第13章 “醋缸迷魂阵”，有地图导航

第三卷避开暗礁，踏平路障 ( Part Three NAVIGATING CHALLENGES )

CHAPTER THIRTEEN Roadmaps through Jealousy

Let jealousy be your teacher. Jealousy can lead you to the very places where you most need healing. It can be your guide into your own dark side and show you the way to total self-realization. Jealousy can teach you how to live in peace with yourself and with the whole world if you let it.

-Deborah Anapol, Love without Limits

让“醋缸”成为你自我提升的道场。妒火能映照出你最需疗愈的隐疾。你可以按图索骥，从醋意中觉察到内心深处的暗角，更加全面地认识你自己。当你以嫉妒之心为鉴、为师，就能从中不断学习到：如何与自己、与整个世界，保持平和共处。

——黛博拉·阿纳坡，《不设限的爱》

FOR MANY PEOPLE, the biggest obstacle to free love is the emotion we call jealousy.

对很多人而言，自由性爱的最大阻碍，是一种情绪，其名曰醋意。

Jealousy feels really rotten, and most of us will go to great lengths to avoid feeling it. However, your authors believe that most people take the destructive power of jealousy way too much for granted, that they give their jealousy far more power than it deserves.

醋意上头，感觉糟透；要想让醋意远离自己，我们当中的许多人，都需要付出漫长的努力。不过在笔者看来，很多人都有一个误区：他们把醋意所带来的破坏性力量，视为理所当然。而事实上，醋意远远没有那么可怕。

After many years of living free and dealing successfully with jealousy, we tend to forget that we live in a culture that considers it acceptable to divorce or even murder a sexually explorative partner who has committed the unthinkable crime of arousing jealousy in us.

本书的两位作者，一直爱得无拘无束；那些和醋意有关的林林总总，都已被摆平，长年波澜不兴。这令笔者对自身所处的社会文化环境——大家往往对出于醋意，和出轨者离婚，乃至将出轨者杀掉，都颇多认可——经常全然忽视，仿佛其不存在。

Let us point out here that monogamy is not a cure for jealousy. We have all had experiences of being ferociously jealous of work that keeps our partner away or distracted from us, or our lover’s decision to cruise the Internet instead of our bodies, or Monday(and Tuesday and Wednesday) Night Football. Jealousy is not exclusive to sluts; it’s an emotion we all have to deal with.

笔者在此想要告诉你，一对一的封闭式专偶关系，并不能将醋意消弭。我们当中的每一个人，都难免会有这样的经历：当伴侣因忙于工作而无法理会我们时，我们为此抓狂，或曰对其工作“醋意大发”；当伴侣沉迷网络或者熬夜看球，我们也会觉得自身受到了冷落。自命风骚的老婊们，同样可能陷入醋缸，难以自拔。换言之，醋意是一种人皆有之、人人都需要妥善处理的情绪。

Many people believe that sexual territoriality is a natural part of individual and social evolution. If you believe that, it’s easy to use jealousy as justification to go berserk and stop being a sane, responsible, and ethical human being. Threatened with feeling jealous, we allow our brains to turn to static with the excuse that we are acting on instinct. Your authors don’t think it matters if jealousy derives from nature or nurture or both. What matters is that we know from experience that we can change it.

很多人都认定：性爱包含着人身独占欲——这是每个人的天性，是人类社会的进化使然。如果你也持此观点，那就很容易把吃醋，视为肆意发飙、无理取闹、不负责任，乃至打破一切人类道德底线的“正当理由”。换言之，一旦醋劲上头，我们就会以此为由，将理智抛到九霄云外，行事只凭野性本能。醋意究竟是天生的，还是后天习得的，或者兼具先天和后天因素，这在笔者看来，完全无关紧要。真正重要的是，笔者结合切实经验，深信关于醋意的一切，都可以改变。

Here is a story from Dossie’s life about the struggle to cope with jealousy:

本书作者之一的道茜，关于如何应对醋意，有一段痛苦挣扎的人生经历，在此分享给你：

My lover is late coming home. I hope she is all right—this morning she left in tears. Last night we both cried until very late. I hope she will not be too angry with me, or then again, her anger might be easier to bear than her pain. Last night I thought my heart would break from feeling her pain.

我的心上人，深夜才回来，我希望她有所好转——那天早晨，她哭着从我身边离开；之前一夜，我们俩一起哭到很晚。我期待她对我的怨气，能稍有平息；或者，索性尽情发泄怒火——如果这样能让她心里好受些的话。从前一个晚上，我就感到自己的心中，能够和她的痛苦产生共鸣。

And it’s my fault, my choice, my responsibility. I am asking my lover to go through the fire for reasons most of the rest of the world consider frivolous if not downright reprehensible. I cannot, will not, be monogamous.

这一切都怪我，是我自酿苦果。在全世界绝大多数人看来，我即使够不上千夫所指，至少也是轻浮不检、自找倒霉——这造成我的心上人，遭受了五内俱焚的痛苦。但无论如何，一对一的专属爱情，我做不到，也不想要。

More than three decades ago, I left my daughter’s violent father, fighting my way out the door, bruised and pregnant, promising anything, promising I would call my parents for money, lying. After I escaped Joe, he sent me suicide threats and threatened murder—one time he set fires around the house he thought we were still in. After I left, I decided he was right—I am a slut, I want to be a slut, I will never promise monogamy again. I will never be a piece of property again, no matter how valuable that property is considered. Joe made a feminist of me—a feminist slut.

早在三十多年前，我就甩掉了那个有暴力倾向的男人——也就是我女儿的父亲。那时我怀着身孕，带着被他殴打的淤青，愤然夺门而出。我当时万念俱灰，也根本无从指望我的父母，能给我些钱救急。那个名叫“乔”的男人，在我逃离之后，向我发送恐吓信息，声称他要自杀或者杀人。有一次，他认为我依然住在某处，便在该处附近放火。逃离之后的我，反而“感谢”乔“做得对”——他使我明确：老娘我就是个婊子，我想要的生活就是去做个婊子，从此以后，我不会再进入一对一的封闭关系中。我不会再成为任何人的专属之物，就算你把我当成价值千金的心肝宝贝，老娘我也不想要。换言之，那个名叫乔的男人，把我变成了一个女权主义者，一个女权大婊。

My lover is back. She brought me a flower. She still doesn’t want a hug. She feels her house has been invaded by alien energy. I was very careful to clean up, all is very tidy, dinner is ready, appeasement and placation, I’ll do anything not to feel so awful.

我的情侣回来看我，带给我一束鲜花，却一直不想让我抱她。她感到自己的房间，有被陌生人侵入后的气场。我一丝不苟地清理，此后的很久，这里的一切都格外整齐，日常饭菜我都做好，以安抚她的情绪。我愿意做任何事情，来舒缓我们之间的氛围。

Why did I insist on doing this? My coauthor and I have been patiently waiting to resume this part of our relationship when my newfound and most beloved partner was ready. She has already conquered the terrors of group sex—tomorrow we will have another couple over for dinner and my birthday spanking, which she herself arranged with no egging on from me. Within the last year she has had more new sexual experiences than she’d had in the previous forty-eight years and has taken to it all like a duck to water.

那时的我，为何要执意这样做？我，和本书的另一位作者珍妮特，都一直在耐心等待，希望我和那个女情侣的的关系，能够恢复如初——尽管我已经和其他人有了新的亲密关系，有了对我而言最重要的新欢。如今，我的那个女情侣，终于克服了对多人群交、聚众淫乱的顾虑。明天，我和她，以及另一对情侣，在共进晚餐之后，一起玩打屁股的虐恋游戏，以此为我庆祝生日。上述的活动，是她自做决定为我安排的，我没有唆使她半句。她在上一年里，各种新奇的性经历，比她之前四十八年的总和还要多，如鱼得水，乐此不疲。

Except her lover having a date with one other person. She hates feeling left out and resents that we are doing it in our home this time, not neutral territory. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe I make a lot of mistakes.

