One of the stunning findings that showed up in long-term meditators—and these other scientists were quite skeptical about [it],
长期冥想者身上有一个非常让人震惊的现象——其他科学家对这一点持怀疑态度
but Richard Davidson my co-author and his group went ahead and tried it—
但我的合著者理查德·戴维森和他的团队进行了大胆尝试
they had people who had done 1,000 to 10,000 lifetime hours of meditation come in and simply do a retreat for one day in the lab.
他们让一生中做过1000到10000小时冥想的人到实验室去做了一天的冥想
And they did a measure of the genes for inflammation,
然后对其体内的炎症基因进行了测试
and they found that there was a down-regulation of inflammatory genes from one day of meditation.
发现经过一天的冥想后 他们体内的炎症基因有所下降
What this means is that inflammation, which is a cause, it’s a risk factor for a wide range of diseases, diabetes, arthritis, cancer,
这就意味着炎症 炎症是很多疾病的致病因素 糖尿病 关节炎 癌症

cardiovascular disease, you name it, inflammation almost always plays a role in disease.
心血管疾病 随便哪一种 几乎任何疾病都伴随着炎症
And what this says is that intensive retreats in meditation, even for a day, help you lower the level of those genes.
这就意味着集中进行冥想 哪怕只是一天 也能降低你体内的炎症基因
We don’t yet know if this is clinically important; that’s another study that needs to be done.
我们不知道这在临床上是否重要 那是另一项需要做的研究
But we do know that it’s so remarkable that people in genomic science were amazed
不过我们知道这很特别 连研究基因科学的专家都大为震惊
that a simple mental exercise could have such a profound impact on this array of genes.
一种简单的心理练习竟然能对炎症基因产生如此深远的影响
Pretty eye-opening. There was a remarkable finding when it comes to how the Olympic level meditators experience pain.
真是大开眼界啊 说到奥林匹克级的冥想者经历疼痛的时候 也有非常卓著的发现
Ordinarily if you bring someone into the lab and you tell them “We’re going to give you a burn in ten seconds,
通常情况下 如果你让人们到实验室里 告诉他们“十秒钟之后 我们会烧你一下
it won’t cause blisters on your skin but you’re going to feel it, it’s going to hurt,”
你们的皮肤不会起泡 但你们能感觉到 会很疼”
the moment you tell them that the emotional circuitry for feeling pain goes ballistic.
在你告诉他们的这一瞬间 他们感受疼痛的情绪回路就会暴走
It’s as though they’re feeling the pain already.
好像他们早已经感觉到疼了一样
And then you get them the touch of the hot test tube—whatever it is, and it stays ballistic,
然后你让他们去触摸热试验管—或者任何东西 他们的情绪回路依然是暴走状态
and then for ten seconds more it stays ballistic; they don’t recover emotionally.
十秒钟过后 还是暴走状态 他们在情绪上不会恢复
The “Olympic-level” meditators had quite a different response.
但“奥林匹克级”的冥想者反应就大不相同
You tell them “You’re going to feel this pain in ten seconds,” their emotional centers don’t do anything.
你告诉他们“十秒钟之后 你会感受到疼痛” 他们的情绪中心没有任何波澜
They’re completely equanimous.
他们非常镇定
The pain comes and they feel it, you see it register physiologically, but there’s no emotional reaction,
疼痛感出现 他们也能感觉到 你能从生理学上真实的看到它 但他们的情绪没有任何起伏
and there’s no emotional reaction afterward, so in other words, they’re totally equanimous, they’re unflappable.
烧过之后他们也没有情绪反应 换句话说 他们完全镇定自若 不慌不忙
Even though they experience the pain physiologically they don’t have the emotional reaction.
即便是生理上感受到了疼痛 但他们的情绪上却波澜不惊
And what we find is that calming the emotional reaction is one of the most powerful benefits of meditation.
我们发现那种镇定的情绪反应是冥想带来的最强大的好处之一
And I’m not talking about the Olympic level, I’m talking about beginners.
我指的不是奥林匹克级的人们 而是冥想起步者
There’s a wonderful method called Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction;
有一种超棒的方法 叫做正念减压疗法
it was developed by a friend of ours John Kabat-Zinn years ago.
它是我们卡巴辛的一位朋友在几年前创造出来的
And it’s for people in hospitals, people in clinics—although anyone could benefit—
专为住院人群和门诊人群设计——尽管任何人都可从中受益
but one of the strongest findings on this has been that it helps with people who have chronic pain.
但在这一点上一个最有力的发现是它能帮助长期有慢性疼痛的人
And I’m talking about pain that medication is not going to help you with,
我指的是靠药物无法缓解的疼痛
there’s nothing medicine knows what to do about this except give you horrible narcotics that are addictive.
药物在这方面无能为力 只会给你开一些让人上瘾的可怕的麻醉药
And here is a very positive alternative,
现在有一种非常积极的替代选择
because what happens when you do MBSR if you have chronic pain is: the emotional component changes.
因为如果你有慢性疼痛的话 你使用正念减压疗法就会发现：你的情绪成分会发生变化
You shift your relationship to the pain.
你会把关系转移到疼痛上
It no longer is “My pain, oh my God I can’t stand it,” instead it’s “Oh, there’s that sensation again.”
它不再是“我的痛感 哦天哪 疼的我受不了” 而是“哦 又出现那种感觉了”
So the physiology of the pain continues, but the emotional component, which is really where the hurt is,
所以生理学上的疼痛会持续 但疼痛真正所在的地方——你的情绪成分
disappears or is much reduced because you no longer have that same relationship to the pain that we do ordinarily.
会消失 或者大幅降低 因为你与疼痛的关系已经不再是一般人的那种样子了