水平相匹配——不要困难到使你感到压力，但也不要容易到使你感到无聊。在心流状态，你竭尽全力地振奋精神迎接挑战。
To set the stage for flow, goals need to be clearly defined so that you always know your next step. "It could be playing the next bar in a scroll of music, or finding the next foothold if you're a rock climber, or turning the page if you're reading a good novel," says Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the psychologist who first defined the concept of flow. "At the same time, you're kind of anticipating."
为给心流做准备，目标要明确以便你始终清楚自己的下一步。“可能是弹奏一卷乐谱的下一小节；或者，如果你是一个攀岩者，找到下一个落脚点；或者，如果你正在读一本好的小说，翻动书页，”第一个定义心流概念的心理学家米哈里·塞克斯哈里（Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi）说。“同时，你还有些期待。”
You also need to set up the task in such a way that you receive direct and immediate feedback; with your successes and failures apparent, you can seamlessly adjust your behavior. A climber on the mountain knows immediately if his foothold is secure; a pianist knows instantly when she's played the wrong note.
此外，你还必须以能够直接并即时收到反馈的方式设定任务；由于成与败一目了然，你可以毫无遗漏地调整你的行为。在山上的登山者立即知道他的落脚点是否安全；一个钢琴演奏者即刻知道她何时弹错了音符。
As your attentional focus narrows, self-consciousness evaporates. You feel as if your awareness merges with the action you're performing. You feel a sense of personal mastery over the situation, and the activity is so intrinsically rewarding that although the task is difficult, action feels effortless.
随着你注意力的焦点缩小，自我意识就消失了。你感到好像你的意识与你正在进行的行动合二为一了。你感到一种对形势的自我掌控感，而且这种行为太有内在益处了，所以尽管任务艰难，但行动却毫不费力。
5: If something is bothering you, move toward it rather than away from it (acceptance).
5. 如果某事使你烦恼，迎面而上而不要逃离（接受）
We all have pain in our lives, whether it's the ex we still long for, the jackhammer snarling across the street, or the sudden wave of anxiety when we get up to give a speech. If we let them, such irritants can distract us from the enjoyment of life. Paradoxically, the obvious response—focusing on the problem in order to combat and overcome it—often makes it worse, argues Stephen Hayes, a psychologist at the University of Nevada.
我们在生活中都有痛苦，无论是我们仍然怀念的前任、在街对面吼叫的手提钻、还是当我们站起身发表演讲时突然而至的一阵焦虑。如果我们允许，这种刺激能使我们从生活的快乐中转移出去。内华达大学的心理学家斯蒂芬·海斯（Stephen Hayes）指出，荒谬的是，容易感觉到的反应——为了对抗和征服而把注意力集中在问题上——经常使问题变得更糟。
The mind's natural tendency when faced with pain is to attempt to avoid it—by trying to resist unpleasant thoughts, feelings, and sensations. When we lose a love, for instance, we fight our feelings of heartbreak. As we get older, we work feverishly to recapture our youth. When we're sitting in the dentist's chair waiting for a painful root canal, we wish we were anywhere but there. But in many cases, negative feelings and situations can't be avoided—and resisting them only magnifies the pain.
面对痛苦时心智自然的倾向是企图逃避——通过试图抵抗不愉快的思想、心情和感觉。例如，当我们失恋时，我们与心碎的悲痛感抗争。随着我们年纪越来越大，我们狂热地工作以重获青春。当我们坐在牙医的椅子上等待一次痛苦的根管治疗时，我们希望自己在其他任何地方而不是这里。但是在许多情况下，负面的感觉和情形是免不了的——与之对抗只会放大痛苦。
The problem is we have not just primary emotions but also secondary ones—emotions about other emotions. We get stressed out and then think, "I wish I weren't so stressed out." The primary emotion is stress over your workload. The secondary emotion is feeling, "I hate being stressed."
问题是我们不仅有一级情绪，还有二级情绪——关于其他情绪的情绪。我们感到压力太大，然后想：“我希望压力不要这么大。”一级情绪是你工作量上的压力，二级情绪是感到：“我讨厌有压力。”
It doesn't have to be this way. The solution is acceptance—letting the emotion be there. That is, being open to the way things are in each moment without trying to manipulate or change the experience—without judging it, clinging to it, or pushing it away. The present moment can only be as it is. Trying to change it only frustrates and exhausts you. Acceptance relieves you of this needless extra suffering.
不必这样。解决方案是接受——让情绪就待在那儿。即，对事物在每一时刻的情形持以开放态度，不要试图操纵或改变体验——不评判、不固守、不排斥。当下时刻只能是它现在的样子。试图改变它只会使你灰心丧气和精疲力竭。全盘接受为你解除了这个不必要的额外痛苦。
Suppose you've just broken up with your girlfriend or boyfriend; you're heartbroken, overwhelmed by feelings of sadness and longing. You could try to fight these feelings, essentially saying, "I hate feeling this way; I need to make this feeling go away." But by focusing on the pain—being sad about being sad—you only prolong the sadness. You do yourself a favor by accepting your feelings, saying instead, "I've just had a breakup. Feelings of loss are normal and natural. It's OK for me to feel this way."