但她始终无法接受自己的爱人，和其他人亲热。她讨厌自己被“晾在一边”的感觉；如果我让其他情侣，来到我和她共同的家里——而不是另找其他地方相约——这会令她深恶痛绝。也许这是我的错误，也许，我对她有很多的不是之处。

My friends and lovers have welcomed her into the family with open arms. Loose lovers often form kinship networks from their sexual connections—and customs, even sort of a culture, have begun to emerge. And so it is customary, in my brand-new culture, for one’s lovers to welcome a new lover, not as competition but as an addition to the community. But this is not her culture.

我的众多狐朋狗友和露水夫妻，都对她敞开胸怀，欢迎她来加入。众多松散、随意的情侣们，往往会通过彼此之间的性爱关系，构建出一个类似亲缘关系的人际网络；共同的风气，乃至某种意义上的文化氛围，也会逐渐形成。这是一种不成文的共识规范，一种属于我们的全新的文化；在这里，每个人的情侣，都欢迎其他人加入，新人是这个共同体的增量，而非任何人的竞争对手。——然而，对我的那个情侣来说，这样的文化，她并不认同。【将亲密关系的新加入者，视为大家共同的增量，而非闯入的外患——生于1938年的琼瑶，多年前就曾在一些作品中，表述过这个思想。拍摄于20世纪末的琼瑶剧《新月格格》，有一句“小三”的台词，令新世纪的众多年轻网民大呼雷人、毁三观：“我是来加入这个家，而不是拆散这个家。”——这样的作品，上世纪末顺利过审、全国播放，而且举国观众，对此波澜不惊，这在“正能量”的当今恐难再现。何况琼瑶并非思想多么开放，更谈不上超前，她的爱情至上理念，槽点满满；尤其糟糕的，是对性别刻板印象的格外强化——多数女主角都活像林黛玉的翻版，貌似傲娇但脆弱入骨，一旦坠入爱河便处处求完美（缺乏安全感的表现），哪怕一点点挫折都足以走上致命的极端，内心比豌豆公主还容易受伤。但即使如此，琼瑶作品的某些闪光点（例如通过很多具体的情境，对“小三”去污名化），在我们这个社会，依然领先于时代；国内大环境的悲哀，也由此可见一斑。——译者】

My lover is ready to talk now. She is pissed. She is seriously pissed. She resents me for every miserable terrified thought she has had today, she is furious that I would subject her to the unprotected experience of her own feelings, and that’s not what she said, that’s my interpretation. And that’s not what I said either—this was no time to get uppity about clean boundaries and the importance of owning your own feelings. I listened. This time I listened, without interrupting, trying only to let her know that I love her, I feel her pain, I am here for her. She is furious with me, and I am not giving myself permission to defend myself, and I hurt.

我的那个情侣，终于道出了自己的真实感受：她真的很恼火，她对我的种种想法，都深恶痛绝，越听越气；尤其令她抓狂的，是我没有顾及她的感受，将她带到令她无法接受的环境里。——上述话语，她并没有对我直接说出，是我根据她的弦外之音，所进行的脑补。我上面这些话，也没有对她讲，因为在这个场景下，诸如“设定清晰明确的边界规则”或者“自己的感受，自己负全责”之类，纯属傲慢的空谈，也根本没有扯这些闲淡的时间。我唯有听她讲，只倾听，不打断，以此尽力让她感受到：我是真心爱她的，对她的痛处感同身受，无论她怎样，我都会陪伴在她身边，尽我所能地关爱她。她对我大发雷霆，而我完全放弃了自己的心理防线，这让我自己也很受伤。

This story has no tidy ending—we talked for hours, or maybe I listened, and I heard how difficult it was for her, how she felt invaded, how she felt her home was not safe, how she feared that my other lover would not like her, how she felt attacked by her and me both, how very much she feared I was abandoning her. We came to no pat little answers that make good stories for books—we just poured out anguish, and went to sleep exhausted, and went on loving each other and working on this issue as best we could.

这段往事的最终结局，是一片狼藉。我和她的交流，持续了几个钟头，基本上都是我听她讲，听她的各种诉苦：听她说，外人闯入我和她之间，令她觉得家里变得有多么不安；听她说，她如何害怕我的其他情侣，会对她心存芥蒂；听她说，她是多么左右为难，既认为我在针对她，同时又在心里，自己和自己打架；听她说，她有着多么深的恐惧，担心自己被我抛弃。我们之间的任何问题，都无从解决（若要就这些问题寻找答案，需要好几本书的篇幅）；我们之间的交流，无非是对内心痛苦的倾诉，直到精疲力竭，各自安歇。在此之后，我们继续相爱彼此，也继续针对之前的旧账，没完没了地折腾。

It’s been more than ten years since Dossie wrote this story, and she is no longer with this lover. The relationship ended for many reasons, none of them particularly about jealousy. Some readers were upset by this story when we included it in the first edition of this book—it’s not exactly cheerful and it doesn’t have a happy ending. But we are including it again anyway, because we think it’s important that our readers know that even accomplished sluts struggle with pain, miscommunication, mismatched desires, anger, and, yes, jealousy.

如今，距离道茜写下以上文字，已经过了十多年；道茜和那位女情侣，也已不再同居。导致这段亲密关系终止的原因有很多，但都和吃醋毫不相干。道茜的这段经历，在上世纪末的本书第一版中就有收录，一些读者看了，感到很失望、很不爽——因为这个故事，以令人不快的结局告终，没有振奋人心的内容。然而，本书的两位作者，无论如何也要在本书的第二版中，再次收录这个故事。因为我们希望读者能够晓得，即使修为再高的婊子，也难免有苦恋，有误解，有欲求不满，有愤恨难平，是的，也可能会妒火中烧，更难免为上述的种种，而竭力挣扎。

【练习题】回想反思你自己，和吃醋有关的经历

EXERCISE How Do You Experience Jealousy?

Set aside some time for introspection. Remember some times when you felt jealous, and write about how that felt. You may find your mind preoccupied with thoughts about what those other people were doing. It may take a little patience to go back to your own feelings: rage, grief, despair, desperation, anxiety; feelings of being lost, ugly, lonely, worthless; or whatever other feelings are particular to how you experience jealousy. We are often tempted to accuse ourselves about horrid feelings, as if we needed some sort of proper justification for feeling lousy. Try having some compassion for yourself when you feel so bad.

Or do a freewrite about jealousy—set a timer for five or ten minutes and just write down whatever comes into your mind. When you’re through writing, be kind to yourself. You might want to do this more than once, maybe over time, and keep it like a journal … to be read by you only, or maybe by a trusted friend or therapist.

Or write a letter to your jealousy. Ask it what it’s trying to accomplish. Ask it for advice. Then have your jealousy write a letter to you.

留出一些时间，进行自我内省。回想自己心怀醋意的经历，将其中的几次，动笔写下来，着重描写你当时的心理感受。也许你会发觉，此刻的自己，满脑子所想的，都是其他人的所作所为，张三李四王二麻子分别如何“胡来”，让你备受伤害。这就需要你多一些耐心，让自己的专注焦点，回归到你自己当时的感受，例如暴怒、伤心、绝望、不顾一切、焦虑不安，或者感到自己形同败犬、丑陋不堪、孤独无助、一无是处……总之，你在妒火中烧时的任何心理感受，都尽管写下来。我们长久所受的熏陶教育，往往让我们一旦有了极其负面的情绪，就将问题的根源指向自己，似乎我们唯有具备正当理由，才有情绪恶劣的资格。为此，当你心绪不佳时，才更要尽量多给自己一些同情。

除此之外，你也不妨针对“醋意”这个话题，随心所欲发挥，写点啥都可以。你需要设定5-10分钟的专门时间，在这段时间里，将脑海里闪现的一切，都写下来。在写下以上内容之时，不要在任何意义上苛责自己、否定自己，相反，要抚慰自己、善待自己。上述的书写，也许会让你多次重复；或者一次写下很多内容，对此欲罢不能；还可能每周或每月写一次，就像出杂志那样……此外，你既可以独自书写，也可以让你所信任的朋友或者心理治疗师，也参与进来。

你还可以写一封信，致以自己内心的醋意，问一问你心中的醋意：你究竟想要达成什么目的？你对我可有什么意见建议？——然后，再以“你的醋意”之名义，站在其立场上，给你写封回信。

醋意，究竟是什么？

What Is Jealousy?

