Perhaps the most startling finding for meditation beginners comes with what’s called compassion or loving kindness meditation.
对冥想初学者而言，最惊人的发现莫过于所谓的同情或慈心禅冥想
This is a practice that often accompanies mindfulness the breath, for example.
这种练习时常伴随着正念呼吸
People will do at the end of the session, they bring to mind people that have been kind to them; they think of themselves;
每期训练结束时，人们会想到曾经善待过自己的人；会想到自身
they think of people they love, people they know, everyone everywhere and wish them well may they be safe, happy, healthy, free from suffering.
还会想到他们爱的人、认识的人、任何地方的所有人，祝愿他们安全、幸福、健康、免受苦难
And it turns out that the repetition of those phrases is psychoactive, it actually changes the brain and how you feel right from the get go.
事实证明这些重复语句能让人精神兴奋，让大脑发生变化，并从一开始就改变你的感受
We find, for example, that people who do this meditation who’ve just started doing it actually are kinder,
比如，我们发现，刚开始做这些冥想的人会更善良
they’re more likely to help someone in need, they’re more generous and they’re happier.
他们更愿意去帮助有需要的人，他们更慷慨、更快乐

It turns out that the brain areas that help us or that make us want to help someone that we care about also connect with the circuitry for feeling good.
大脑的某些区域会让我们去帮助我们在乎的人，而这些区域与感觉良好的脑回路相互关联
So it feels good to be kind and all of that shows up very early in just a few hours really of total practice of loving kindness or compassion meditation.
善良的感觉很不错，所有这些感觉很早就会出现，它们会在整个同情或慈心禅冥想练习的前几个小时就出现
So we feel that the brain is somehow biologically prepared to learn to love better.
所以我们觉得从生物学上来讲，大脑似乎随时准备着去学习更爱别人
The brain area that become stronger in its activity is the same as a parent’s love for a child.
大脑活跃度增强的那一部分与父母对孩子的爱是一样的
It’s the mammalian caretaking circuitry. We share it with all other mammals.
这是哺乳动物的照顾回路，人类和其他哺乳动物都有
And in humans it’s extremely important for the third of three kinds of empathy.
对人类而言，三大同理心中的第三种尤为重要
There’s empathy that allows you to understand better how someone thinks to take their perspective, lets you be a good communicator.
第一种同理心能让你换位思考，更好地理解别人的想法，从而让你成为一名良好沟通者
There’s the empathy where you connect emotionally; you feel what the other person feels immediately; you sense in your own body what’s going on in the other person.
第二种同理心是指情感上的连接；你能立即体会到别人的感受；你能对别人的遭遇感同身受
This allows rapport and chemistry, it’s also very important.
这会让你和别人之间产生密切关系和化学反应；这种同理心也很重要
But the third kind of empathy is what’s called empathic concern; it’s the feeling of caring about another person wanting to help them.
但第三种同理心是所谓的移情关怀；它是指关心别人、想要帮助别人的感受
It’s the basis of compassion.
而这正是同情的基础
You can have the first two and not to be particularly concerned or caring, but if you have all three then you’ve got the whole package of empathy
你可以只拥有前两种同理心，不必过于关怀或关心，但如果你三种同理心都有，那你就拥有了同理心的全部内容
and we find that love and kindness meditation strengthens that third, both in terms of how you behave, how you feel and what’s happening in the brain.
我们发现慈心和善良冥想能够加强第三种同理心，包括你的表现、感受和大脑反应三方面
One of the paradoxes we found when we started looking very closely at all of the research that’s done on meditation
当我们开始仔细观察在冥想领域所做的所有研究时，发现了一个悖论
was a kind of a disconnect between what the classic traditions from which these methods come are saying is important and what scientists are studying.
那就是诞生这些措施的古典传统认为很重要的事情和科学家们正在研究的事情之间出现了分歧
One of the most important things, whether you’re looking in the Christian literature or the Buddhist literature or Jewish literature or Hindu literature, doesn’t matter,
无论是基督教文学、佛教文学、犹太教文学还是印度教文学，其中有一些最重要的东西
all of the meditative traditions within those classical schools of thought are saying the most important thing is that you become less focused on yourself, caring only about yourself,
那些古典学派中的冥想传统认为最重要的事情就是减少对自己的关注和关心
less selfish as it were and more open to the needs of others, more compassionate, more caring, more present to other people.
别太自私，应该更关注他人的需求，更慈悲，更有同情心，更多地给予他人
And even though the classic traditions say this is what counts, in terms of the scientific interest it was minimal.
即便古典传统认为这些才是最重要的事情，但科学家认为它们都微不足道
We found maybe three or four studies... remember out of 6,000... that really were tight methodologically and spoke to this, but here again the news was good.
在6000份研究中，我们只找到了三四篇在方法论上很严谨的研究提到了这些内容，不过这是好消息
If you look at the longer-term meditators, people who have done more than say 1,000 or 2,000 hours of meditation over their entire life,
如果你看一下那些更长期的冥想者，那些一生中已经做过1000或2000多小时冥想的人们
and this happens naturally, let’s say you do a half hour of sit every morning before you go out for the day, well after a decade or two it does add up.
这些冥想是很自然发生的，比如每天早上出门前坐下冥想半小时，十几二十年后时间就累积起来了
And it seems that that cumulative amount does make people less selfish, less just caring about me
似乎那种长期累积确实会让人变得不那么自私，不那么以自我为中心
and more open to other people around them, more caring, more able to tune in, more able to empathize.
而是更多地关注身边的人，更善良，更能及时出现，更有同情心
And this also shows up in a brain change, which we think is quite significant, which is that the nucleus incumbents,
这一点在大脑变化方面也有所体现，我们认为这很重要，那就是长期冥想者大脑中的位核
which is the focus of craving of I got to have that, drug addiction for example, actually become smaller in longer-term meditators.
即我必须要拥有某种东西的渴望——比如说毒瘾——会变得更小
And that seems to be related to this lack of "I me mine" in how people behave and how they think in their emotional life.
而这似乎与人们在感情生活中减少了“我 我 我”的行为和思想有关
And we see it most strikingly, of course, in Olympic level meditators where these are people who have done 10,000 or more... 10,000 to 62,000 hours of meditation
当然，这一点在已经冥想了10000小时或更多——10000到62000小时之间的冥想者身上体现的最为显著
and they are genuinely selfless people, but they’re very nourishing very enjoyable to be with because they pay attention to you,
他们是真正大爱无私的人，和他们相处如沐春风，让人身心愉悦，因为他们很重视你
they really focus on the person they’re with and how they can be of service or what do you need now and it’s very refreshing.
他们真的会很关注一起相处的人，随时为你服务，随时向你伸出援助之手，而这能让人重振精神