《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 68 (150):走出靜默

The retreat ended two days later, and everyone came out of silence. I got so many hugs from people, thanking me for having helped them.

兩天後，靜修結束，大家走出靜默。許多人都過來擁抱我，感謝我幫他們忙。

"Oh, no! Thank you," I kept saying, frustrated at how inadequate those words sounded, how impossible it was to express ample gratitude for their having lifted me to such a towering height.

“喔，不！該道謝的人是我。”我不斷重複地說道，懊惱這些詞句無法恰當表達我對他們的謝意，感謝他們讓我提升到至高境界。

Another one hundred seekers arrived a week later for another retreat, and the teachings and the brave endeavors inward and the all-encompassing silence were all repeated, with new souls in practice. I watched over them, too, and tried to help in every possible way and glided back into turiya a few times with them, too. I could only laugh later when many of them came out of their meditations to tell me that I had appeared to them during the retreat as a "silent, gliding, ethereal presence." So this was the Ashram's final joke on me? Once I had learned to accept my loud, chatty, social nature and fully embrace my inner Key Host-ess—only then could I become The Quiet Girl in the Back of the Temple, after all?

一個星期後，另一百名信衆前來參加另一場靜修。再一次領受諄諄教導、致力於內心的努力、體驗無所不包的寂靜，只不過實行者是另一批人。我仍負責照顧他們，盡力提供協助，有幾次也與他們一同回到“第四境”。後來他們當中許多人在禪修後對我說，靜修期間，我在他們眼中似是一種“沉默、飄飄然、超凡脫俗的存在”，真讓我哭笑不得。這就是道場對我開的最後玩笑？學會接受自己響亮、聒噪、社交的天性，全心擁抱內在的“主招待”角色之後——唯有此時，我終究才能成爲“寺院後方那位安靜的姑娘”？

In my final weeks there, the Ashram was imbibed with a somewhat melancholy last-days-of-summer-camp feeling. Every morning, it seemed, some more people and some more luggage got on a bus and left. There were no new arrivals. It was almost May, the beginning of the hottest season in India, and the place would be slowing down for a while. There would be no more retreats, so I was relocated for work again, now placed in the Office of Registration, where I had the bittersweet job of officially "departing" all my friends off the computer once they had left the Ashram.

在我待在這兒的最後幾個星期，道場充滿類似夏令營最末幾天的哀傷氣氛。每天早晨，似乎又有另一批人、另一批行李搭巴士離去。沒有新來的人。已將近五月，印度最熱的季節即將開始，道場的節奏即將慢下來一陣子。不再有靜修活動，因此我又被調往別的工作，這回是註冊處，這是一份苦中帶甜的職責：在我的朋友們離開道場後，一一在電腦中的文件裏向他們“告別”。

I shared the office with a funny former Madison Avenue hairdresser. We'd do our morning prayers together all alone, just the two of us singing our hymn to God.

我此刻在辦公室的同事，從前在麥迪遜大道當美髮師，是個逗趣的人。我們兩人一同晨禱，只有我們倆對神唱頌歌。

"Think we could pick up the tempo on this hymn today?" asked the hairdresser one morn-ing. "And maybe raise it to a higher octave? So I don't sound like a spiritual version of Count Basie?"

“今天我們試試加快頌歌的節奏？”一天早晨美髮師問道“或許還高個八度音？會讓我聽起來比較不像靈歌版的貝西伯爵（CountBasie）嗎？”

I'm getting a lot of time alone here now. I'm spending about four or five hours every day in the meditation caves. I can sit in my own company for hours at a time now, at ease in my own presence, undisturbed by my own existence on the planet. Sometimes my meditations are surreal and physical experiences of shakti—all spine-twisting, blood-boiling wildness. I try to give in to it with as little resistance as possible. Other times I experience a sweet, quiet con-tentment, and that is fine, too. The sentences still form in my mind, and thoughts still do their little show-off dance, but I know my thought patterns so well now that they don't bother me anymore. My thoughts have become like old neighbors, kind of bothersome but ultimately rather endearing—Mr. and Mrs. Yakkity-Yak and their three dumb children, Blah, Blah and Blah. But they don't agitate my home. There's room for all of us in this neighborhood.

現在我有很多時間獨處。我一天大約花四五個鐘頭待在禪坐洞。我現在可以一次單獨坐數個小時，怡然自處，坦蕩面對自身的存在。有時我的禪坐是超現實、生理上的“莎克蒂”經驗——筋骨扭擰、熱血沸騰的狂野狀態。我嘗試聽命於它，儘可能不去反抗。有時則感到某種甜美、安靜的滿足，也很不錯。詞句仍在我的腦子裏成形，思維仍賣弄風騷地手舞足蹈，但我現在已經十分熟悉自己的思維模式，不再受到干擾。我的思維已成了老鄰居，雖然有點討厭，卻又是最親愛的人。王先生和王太太以及他們的三個傻孩子，等等，等等。但他們不會擾亂我家。在這個街坊鄰里，人人都有自己的空間。