We cannot ask this question too often. What is jealousy to you? Does jealousy really exist, and is it what we think it is? When we choose to confront the feeling of jealousy rather than run away from it, we can see more clearly what jealousy truly is for each of us. Jealousy is not an emotion. It can show up as grief or rage, hatred or self-loathing— jealousy is an umbrella word that covers the wide range of emotions we might feel when our partners make sexual connection with somebody else.

对这个问题，我们尽可不厌其烦地发问——没有“太多”，只有不够。醋意对你而言意味着什么，在你身上有哪些表现？醋意究竟是你真实存在的感受，还是你自认为“理当如此”的心魔？针对醋意上头的种种感受，一旦我们决心直接面对，而非逃避讳言，我们就能将醋意对自己的真实影响，由此看清、看透。醋意不是一种单纯的情绪，它可以表现为悲伤欲绝、怒火中烧、自暴自弃等多种形态。醋意这个词，就像一把大伞，将一系列不同的情绪都覆盖在里面——当我们的伴侣和其他人发生了性关系，我们内心的各种不爽，都能被装进“醋意”这个大箩筐。

Jealousy may be an expression of insecurity, fear of rejection, fear of abandonment, feeling left out, feeling not good enough, feeling inadequate, feeling awful. Your jealousy may be based in territoriality, or in competitiveness, or in some other emotion that’s clamoring to be heard under the jealous racket in your brain. Sometimes it may show up as blind screaming rage—and being blind can make it very difficult to see.

所谓的“醋意”，也许是对“不安全感”的外在表达。例如：担心自己被拒绝、被抛弃；觉得自己遭到冷落；感到这段关系美景不再，令自己欲求不满，既莫名恐慌又有一肚子邪火。你的妒火，可能是基于独占欲或者竞争心理，也可能是一直在你脑海深处发出呐喊的其他情绪，有一天突然爆发，喷射出被冠以“醋坛子”之名的火箭。有时，醋意的外在表现，就像“两眼一抹黑”地撒泼打滚——但其真正的原因，却令人难以觉察，因为这一切都是盲目的。

Dossie, when she first started thinking about and challenging her jealousy, felt an almost intolerable sense of insecurity, along the lines of “nobody will ever love me because something is wrong with me and I’m unlovable.” She discovered this about herself in the early years of feminism, so it fit perfectly with her feminist explorations to go to work on her self-esteem and build a foundation of security that didn’t need to be granted by another person and that no one else could take away. You can probably figure out how valuable a lesson this was and how many more uses she has found for feeling secure within herself. Thank you, jealousy—without this lesson she wouldn’t be confident enough to be writing this book.

本书作者之一道茜，在决心将“醋意”搞明白并且关进笼子时，她最初的情绪体验，是一种几乎无法忍受的不安，伴随着“自我罪错感”和“我不配得到爱”的妄念。之所以能够自我觉察，得益于道茜早年便已生根的女权主义萌芽。接下来，道茜对醋意的思考和行动，便可与她对女权主义的探索，彼此无缝对接，从而让她建立起无须别人首肯的自我价值感和个人安全感，铸就他人无法摧毁的自尊自信。相信你会从中意识到，这是多么有意义的一课，以及，拥有真正属于自己的内在安宁，有着多么深远的功用。谢谢你，醋意，正是上述这一课，让道茜拥有了能够写出这本书的自信。

If you experience your jealousy as insensate rage, then you might want to read something about anger, how other people are thinking about it, working with it, dealing successfully with it; perhaps you can take a course in anger management. Maybe you can come to terms with your anger. Maybe you can get to a place where you and your lovers need never fear your anger again. Wouldn’t that be worth working on? Many people find forms of jealousy in themselves that are actually pretty easy to deal with—nagging doubts, bits of nervousness about performance or body image. Others find themselves falling into a whirlpool of terror or grief, difficult even to look at, much less to tease apart into separate feelings like fear of abandonment or loss or rejection. Why do we sometimes feel this way? Dossie the therapist has a theory about this, based not only on her own experience but also that of many clients she has worked with on these issues.

如果醋意对你而言，是狂怒发飙的体验，那你大概就需要阅读一些解读和控制怒气的书籍，了解下其他人如何看待怒气、如何与怒气和平共存、如何成功地应对怒气；也许你应该学一学如何管控怒气的相关课程。这样，你就有望和内心的怒气达成和解；或许，你能找到一个安全空间，在那里，无论你还是你的爱人，都无须担心你的怒火发作。以上种种，难道不值得我们为之努力争取吗？有些人会由此发觉，某些类型的醋意，比如碎碎念式的疑虑，或者对自己形象气质的神经质焦虑，其实根本不难应对。但也会有另一些人，感觉自己仿佛跌入一个名曰恐惧或者悲哀的旋涡乱流，连正视它都很困难，遑论对自己情绪的梳理（例如你究竟在担心什么？害怕被抛弃，害怕失落感，还是怕被拒绝？）。——我们为何会时常陷入这样的感知模式？作为心理治疗师的道茜，对此有一套理论，既源于自己的切身经历，也融入众多来访客户，和她一起共同应对相关问题的经验。

Jealousy is often the mask worn by the most difficult inner conflict you have going on right now, a conflict that’s crying out to be resolved and you don’t even know it. Because it’s rooted so deeply, it can be incredibly difficult to stay aware when jealousy peeks over the horizon: we twist and turn and writhe in our attempts to not feel it. This is when your emotions are most likely to bring you to grief—when you believe that you need to avoid feeling them at any cost.

醋意，往往只是一个表面的幌子，其深层实质，是你当下最难处理的内在冲突：一方面已经濒临井喷；另一方面，你对其中的深层问题，全然无知。上述的内在冲突，在你心中扎根很深，当流于外表的“醋意”浮出水面、呈现出来，更深层的问题就格外难以被觉察——因为此时，我们的意图被“扭曲、翻滚”得面目全非，而真正的内在自我，变得晦暗不明。一旦情绪发作，往往就会让你陷入悲哀，道理就在于此。——切记，你越是坚持“我要不惜一切代价，避免这种情况发生”，醋意为你带来的悲哀，会越发严重。

One way to not-feel a feeling is to project it onto your partner. Projection is a psychological defense that involves trying to move a painful feeling outside yourself by running your emotional movie on someone else, as if that person were a screen for your fears and fantasies and not a human being. It may be that this is the only real definition of jealousy: it’s the experience of projecting one’s uncomfortable feelings onto one’s partner.

有一种常见的“精神麻醉法”，是将某种情绪，投射向你的亲密伴侣。情感投射是一种心理防御，将那些令你痛苦的“剧情”，从自己身上扔出去，丢到其他人身上“播放”，仿佛对方不是和你一样的人类，而是你的一块幕布，用来承载你的疑惧和狂想。这也是许针对“醋意”的最可靠定义：把令自己不适的情绪，投射向自己的伴侣。

But here’s some good news. If you recognize yourself in any of this, then some part of you has decided that you are strong enough to acknowledge the underlying emotion, and that means you’re in an excellent position to do some healing right now. Use your jealousy as a signpost: “Work on this feeling here!” Take a class, join a group, find a good therapist, start practicing meditation—go to work on yourself. You have a golden opportunity, so make the most of it. You could get a whole lot of bang for your buck if you do the work that’s presenting itself now: heal old wounds, open up new possibilities, gain health and freedom from fear…and somewhere in there, almost as a bonus, you get to grasp your sexual freedom as well.