假设你刚与女朋友或男朋友分手，你悲痛欲绝，被悲伤和思念的心情淹没。你可能试着与这些心情抗争，本性使然地说：“我讨厌感到这样；我必须让这种心情走开。”但是把注意力集中在痛苦上——为悲伤而悲伤——你只是延长了悲伤。为自己好，接受你的心情，改说：“我刚分手，失去的心情是正常而自然的。感到这样，对我来说还行。”
Acceptance of an unpleasant state doesn't mean you don't have goals for the future. It just means you accept that certain things are beyond your control. The sadness, stress, pain, or anger is there whether you like it or not. Better to embrace the feeling as it is.
接受不愉快的状态并不意味着你对未来没有目标，只是意味着你接受有些事不是你能控制的。不管你喜欢不喜欢，悲伤、压力、痛苦或愤怒都在那儿。还是照原样拥抱这些感觉比较好。
Nor does acceptance mean you have to like what's happening. "Acceptance of the present moment has nothing to do with resignation," writes Kabat-Zinn. "Acceptance doesn't tell you what to do. What happens next, what you choose to do; that has to come out of your understanding of this moment."
接受也不意味着你必须喜欢正在发生的事。“接受当下时刻与顺从无关，”卡巴金写道。“接受不告诉你做什么。下一步发生什么，你选择做什么，这些都得来自你对当下时刻的理解。”
If you feel anxiety, for instance, you can accept the feeling, label it as anxiety—then direct your attention to something else instead. You watch your thoughts, perceptions, and emotions flit through your mind without getting involved. Thoughts are just thoughts. You don't have to believe them and you don't have to do what they say.
比如，如果你感到焦虑，你可以接受这种感觉，将其标示为焦虑——然后把注意力转向其他事。你看着你的念头、感知和情绪掠过你的头脑而并不牵涉其中。念头只是念头，你不必相信它们，也不必按它们所说的去做。
6: Know that you don't know (engagement).
6. 知道你不知道（全神贯注）
You've probably had the experience of driving along a highway only to suddenly realize you have no memory or awareness of the previous 15 minutes. Maybe you even missed your exit. You just zoned out; you were somewhere else, and it's as if you've suddenly woken up at the wheel. Or maybe it happens when you're reading a book: "I know I just read that page, but I have no idea what it said."
你或许有过这样的经历：你正沿着高速公路开车，不料突然间意识到你对之前的15分钟没有任何记忆或意识。可能你甚至错过了你的出口。你只是走神了，神游到了别的什么地方，而且好像你突然间意识到了车轮子。或者可能它在你正在读一本书时发生：“我知道我刚读了那一页，但我完全不知道它说了什么。”
These autopilot moments are what Harvard's Ellen Langer calls mindlessness—times when you're so lost in your thoughts that you aren't aware of your present experience. As a result, life passes you by without registering on you. The best way to avoid such blackouts, Langer says, is to develop the habit of always noticing new things in whatever situation you're in. That process creates engagement with the present moment and releases a cascade of other benefits. Noticing new things puts you emphatically in the here and now.
这些自动驾驶的时刻是哈佛的埃伦·兰格所称的失神——你太沉迷于自己的思绪以致于没有意识到当前的体验时所度过的时间。结果，生活从你身边经过而没有给你留下任何印象。兰格说，避免这种意识中断的最好方法是：培养无论在何种情形下总要观察新事物的习惯。这个过程引起对当下时刻的全神贯注并引出一连串的其他好处。观察新事物使你着重于此时此地。
We become mindless, Langer explains, because once we think we know something, we stop paying attention to it. We go about our morning commute in a haze because we've trod the same route a hundred times before. But if we see the world with fresh eyes, we realize almost everything is different each time—the pattern of light on the buildings, the faces of the people, even the sensations and feelings we experience along the way. Noticing imbues each moment with a new, fresh quality. Some people have termed this "beginner's mind."
兰格解释说，我们变得失神，是因为一旦我们认为我们知道某事，我们就停止对其的注意。我们在薄雾中行走在早晨的通勤路程上，因为我们以前在同一条路上走过一百次了。但是如果我们用全新的眼睛看这个世界，我们认识到几乎每件事每一次都是不同的——照到建筑物上的光的图案、人的脸、甚至我们沿途体验到的感觉和心情。观察的行为使每一刻充满着一个新的、未经历过的特性。有些人把这叫做“初心。”
By acquiring the habit of noticing new things, says Langer, we recognize that the world is actually changing constantly. We really don't know how the espresso is going to taste or how the commute will be—or at least, we're not sure.
