When you first become aware of something, there is a fleeting instant
of pure awareness just before you conceptualize the thing, before you
identify it. That is a stage of Mindfulness. Ordinarily, this stage is
very short. It is that flashing split second just as you focus your eyes
on the thing, just as you focus your mind on the thing, just before you
objectify it, clamp down on it mentally and segregate it from the rest
of existence. It takes place just before you start thinking about it--
before your mind says, "Oh, it's a dog." That flowing, soft-focused
moment of pure awareness is Mindfulness. In that brief flashing mind-
moment you experience a thing as an un-thing. You experience a softly
flowing moment of pure experience that is interlocked with the rest of
reality, not separate from it. Mindfulness is very much like what you
see with your peripheral vision as opposed to the hard focus of normal
or central vision. Yet this moment of soft, unfocused, awareness contains
a very deep sort of knowing that is lost as soon as you focus your mind
and objectify the object into a thing. In the process of ordinary perception,
the Mindfulness step is so fleeting as to be unobservable. We have developed
the habit of squandering our attention on all the remaining steps, focusing
on the perception, recognizing the perception, labeling it, and most of all,
getting involved in a long string of symbolic thought about it. That original
moment of Mindfulness is rapidly passed over. It is the purpose of the above
mentioned Vipassana (or insight) meditation to train us to prolong that moment
of awareness.

当意识最初有所「觉知」的那一瞬间，还没有「概念化」、仍来不及辨识的「觉」，
就是正念。通常「觉」只是短暂存在，来不及看、想，或客体化。正念发生在你心□
想－－－「啊！那边那个是一条狗」之前，那个流动轻轻「聚焦」、纯然「觉知」者
就是正念。在那一瞬间，你经验到一个「并不是东西的东西」。在那轻轻流动的片刻
，你有了物物相关连的纯然经验。正念像用眼角的馀光看、而不是用正眼瞧。在那一
瞬间，轻柔、「将聚焦的觉知」具有一种「深知」，这种深知是集中心神、将事物客
体化时所无法显现的。通常在认知的过程中，正念快得无法观察。我们已经变成将注
意力浪费在认知、加标签的步骤中，陷在一长串的象徵思惟中；那最初瞬间的正念因
而被溜了过去。正观禅的目的就是为了延长那瞬间的觉知。

                                                    ～待续～

◆ 修改: 02/12/19  0:49:14 <202.145.67.54>