然而，以下是一些好消息。当你有了某种程度的自我觉察，接下来，你的一部分脑回路，就会打定主意：“我对自己内心的情绪暗流，可以足够坚强地坦然面对。”这意味着此刻的你，已经启动了自我治愈的绝佳程序。醋意的妒火，照亮了今后的路标——“化解这种感受背后的问题，是我接下来的努力方向！”你可以去参加相关的心理课程、互助小组，也可以找个靠谱的心理医师，或者尝试着冥想沉思，和自己的心灵对话。醋意，让你拥有了一个真正为自己做点实事的最佳时机，一定要尽量发挥其最大效益。只要你真正去做，物超所值的收益就会显而易见：旧日的创伤得以治愈，全新的可能由此开启，将曾经的恐惧转化为健康和自由的坚实地基。其中还蕴含着一个大彩蛋，你总会在某个地方发现——你对性爱的自由，从此掌控在自己之手。

Sometimes what we perceive as jealousy is actually something else. Think through the details of how jealousy works in you. What bothers you the most? Is it that you don’t want your partner to do those things with someone else or that you do want your partner to do them with you? Jealousy might actually be envy, and envy is often very easy to fix: why not make a date with your lover to do what you have just discovered you are missing?

有时，我们所自以为的“醋意”，其实是另外的东西。结合前因后果，彻头彻尾地想一想，醋意是怎样在你身上发生作用的，例如，为你带来最大困扰的，究竟是什么？究竟是“我不想让我的伴侣，和其他人做那些事”，还是“我想让我的伴侣，和我做那些事”？醋意的实质，也许是求而不得的羡慕嫉妒，而羡慕嫉妒的感受，也不难妥善安置：如果你忽然发现，你和自己的伴侣之间，刚刚错过了什么好事，那就赶快和ta商量个日子，一起去做吧！

Sometimes jealousy is rooted in feelings of grief and loss, which can be harder to interpret. We have been taught by our culture that when our partner has sex with another, we have lost something. Not to sound dumb, but we are confused. What have we lost? When our partners come home from hot dates, often they are excited and turned on and have some new ideas they would like to try out at home. We fail to see what we lose in this situation.

有时，醋意的根源，是伤心和失落，这样的感受，经常格外难以言表。我们都难以摆脱社会主流文化的如此洗脑：“如果我们的爱侣，和其他人发生了性关系，就意味着我们受到了损失。”别看这话傻逼至极，却经常把我们忽悠得找不到北。可是话说回来，我们“戴绿帽子”，究竟有何损失呢？当爱侣结束了一场和外人的性感派对，回到你身边，往往不但很开心，而且还有一些新奇的玩法，想要和你分享。这种情况，我们根本无法找出“谁受了什么损失”。

Or the sense of loss you feel might be the loss of an ideal, a picture you have been holding in your head of what a perfect, monogamous relationship might look like. It may be helpful to remember that all relationships change through time: people’s needs and desires shift according to age and circumstance, and the most successful long-term relationships are the ones with enough flexibility to redefine themselves over and over again through the years.

也许你会感到，你所损失的是一种“理想状态”，是你执著以求的“完美图景”——大抵无非是一对一的封闭专偶关系。针对上述情况，一剂很好的解药，是切莫忘记：“一切亲密关系，都可能因时而变。”这意味着，随着年龄和境遇的变迁，每个人的需求和欲望，也会有所转变；而那些持久保鲜的亲密关系，通常都有着极其强大的灵活性，能够不断重新定义自身，或曰自我重塑，从而经得起漫长岁月的风吹雨打、大浪淘沙。

Occasionally, our discomfort means that we are becoming aware on an intuitive level that our partner is moving away from us, and it might be true that we are losing the relationship we cherish. That does happen. The fact that supposedly monogamous people everywhere often leave one partner for what they perceive as greener grass with another is not much consolation when it happens to you.

有些时候，我们酸溜溜的不适感，是因为我们凭着直觉，发觉伴侣有意疏远自己——这大概表明，我们所珍视的亲密关系，即将由此丧失。上述的疑虑，的确会成为现实。据说所谓的用情专一，无非是瞒着自己的伴侣，和更有魅力的其他人在一起——然而如果那个被单独留下的伴侣，恰好就是你，上述的俏皮话，就很难用来自我安慰，反倒成了一杯苦酒。

We watched a friend of ours go through feelings of deep grief and loss when she perceived that her partner’s lover was trying, nearly successfully, to abscond with her partner. In this case, her pain threw a spotlight on some dishonesty and manipulation on the part of the third party and gave her partner the strength to break off from the outside lover and to find other lovers who had greater respect for his primary bond. On the other hand, this scenario might just as easily have ended in a breakup; we’ll talk more about breakups, and dealing with them ethically with care for your own and your partner’s feelings, in chapter 20,“The Ebb and Flow of Relationships.”

本书的两位作者，亲眼目睹了一位我俩共同的朋友，经历了一场严重的哀伤和失落。那是因为她发觉自己的伴侣，被外面的情人引诱，双方险些合谋甩掉自己。而在这个事件中，那位朋友的痛苦感受，让“第三者”的一些虚伪言行和操控意图，都露出马脚；这也促使她的伴侣奋然醒悟，痛下决心和那个情人分了手，随后，又遇到了另一些能够尊重接纳其家庭关系、而不想“拆散其原有家庭进而将其独占”的其ta情人，从而开启了更好的多边恋爱。但从另一个方面看，上述的剧情，并非普遍适用的万能公式，相反，导致与最爱之人关系破裂的风险，同样不容忽视。针对与爱人分手——如何以道德无亏、有情有义的方式，处理好此事，并照顾好伴侣的情绪——请参看本书第20章，“亲密关系：潮起潮落，缘生缘灭，在所难免”。

Jealousy might also be associated with feelings of competitiveness and wanting to be number one. There’s a reason there is no Olympics of sex: sexual achievement is not measurable. We cannot rank each and every one of us on some hierarchical ladder of who is or is not the most desirable or the better fuck. What a horrid idea! Your authors want to live in a world where each person’s sexuality is valued for its own sake, not for how it measures up to any standard beyond our own pleasure. If you find out about something that you would like to add to your own repertoire, you can certainly learn to do it without wasting time trashing yourself for not already having known how.

醋意还可能和竞争心态——想要成为某个人心中的“头号情侣”——有关。然而天底下从来没有针对性爱的奥运赛事，道理也显而易见：性爱的成败高下，根本没有衡量尺度。我们无法按照“对谁最多心动，和谁最想上床”之类的等级阶梯，对身边的每一个人，作出明确无疑的排序；上述排序方案，纯粹是鬼扯淡。本书的两位作者，都希望生活在这样的世界：人人都能享受性爱，性快乐的唯一目的就是性快乐本身，而不要让性爱去迎合某种“高于性快乐”的外在规范。当然，如果你想要为自己的性爱套餐，加点其他类型的调料，一点问题也没有——这和被性爱之外的其他因素“牵着鼻子走”，懵懵懂懂地让性爱异化为内耗，是毫不相关的两码事。

Fear of being sexually inadequate can add up to a very deep and secret wound. But allow us to reassure you that eventually, when you succeed in establishing the lifestyle you are dreaming about, you will be so familiar with so many different individuals’ ways of expressing sexuality that you will no longer have to wonder how your sexuality compares to another’s; you’ll know from direct experience. Great lovers are made, not born. You can learn from your lovers, and your lovers’ lovers, and your lovers’ lovers’ lovers, to be the sexual superstar you would like to be.