兰格说，通过养成观察新事物的习惯，我们认识到世界实际上一直在变化。我们真的不知道爱斯普利索咖啡的味道将会如何或者通勤路程将如何——或者至少，我们不确定。
Orchestra musicians who are instructed to make their performance new in subtle ways not only enjoy themselves more but audiences actually prefer those performances. "When we're there at the moment, making it new, it leaves an imprint in the music we play, the things we write, the art we create, in everything we do," says Langer. "Once you recognize that you don't know the things you've always taken for granted, you set out of the house quite differently. It becomes an adventure in noticing—and the more you notice, the more you see." And the more excitement you feel.
得到指示要以微妙的方式更新演奏的管弦乐队的音乐家们不仅自己更快乐，而且观众实际上也更喜欢这些演奏。“那一刻当我们在那里时，推陈出新在我们弹奏的乐曲里、在我们写的东西里、在我们创造的艺术品里、在我们做的每一件事上留下烙印。”兰格说。“一旦认识到你并不熟悉一直以来想当然的东西，你离开剧场时会感到完全不同。它成了一个发现的奇遇——你发现的越多，你看到的就越多。”而且感到的兴奋就越多。
Don't Just Do Something, Sit There
不要只是做事，坐在那儿
Living a consistently mindful life takes effort. But mindfulness itself is easy. "People set the goal of being mindful for the next 20 minutes or the next two weeks, then they think mindfulness is difficult because they have the wrong yardstick," says Jay Winner, a California-based family physician and author of Take the Stress out of Your Life. "The correct yardstick is just for this moment."
过一种始终如一的正念生活需要努力。但正念本身是容易的。“人们设定目标，要在接下来的20分钟或2个星期内保持正念，然后他们认为正念很难，原因是他们的准绳是错的。”一位加州的家庭医生及《赶走你生活中的压力》（Take the Stress out of Your Life）一书的作者杰伊·威纳（Jay Winner）说。“正确的准绳只是这一刻。”
Mindfulness is the only intentional, systematic activity that is not about trying to improve yourself or get anywhere else, explains Kabat-Zinn. It is simply a matter of realizing where you already are. A cartoon from The New Yorker sums it up: Two monks are sitting side by side, meditating. The younger one is giving the older one a quizzical look, to which the older one responds, "Nothing happens next. This is it."
卡巴金解释说，正念是唯一一个不准备试着提升你自己或到达其他任何地方的有意的、系统的行为。它只不过是意识到你已经在什么地方的一件事。《纽约客》（The New Yorker）上的一个漫画对它作了概括：两个和尚并排坐着，在沉思。年轻的那个给年长的那个一个探询的目光，对此，年长的那个回应说：“接下来什么事都不发生。就是这样。”
You can become mindful at any moment just by paying attention to your immediate experience. You can do it right now. What's happening this instant? Think of yourself as an eternal witness, and just observe the moment. What do you see, hear, smell? It doesn't matter how it feels—pleasant or unpleasant, good or bad—you roll with it because it's what's present; you're not judging it. And if you notice your mind wandering, bring yourself back. Just say to yourself, "Now. Now. Now."
只要把注意力放在即刻的体验上，你可以在任何时刻变得正念。你马上就能这么做。在这一刻正在发生什么事？把自己看作是一个永恒的观察者，并且只观察这一时刻。你看到什么？听到什么？闻到什么？感觉如何并不重要——愉快或不愉快、好或坏——你与它一起向前运转，因为它是当前的事物；你不是在对它作出评判。而且如果你发现自己在胡思乱想，把自己拉回来。只要对自己说：“现在，现在，现在。”
Here's the most fundamental paradox of all: Mindfulness isn't a goal, because goals are about the future, but you do have to set the intention of paying attention to what's happening at the present moment. As you read the words printed on this page, as your eyes distinguish the black squiggles on white paper, as you feel gravity anchoring you to the planet, wake up. Become aware of being alive. And breathe. As you draw your next breath, focus on the rise of your abdomen on the in-breath, the stream of heat through your nostrils on the out-breath. If you're aware of that feeling right now, as you're reading this, you're living in the moment. Nothing happens next. It's not a destination. This is it. You're already there.
这是所有似非而是的论点中最基本的：正念不是一个目标，因为目标是关于未来的，但是你确实必须设立关注当下时刻正在发生的事的意念。在你读印在这一页上的文字时，在你的眼睛分辨出白纸上黑色的花体字时，在你感到地心引力把你固定在地球上时，醒醒。知道自己活着。并且呼吸。在你吸入下一口气时，吸气时注意腹部的隆起，呼气时注意通过你鼻孔的热流。在你读本文之时，如果你现在就明白那种感觉，你就是正活在当下。接下来什么事都不发生。它不是一个目的。就是这样。你已经在那里了。