You can expect certain benefits from your meditation. The initial ones are practical, prosaic things; the later stages are profoundly transcendent. They run together from the simple to the sublime. We will set forth some of them here. Your own experience is all that counts.
你可以期望从禅修中得到一些利益，最初的利益很实际和平凡，往后阶段所得的利益则是深远与超凡的，它们从简单的到崇高的都有，我们在这里会宣布一些，你自己的体验才算是真的。
Those things that we called hindrances or defilements are more than just unpleasant mental habits. They are the primary manifestations of the ego process itself. The ego sense itself is essentially a feeling of separation -- a perception of distance between that which we call me, and that which we call other. This perception is held in place only if it is constantly exercised, and the hindrances constitute that exercise.
Greed and lust are attempts to get 'some of that' for me; hatred and aversion are attempts to place greater distance between 'me and that'. All the defilements depend upon the perception of a barrier between self and other, and all of them foster this perception every time they are exercised.
Mindfulness perceives things deeply and with great clarity. It brings our attention to the root of the defilements and lays bare their mechanism. It sees their fruits and their effects upon us. It cannot be fooled. Once you have clearly seen what greed really is and what it really does to you and to others, you just naturally cease to engage in it.
When a child burns his hand on a hot oven, you don't have to tell him to pull it back; he does it naturally, without conscious thought and without decision. There is a reflex action built into the nervous system for just that purpose, and it works faster than thought. By the time the child perceives the sensation of heat and begins to cry, the hand has already been jerked back from the source of pain.
AMindfulness works in very much the same way: it is wordless, spontaneous and utterly efficient. Clear mindfulness inhibits the growth of hindrances; continuous mindfulness extinguishes them. Thus, as genuine mindfulness is built up, the walls of the ego itself are broken down, craving diminishes, defensiveness and rigidity lessen, you become more open, accepting and flexible. You learn to share your loving-kindness.
那些我们称为盖障或烦恼的东西，不仅是令人不快的心理习惯而已，它们是自我活动过程本身的主要表现。自我感觉本身基本上是一种疏离的感受，一种「自我」与「其他」之间的距离知觉。这种知觉要不断重复演习才能稳固地保持，而那些演习就是盖障所组成的。
贪心与爱欲试图为「自我」得到「其他」的一些东西，瞋恚与厌恶则试图拉阔「自我」与「其他」之间的距离。所有烦恼皆因「自我」与「其他」之间有障碍的知觉而生起，而每次烦恼出现时，全都会助长此一知觉。
静观能深入与极清晰地体会事物，它能带领注意力到烦恼的根源，把它们的机制暴露无遗，它知道它们对我们所造成的后果与影响，它不会被愚弄。一旦你看清楚贪欲的真面目，真正认识到它对你及其他人的所作所为，你自会停止，不再参与其事。
就好像一个小孩，当他的手被烤炉烫过后，你无需叫他缩手，他也自然会做的，而且是不假思索或决断。神经系统自会作出此反射动作，且它的速度比思想还要快。当孩子感到火热的感觉并开始哭的时候，他的手已急拉离开了致痛的源头。
静观的运作方式与此很相似，它是无言的、自发的、且绝对有效率。清晰的静观制止了盖障的增长，持续的静观则可彻底消灭它们。因此，当真正的静观被建立起来时，「自我」的墙壁会瓦解、渴爱会减少、自我防御和顽固僵硬等亦会减轻，你会更为开放、更为包容与灵活变通，你学会与他人分享你的慈悲心。