对“性匮乏” 【比如担心自己一旦错过眼前这个人，今后再也没人要、没人爱——译者注】 的恐惧，难免让醋意之苦雪上加霜，为你带来既深入骨髓又难以启齿的创伤。笔者希望你能够明确：归根结底，只要你真正活出你所希望的样子，针对其他人各不相同的性观念、性口味、性生活方式，你都不会大惊小怪，都能像老司机一样熟练应对；同时，你会专注于自己的生命体验，并从中感悟到：根本没必要将自己和“性”（广义）有关的林林总总，去和其他人做比较，更不要再去纠结于此。真正懂得爱与被爱的人，是后天习得的，而非天生如此的。你的情侣，或者你情侣的其ta情侣，情侣的情侣的情侣，都可以成为你吸取经验教训的素材，让你如己所愿，成为性爱达人。

翻转醋缸，解构醋意

Unlearning Jealousy

To change the way you experience a feeling takes time, so expect a gradual process, learning as you go, by trial and error. And there will be trials, and you will make errors.

内在的改变，是个需要花些时间的渐进过程，还要摸着石头过河，不断试错，积累经验。难关肯定会有很多，你需要做的，是不断碰壁、死磕。

Start by giving yourself permission to learn. Allow yourself to not know what you don’t know, to be ignorant; Buddhists call this beginner’s mind. You must allow yourself to make mistakes; you have no choice. So reassure yourself: there is no graceful way to unlearn jealousy. It’s kind of like learning to skate—you have to fall down and make a fool of yourself a few times before you become as graceful as a swan. The challenge comes in learning to establish within yourself a strong foundation of internal security that is not dependent on sexual exclusivity or ownership of your partner. This difficult work is part of the larger question of how to grasp your personal power and learn to understand and love yourself without such a desperate need for another person to validate you. You become free to give and receive validation, not from need or obligation, but from love and caring.

让自己尽管去尝试，这是第一步。坦诚接纳自己的迷茫懵懂，从而求知若愚：佛家称之为“初发心”。 【“初发心”源自《华严经》，“初心”一词即滥觞于此。在美国，日裔禅僧铃木俊隆的弘法传播，使其英译短语（beginner's mind）成为广为人知的佛教语汇。——译者注】 你必须允许自己做错，除此之外别无选择。你需要告诫自己：将醋意从根源上解构掉，没有任何一条轻便捷径，能够让你继续端着架子、全程保持优雅。这在一定程度上就像学滑冰——那些在冰面上跳天鹅湖的优雅之人，之前都曾像傻逼一样，一而再再而三地摔个狗吃屎。其中一个困难挑战，是你必须学会建立起一种自给自足、坚固强大的内在安全感：这种内在的安全，既不依赖于对伴侣的性独占，也不依赖于对伴侣的“拥有”感。打通这一关，也只是解决了一个大难题的一小部分，那个更大的难题是：如何不再渴求被其他人所认可，真正学会自我理解、自我关爱，并且能够妥善管控好自身的力量，不要暴走发飙。这样一来，你无论得到别人的认可，还是将这种认可，给予其ta人，都能收放自如——上述的认可，不是必需品，亦非“人情债”，而是出于爱意和关心。

We suggest most strongly that you put some effort into learning to validate yourself: believe us, you’re worth it.

笔者最高级别的强烈建议，莫过于希望你多花些功夫，真正学会肯定自己、认可自己。切记，你配得上这些自我肯定、自我认同。

Many people find that as they develop their polyamorous families, they actually get validation from lots and lots of people and thus become less dependent on their partner’s approval. Their needs and their sources of nourishment get spread out over a wider territory.

那些建立起多边恋爱的稳定家庭之人，往往都会觉察到，自己不断得到很多人的认可、肯定，这样一来，就能降低对“被伴侣认可”的心理依赖。这样的人群，其需求，及其身心滋养的来源，都变得更加宽广，边界再大也会被超越。

为你的妒火“釜底抽薪”

Disempowering Your Jealousy

We can’t tell you how to banish jealousy or how to exorcise it as if it were a demon. It may be your inner demon, but it is not a cancer that you can cut out. It is a part of you, a way that you express fear and hurt. What you can do is change the way you experience jealousy and learn to deal with it as you learn to deal with any emotion: work with it until it becomes, not overwhelming and not exactly pleasant, but tolerable; a mild disturbance, a warm summer shower rather than a typhoon.

我们无法告诉你，如何消除吃醋一闪念，或者如何像驱魔一样让醋意退散。醋缸的妒火，大抵可说是你的心魔，但它无法像肿瘤一样被手术切割。它是你的一部分，是你表述出恐惧和伤痛的一种方式。对此，你所能够做到的，是改变你对醋意的感受方式，并且学会妥善应对——就像你需要学会处理好其他任何情绪，是一个道理。你只管带着这种情绪，尽自己的努力，直到逐渐实现良好的情绪控制；所谓的良好，不是对其无法抗拒，也不完全是欣然接受，而是控制在一个可以容忍的范围；或者说，是一种轻度的不适，就像大夏天洗热水澡，但绝非像台风那样凶猛。

One woman we talked to had some very good ideas about what you can do about jealousy:

一位曾与笔者交谈过的女人，就“针对自己心中的醋意，我们可以做些什么”，有一些非常好的点子：

I notice that jealousy comes and goes, depending on how good I feel about myself. When I’m not taking care of getting what I want, it’s easy to get jealous and think that someone else is getting what I am not. I need to remember that it’s my job to get my needs met. I feel the jealousy, but I’m not willing to act on it, so it mostly goes away.

我留意到，吃醋与否，取决于我对自己的感受。当我没有针对自己的欲求，做好自我关爱，这时就很容易认为别人抢走了我的奶酪，对别人妒火中烧。然而，我需要牢记，满足自己的需求，我自己才是第一和唯一的责任人。当我感受到自己的醋意，就会明确意识到绝不能“赖在醋缸里”，让它主导我的行动。这样一来，醋意通常就会离我而去。

Once you have made a commitment to refuse to act on your jealousy, you become free to start reducing the amount of power you let your jealousy have over you. One way to do this is simply by allowing yourself to feel it. Just feel it. It will hurt, and you will feel frightened and confused, but if you sit still and listen to yourself with compassion and support for the scared child inside, the first thing you will learn is that the experience of jealousy is survivable. You have the strength to get through it.

只要你下定决心，让自己的言行，绝不能被醋意所支配，你就等于释放了自己，从而降低了醋意的破坏力，让妒火再也难以掌控你的身心。要想做到这点，一个简单的方法，是任由自己去感受吃醋之时的各种情绪——只管去感受这一切，其他什么也不用做。这难免会很痛苦，还会令你惊慌失措；但是，只要你静坐不动，倾听自己的心声，并且对自己心中那个“受到惊吓的小孩”，充满同情并予以安抚，你首先能够从中领悟的道理是：经受醋意的煎熬，并非“要了亲命”的大事。换言之，醋意之苦根本没啥，你有足够的力量可以挺过去。

A large part of our difficulties with jealousy comes from our attempts to avoid feeling a scary or painful emotion. Perhaps long ago when we were children, truly powerless in the world and with a very limited set of tools for dealing with our emotions, we felt something scary and told ourselves, “I will never feel this again, it’s too awful, I’ll die, I’ll kill myself.” So we stick the feeling, and the event that inspired it, into something like a pot, and put the lid on good and tight. As the years go by, whenever something comes along that reminds us of what’s in the pot, that rattles the lid a little, we push down on that lid. “Gotta keep the lid on that pot,” we tell ourselves—we may not even remember why. And the pressure builds and builds, not so much from what’s in the pot as from our frantic struggles to keep the lid on.

克服醋意的一大难点，源于我们逃避负面情绪（如恐惧、悲苦）的企图。或许在我们久远的幼年，确曾无力无助，缺乏应对各种情绪的手段，所以难免这样想：“我再也不想经历这样的情绪了，太难受了，简直要了亲命，生不如死！”为此，我们刻意阻断此类感受，以及引发此类感受的事件，仿佛将这些东西都塞进罐子里，盖上盖子关严实。随着时间的推移，无论发生任何事，只要唤起我们对“罐中危险品”的回忆，仿佛将罐子盖轻轻叩响，我们就会对自己说：“赶快把罐子，捂得更严实！”——我们不断如此重复，甚至忘记了究竟意义何在。与此同时，我们心中的罐子，承受的压力越来越大，不是因为里面装了太多东西，而是因为总被慌慌张张的双手，连捂带压得太紧。

When we grow up and we need to take the lid off so that we can deal with our emotional reality as an adult, it can feel really scary. But surprisingly, often when we actually look at what’s in our pot and feel it, it’s much more manageable than we had feared. You can indeed open your pots, look at what’s bubbling away in there, and then put the lid back on. Your old defenses will continue to work just fine when you want them to.

