《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 67 (149):體驗自己的無限
The place in which I was standing can't be described like an earthly location. It was neither dark nor light, neither big nor small. Nor was it a place, nor was I technically standing there, nor was I exactly "I" anymore. I still had my thoughts, but they were so modest, quiet and observatory. Not only did I feel unhesitating compassion and unity with everything and everybody, it was vaguely and amusingly strange for me to wonder how anybody could ever feel anything but that. I also felt mildly charmed by all my old ideas about who I am and what I'm like. I'm a woman, I come from America, I'm talkative, I'm a writer—all this felt so cute and obsolete. Imagine cramming yourself into such a puny box of identity when you could experience your infinitude instead.
我站立的地方不能說是凡間。不暗也不亮，不大也不小。也不是一個地方。嚴格來說，我也不是站在那兒，我也不再是“我”。我仍有自己的思維，卻是謙卑、安靜、觀察性的思維。我不僅感覺到堅定的慈悲，與萬事萬物合而爲一，奇怪的是，我也在想，人怎麼可能感受到這樣的感覺。我還略微陶醉於關於我是什麼人、哪一種人的昔日想法。“我是女人，我是美國人，我愛講話，我是作家”——這一切可愛而陳舊的感覺。請想象自己被塞進一個身份的小盒子裏，卻反而體驗到自己的無限。I wondered, "Why have I been chasing happiness my whole life when bliss was here the entire time?"
我納悶地想：“我爲何一輩子追求快樂，卻不曉得極樂一直在這裏？”I don't know how long I hovered in this magnificent ether of union before I had a sudden urgent thought: "I want to hold on to this experience forever!" And that's when I started to tumble out of it. Just those two little words—I want!—and I began to slide back to earth. Then my mind started to really protest—No! I don't want to leave here!—and I slid further still.
我不清楚自己在這萬物合一的氛圍中漂浮多久，而後突然出現急迫的想法：“我想永遠抓住這種經驗！”這時，我開始跌了出去，只是兩個小小的字——“我想！”——就使我慢慢地滑回地球。而後我的腦袋開始鄭重抗議——“不！我不想離開這裏！”——於是滑得更遠。
I want!
我想！I don't want!
我不想！I want!
我想！I don't want!
我不想！With each repetition of those desperate thoughts, I could feel myself falling through layer after layer of illusion, like an action-comedy hero crashing through a dozen canvas awnings during his fall from a building. This return of useless longing was bringing me back again into my own small borders, my own mortal confines, my limited comic-strip world. I watched my ego return the way you watch a Polaroid photo develop, instant-by-instant getting clearer—there's the face, there are the lines around the mouth, there are the eyebrows—yes, now it is finished: there is a picture of regular old me. I felt a tremor of panic, mildly heartbroken to have lost this divine experience. But exactly parallel to that panic I could also sense a witness, a wiser and older me, who just shook her head and smiled, knowing this: If I believed that this state of bliss was something that could be taken away from me, then I obviously didn't understand it yet. And therefore, I was not yet ready to inhabit it completely. I would have to practice more. At that moment of realization, that's when God let me go, let me slide through His fingers with this last compassionate, unspoken message:
這個絕望的想法每重複一次，我就感覺自己穿越一層層幻象掉落下去，好比喜劇動作片主角從屋頂掉下來的時候砸進十幾個帆布篷上一般。我跌回徒勞的渴望，再次回到自己小小的邊界，封閉的凡間，有限的漫畫世界。我看着自己像一張立拍立現照片顯像般地回到凡俗，一個瞬間、一個瞬間清晰起來——臉出現了，嘴角紋路出現了，眉毛出現了——好，顯像完成：照片裏是正正常常的故我。我感到一陣恐慌，失去此種神聖體驗，讓我有些傷心。然而恐慌的同時，卻也感受到一個目擊者，一個更明智、更老練的我，只是搖頭微笑，心中明白：倘若我認爲此種幸福狀態可從我身上奪去，那麼我對它顯然還不瞭解。因此，我還未完整居住其中。我得多做練習。在瞭解了這一點瞬間，神放我走了，讓我從他的指縫間滑下去，給我最後這則慈悲、靜默的信息：You may return here once you have fully come to understand that you are always here. Eat, Pray, Love
只要你完全瞭解自己始終在這裏，就回這裏來吧。