当我们长大了，需要将心中的罐子打开——唯有如此，才能像个成年人一样，妥善应对现实生活中的情绪问题——这时候的痛苦感受，难免令人畏缩不前。然而令人惊喜的是，往往我们只要真正看到“罐子”里的东西，真正感受到它们，它们就会变得更容易驾驭；过去对它们的恐惧，纯属自己吓唬自己的多余。你尽管将心中的“罐子”开启吧，看看里面叮当乱响的，究竟是些什么东西。然后，你也可以再把罐子合上——你由来已久的心理防线，当你需要的时候，依然可以照常运转。

We have heard sluts accuse each other of being jealous as if it were a crime: “See? Look at you! You’re jealous, aren’t you? Don’t try to deny it!” It is particularly important that you own your jealousy, to yourself and to your intimates. If you try to pretend that you are not jealous when you are, others will perceive you as dishonest, or worse yet, they may believe you and see no need to support or protect you—because you’re fine, right? If you pretend to yourself that you are not jealous when you are, then your own emotions may try devious routes to bring themselves to your attention, manifesting themselves as intensely irrational anger, unreasonable behavior, crushing anxiety over anything at all, temper tantrums, crying fits, or even physical illness.

笔者曾听到一些性爱非常开放的老婊，将吃醋当作一种罪错，以此相互指责：“看见没？瞧瞧你自己吧，你分明是在吃醋，不是吗？别欲盖弥彰啦！”在此明确地说，你需要对自己的醋意担负全部责任，无论其影响仅限于自身，还是波及到你的亲密关系。当你确实心怀醋意，却对此试图掩盖，其他人就可能觉察到你的虚伪；而更糟糕的可能是，别人对你的伪装信以为真，认为你一切安好，无需帮助也无需保护。如果明明妒火中烧，却装作若无其事，你的情绪就会形成幽僻的暗流，显现出其他的形态，例如毫无来由的暴怒、无理取闹的行径、万事皆废的焦虑、抽疯发飙的狗怂脾气、歇斯底里的大哭大叫，乃至身体发生病变。

When you deny your jealousy to yourself, you take from yourself the opportunity to be compassionate with yourself, to offer yourself support and comfort. When you deny jealousy, or any other difficult emotion, you put yourself in a harsh and difficult landscape, full of pitfalls and land mines. “Acting out” means doing things you don’t understand, driven by emotions you have refused to be aware of. Denying your jealousy can lead you to act out harsh feelings in ways you will regret later.

当你明明醋火攻心，却不肯承认这个事实，你无异于放弃了对自己的同情，放弃了对自己的支持和抚慰。无论是醋意，还是其他任何令你痛苦的情绪，如果你假装它不存在，就等于把自己置于遍布陷坑和地雷的严酷境地。（心理学意义上的）“付诸行动”（acting out )一词，指的是你在某种情绪的驱使下，不明不白不清不楚地做出一些事；而那种情绪，往往是你不愿坦诚面对、不肯自我觉察的。明明醋意发作却故意“蒙席盖井”，会让你通过令自己后悔的方式，将憋在心里的邪火“付诸行动”喷发出来。

Sometimes acting out takes the form of making ultimatums about what your partner may and may not do or, worse, trying to enforce retroactive “agreements” by getting all righteously indignant about how anybody could have figured out that it wasn’t okay to take Bob to the movie you wanted to see, and aren’t both of them inconsiderate and rotten? You cannot deal constructively with jealousy by making the other guys wrong. Foisting your feelings off on your partners is a dead end strategy; it just plain won’t work. Jealousy is an emotion that arises inside you; no person and no behavior can “make” you jealous. Like it or not, the only person who can make that jealousy hurt less or go away is you.

“付诸行动”的表现，有时可能是强行要求伴侣，今后“只能这样，不能那样”，就像给伴侣下达“最后通牒”。另一种更糟的做法，是把陈年旧账的“协议”翻出来，让针对伴侣和其他人一起看电影之类的事情而大发雷霆，变得“正当有理”。——上述两种，都是不顾伴侣感受的卑劣行径。“把错误推到别人身上”，这种应对醋意的方式，无法取得建设性的结果。把自己的感受强加于伴侣，这种“策略”非但于事无补，而且无异于作茧自缚、玩火自焚。醋意仅仅是你自己的心魔业火，自业自得；其他人无论是谁，无论做了什么，都无法把一个大醋坛子“搬运”到你的心里。无论你是否乐于接受，事实都明摆着：只有你自己，才能让心中的醋意，降低伤害，乃至化解消弭。

Listening to someone who is feeling jealous can be difficult, particularly when the jealousy is focused on you. Sometimes when a lover is jealous and in pain, you may find it easier to feel angry and push that person away, rather than staying close, staying in empathy, listening, caring. When you blame this person for being jealous, what you’re really saying is that you can’t stand to listen to how much your beloved hurts when you’re on the way out the door to play with someone else. This seeming indifference is a crummy way to avoid dealing with your own feelings of guilt.

面对一个心怀醋意之人，倾听其心声，往往很困难——尤其是当你聚焦于醋意本身，将其作为问题核心。你也许会发觉，很多时候，当爱人跟你吃醋、心情痛苦时，你最省事的应对方式，是怒气冲冲地甩开ta，扬长而去；这比待在ta身边，感同身受地倾听和抚慰，简单有效得多。不过你也要意识到，当你责怪此人“不该吃醋”，你真正的言外之意是：这位爱人对你所倾倒的苦水，你已经不耐烦去倾听，尤其不想让这种事，耽误了你和其他人寻欢作乐。——如此故作漠不关心，即使能够让你逃避内心的歉意，也无疑是一种低水准、不道德的做法。

There are easier solutions. Feelings like to be listened to—other people’s feelings, and your own. Once you understand that you are doing something constructive when you just listen, or ask someone else to just listen to you, you can get those troublesome feelings out in the open and learn to satisfy them. The idea is to be nice to your feelings, to welcome them as guests, till they feel finished and move on through. If this sounds familiar to you, if you have experienced times like this in your life, we recommend that you practice the skill of staying quietly with both your own and your lover’s pain. Remember, you don’t have to fix anything: all you have to do is listen, to yourself or another, and understand that this hurts. Period.

真正简单有效的应对方法，是真心愿意倾听其ta人，同时也希望得到对方的倾听；当你用心倾听ta人的情感，也是在倾听你自己的心声。当你真正懂得，单纯的倾听，以及明确要求你的心里话得到别人的倾听，这是一件颇有建设性的事情，你就能够将种种负面情绪释放出去，并且解决其背后的欲求不满。这样一来，就能让内心的各种感受，都顺其自然，任由它们像客人一样乘兴而来尽兴而归，我自海纳百川，淡定从容。以上这番话，如果令你感觉很熟悉，或者你曾亲身体验过类似情形，那么，笔者建议你，将上述技能不断付诸实践——静坐在伴侣身旁，倾听彼此的苦衷。切记，你并不需要去解决什么问题，你所唯一需要去做的，就是倾听，倾听对方也是倾听自我，尽量去理解彼此的辛酸苦辣。仅此而已。

Janet and a life partner had a difficult moment when she first told him that she was in love with one of her lovers.

本书作者之一珍妮特，和她的一位关系长久的伴侣，曾有过一段痛苦的时光——当时，珍妮特第一次告诉这位伴侣，自己还有很多炮友，并且和其中的一个炮友，发展为爱情关系。

I’d been seeing this woman for a while and realized, much to my surprise, that my feelings toward her had gone beyond simple sexual friendship and into a deep romantic emotion that I identified as being in love. When I told my life partner about this, I think his first impulse was to feel threatened, insecure, and, yes, jealous. I could feel him getting close to exploding. It was hard for me not to try to fix things, to take back what I’d said about being in love, or to simply leave the discussion altogether because I felt scared and guilty.

我良久凝望着那个女炮友，蓦然发觉我对她的感情，已经超越了单纯的炮友关系，变成了一种深入内心的浪漫——我知道，我爱上了她。当我将此事，告诉了和我长期一起生活的“老伴儿”，我想，他的第一反应是吃惊、不安，当然还有醋意。我能感受到，他正处在情绪爆发的边缘。当时的我，深感恐惧和内疚，试图做些什么来“弥补过失”，想要收回我方才说过的“爱上别人”的话语，或者只求避开争执。

But he stayed on course, allowing the feelings to present themselves, but not allowing them to drive him into acting angry or defensive. He asked me some questions about what exactly this meant to us, and I was able to explain that I wasn’t planning to leave him, that my love for her was in no way a threat to my love for him, that she and I weren’t expecting to become primary partners—that, really, nothing had changed except my own emotions and the words I was using to describe them. We went on to revisit this discussion from time to time, especially when our busy schedules permitted me to spend some extra time with my lover.

但他却平静地待在那里。他没有掩饰自己的糟糕情绪，但也没有任由情绪爆发化作怒火，也没有存心设防。他问我：“这件事对我俩之间，究竟意味着什么？”于是，我也得以对他解释：“我并没有和他分手的打算，我和那个女友的爱情，绝非对他的威胁，我和她都并不打算发展为凌驾于其他伴侣之上的首要亲密关系。——这就意味着，根本没有发生任何实质性的改变，除了我的内心为此而波动，以及我需要遣词造句来描述这种感受。” 后来，我和他针对上述的讨论，多次进行复盘，尤其是在我俩都有很多空闲，去和其ta情人寻欢作乐的时段。

She and I drifted apart fairly easily later on as we moved on to other things in our lives … and, for that matter, so did he and I, less easily. But all three of us who were involved in that particular triangle can look back with pride at the way we gave each other the space and respect we needed to process a change that at first felt terribly threatening to us all.

那个女爱人，不久便云淡风轻地和我分了手，彼此各奔前程；但无论我自己，还是我的“老伴儿”，针对这件事，都长久难以释怀。但无论如何，处于三角关系的我们三人，回首往事都能够为之自豪——我们都能尊重彼此，给与彼此空间，来面对这场“变故”，将起初的灾难性预判，消弭于无形。

You can feel jealousy without acting on it. In fact, flying into a rage and breaking all the crockery, or calling your lover’s lover and hanging up every fifteen minutes during your first sleepless night, or picking a fight with whoever’s handy actually won’t help you feel better. All these are things that people do in order to not feel jealous, in order to not feel scared and small. Anger can help us feel powerful when we use it to push vulnerable feelings away, but it won’t actually make us stronger or safer.

由此可见，我们完全可以让内心的醋意，免于恶性爆发，也就是不会“付诸行动”。当场大发雷霆、摔盘砸碗，或者整夜不睡觉，每隔十五分钟就给你情人的情人打一通电话，甚至把身边能找来的人都找来，大家一起掰扯干架……这些做法，往往被用来平息妒火，用来避免让自己感到惊慌失措、一无是处，但在事实上，都无法真正改善你的内心感受。通过发脾气，我们可以将自己的脆弱，暂时抛诸脑后，但这并不等于我们真正变得更强大、更坚不可摧。

When you hold still with your jealousy, you will find that it is possible to feel something difficult without doing anything you don’t choose to do. You will have taken your second step at disempowering your jealousy. You’ve told your jealousy that you will not allow it to drive you to do anything that might destroy your loving relationships.

如果你在醋火攻心时，保持沉着镇定，你就会由此发觉，在心情恶劣时，你完全能够忍住冲动，不做令你后悔之事。你无异于对自己心中的醋坛子，作出明确告知：“你休想操控我，让我亲手摧毁自己的爱恋关系。”

Khalil Gibran wrote something truly profound about the nature of pain: “Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.”

黎巴嫩裔作家纪伯伦（1883—1931)，针对痛苦的本质，有这样一段深刻的描述：“你的认知被封锁在硬壳里，而你的痛苦，是那个硬壳的破裂过程。”

宛如急浪中的木筏

WHITEWATER RAFTING

So here you are, shell cracked, with waves of pain washing over you. What do you do? Get as comfortable as you can, and see how you can learn to ride those waves instead of drowning under them. Gather up the courage to feel what you’re feeling. Explore your feelings, nourish them, treasure them—they are the most essential part of you.

读到这里的你，认知的硬壳破裂了，伴随着渗入灵魂的阵痛浪潮。接下来，你该怎么做呢？尽管让自己舒适放松，且看你自己，将如何学会在“苦海”中乘风破浪、激流勇进，而非沉溺于其中。充分调动起你的勇气，直面你的感受。对你的一切感受，深入探究，悉心滋养，视如珍宝——因为这些感受，是你最为本质的组成部分。

Be good to yourself, and remember that the most important part of love is not loving someone’s beauty and strength and virtue. The real test of love is when someone sees our weaknesses, our stupidities, and our smallnesses and still loves us. This unconditional love is what we want from our lovers, and we should expect no less from ourselves. Experiencing painful feelings is not a moral issue—it is in no way“wrong” to feel what you feel and to want what you want. Only actions can be crimes. Let us repeat that one: emotions are never wrong; only actions can be wrong. Emotions are an expression of our emotional truth, and truth cannot be wrong. Nor do they need to be justified. They just need to be felt.

关于“爱自己”，我们要切记：爱的核心，绝非贪慕某个人的美貌、力量和人品；爱的真正试金石，是当某个人看到你的软弱、愚蠢和卑微时，依然对你深情不渝。我们都希望情侣，能够如此无条件地爱自己——那么，我们对自己的关爱，应当比对情人之爱的期许，有过之而无不及才是。痛苦的情感体验，无关道德是非，无论你的心中作何感受、有何渴求，都绝非“做错了什么”。唯有付之行动，才可能酿成罪错。我们有必要再重复一遍：没有错误的情感，只有错误的行动。情感所彰显的，是我们内心的真相，既然是“真”，就没有“错”。为此，对任何情感，都无需对任何人解释什么，无需向谁“自证清白”；你只需用心感受自己的种种情感，如此便可。

Remember, as you look at yourself, to look kindly, and also remember that you are not balancing a checkbook: anything you see that you don’t like, or that you want to change, is not a debit that you subtract from your virtues. When you learn to reflect on your strengths, it becomes easier to look at your weaknesses with acceptance and compassion. Keep your virtues at their full value, and cherish them.

切记，自我审视一定要用温柔、善意的目光，而非自我苛责；尤其不要忘记，你绝不是在平衡账簿的收支——你对自己不满意的部分，和想要自我改变的部分，并非令你的长处或曰“资产”，为此有所贬值的“负债”。当你学会对自己的优点进行反思，就更容易抱着平常心，看待自己的不足，并且能够接纳和关爱自己的全部。

Start by setting yourself the task of getting through a short period of time with your jealousy, like an evening or an afternoon when your partner may be off with another. Make a pact with yourself that you will stay with your feelings, whatever they may be, for this brief time. If a whole evening or night seems like too long, start with five or ten minutes, then arrange to distract yourself with a video or whatever.

现在就开始实操实干吧：花点时间，想一想如果你的伴侣从你身边离开，去和其ta人约炮，你会作何感受——只管去感受你的醋意，任凭醋意在你心中“自由来去”，这样你就挺过了妒火的煎熬，或者说克服了它。在此过程中，和自己作个约定：无论你产生了何种感受，都顺其自然，泰然处之。如果让你花一个下午或者一个晚上，去做这件事，也许时间太长了，那就先给自己设定5～10分钟，专时专用；时间结束后，赶快去做点别的事，比如刷视频，分分神、散散心，以免让自己一直沉浸在方才的情绪里。

这也许比你的预想，更容易搞定

IT MIGHT BE EASIER THAN YOU THOUGHT

One of the possible, and indeed common, outcomes will be that your partner will go off on a date with another and you will feel just fine. Surprise! Your anticipation may have been a lot worse than the actual event. Experienced sluts often find that they feel jealous only now and then. When they do experience jealousy, they examine these specific experiences to see what they can learn about themselves, and then brainstorm strategies to make this particular sort of event safer and easier.

有一种其实很常见的可能情况，是当你的伴侣准备和其ta人约炮时，你根本没有负面感受，没觉得有啥可说。这并不奇怪，因为针对一件事，你的自我预判可能会很糟，但如果这件事真的发生了，可能对你而言，其实根本没啥。很多经验丰富的老婊，都会发觉吃醋的感觉，对自己而言，只是偶发现象。当ta们发觉自己确实心怀醋意时，ta们往往会回顾与之类似的既往经历，设想如何从中汲取可行经验，妥善平息当下的问题。

One couple we talked to is working to maintain their primary relationship in a diffcult situation: One of them is out of town most of the time on business, and thus much of their activity with other partners takes place under circumstances that prevent them from reconnecting physically afterward. One of their agreements is that they talk on the phone every single night, regardless of where they are or how busy they are. Often, their conversations take place after one of them has spent time connecting with an outside partner. One of them notes that during these conversations,

笔者和一对亲密关系在艰难处境下得以长期维持的伴侣，有过一些交流。这对伴侣中的其中一位，经常出差在外，这样一来，他俩往往只能各自和其ta情侣发生多边关系，而这些多边关系，很难让他俩在有身体接触的前提下共同参与。这对伴侣之间有很多条约定，其中的一条是，无论双方各自有多忙，每天晚上都要互通电话。一般而言，双方的电话交谈，都是在各自寻花问柳的空闲时间。这对伴侣的其中一人，就上述交流，有以下记录：

He allows my feelings. I don’t hesitate to say anything I want; in fact, he encourages me to. I’ve found that just being allowed to say these things, to talk about my jealousy and sadness, somehow defuses them. They lose a lot of their power because they meet no resistance from him; he just listens to them and lets them be.

他对我的所有感受，都充分接纳。和他说话，我没有任何顾虑；事实上，他一直鼓励我“怎么想就怎么说”。这让我明确意识到，我可以将自己心中的醋意和酸楚，都对他合盘道出，而这样一来，醋意之苦也能在一定程度上有所缓解。那些醋意和负面情绪，因为没有遇到阻抗，而变得微弱无力；他什么也没做，只是倾听我的声音，让我的一切情绪都顺其自然。

用心感受你的一切情绪

FEEL YOUR FEELINGS

Painful feelings, even the most intense of them, have a tendency to run their course if you let them, so an initial strategy is to make yourself as comfortable as possible and wait. Find your jealous feelings—hurt or anger or whatever—and let them flow through you, like a river. Your mind may be racing with nasty thoughts, angry, blaming,focusing on some detail that you’re absolutely certain those other people did wrong, obsessing on believing that someone is taking advantage of you or riding roughshod over your naked emotions. You hurt a lot, so surely it must be somebody’s fault! But sometimes there is great pain and there is no villain. Allow us to reassure you: we all go through this. Don’t die of shame, just let these thoughts run through you, too.

形形色色的痛苦情绪——哪怕是最严重的情形——都有这样一个普遍倾向：只要你顺其自然、听之任之，痛苦感受就会变得有规律可循，可以因势利导。为此，面对痛苦情绪，不妨立刻让自己在尽可能舒适的状态下，除了等待，啥也不做。当你心中醋火中烧时，只需用心觉察你的种种感受——例如伤心、愤怒或者其他种种——并且任由这些情绪，像河水一样，从你的心头流过。此时，你的理智可能会和各种糟糕的念头“赛跑”，彼此进行激烈冲突；那些糟糕的念头，包括愤怒、抱怨、钻牛角尖（聚焦于在你看来“我没有错，错的都是别人”的细节，死死不放）、偏执的受害感（执意认定有人趁你心无防范，而肆意践踏你的情感，从中渔利）。总之，既然你受伤如此之深，那就肯定是其他人的过错！——但事实上，很多情况下，痛苦并非由“坏人”所致。向你交个实底：本书的两位作者，也曾经历过上述的心路历程。所以，你对此类情绪，也不要羞于承认，把自己活活“憋死”；对任何念头都尽管顺其自然，任其流过你的身心，一如笔者的亲身经历。

Feelings, once uncovered, can be better understood by reflecting on them. It is useful to have scripts and strategies for self-exploration. Journal writing, preferably with total disregard for grammar and syntax, can be a good way to vent feelings and learn about yourself at the same time. It is okay to cover pages of your journal with FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK I HATE THIS! in bright red ink; if this feels good to you, we recommend you get an extra-large journal. Try writing down your stream of consciousness, which means whatever you find in your head whether or not it makes sense, and see what you get. Treasures, jewels of self-knowledge, are often found here.

对任何情绪，只要不再藏着掖着，你就能够对其进行反思，从而让种种情绪，都能被你更加全面、深入地理解。一个颇为有效的自我探索方式，是“草稿记录”。通过无视语法规则的文字，每天写点东西，能让你在充分发泄内心情绪的同时，更加了解你自己，以己为鉴提升今后的经验值。即使你的日志，用鲜亮的红笔涂满“我好恨，肏蛋肏蛋真肏蛋”之类，也完全可以；如果这样能让你感觉更好，笔者建议你，干脆找个特大号的日记本，以便抡圆了开骂。你可以尝试着记录你的“意识流”。“意识流”指的是：在你脑海中浮现的任何内容，无论是否“有意义”、“合情理”；同时，当你“捕捉”和记录这些意念时，脑海里会涌现出更多东西，这些东西也应包含在内。记录下来的“意识流”，是自我认知的宝藏源泉。

You can get a big drawing pad and a set of oil pastels, which are crayons for grown-ups. These big crayons encourage expression with bright colors and discourage getting hung up on details (they’re too fat to get crabby with). Sometimes you will draw and get squiggles, and that’s great; the smallest thing you can accomplish still helps you hold still for a while and rant in color. Other times, you may surprise yourself with a drawing that is profoundly meaningful to you. Both of us use drawing a lot to vent our strong feelings and discover things about ourselves. Dossie quit smoking this way, and Janet used it as an important tool to get out of suburbia and recover her sluthood, and we assure you that neither of us is a great artist.

你不妨找个大号的绘画板，和一套彩笔——要用适合成年人的大号彩笔。大号彩笔会促使你更多使用鲜亮的色彩，同时让你很难在琐屑细节上，作过多纠缠。有些时候，你会画点啥，或是随意涂鸦，无论怎样都是非常好的——即使很微小的心得体会，也会促使你静坐片刻，用笔墨色彩发出心中的呐喊。另一些时候，你可能会对自己的画作感到惊异，因为这幅画对你而言具有深远的意义。本书作者之一的道茜，就是通过这种方式戒烟成功；而对另一位作者珍妮特来说，这种方式成为她走出乡村、重启荡妇生涯的重要推动力。

Some people like to express their feelings with their bodies and might like to run, or work out at the gym, or clean the kitchen, or dig in the garden. Safety note: if your feelings like intense physical expression, you will need to keep a piece of your mind alert to the fact that you’re heavily adrenalized and feel stronger than you actually are, so give a little attention to what you can do without injury. Dossie once hiked up a big hill in a stressed-out state and felt powerful and wonderful— she remembers thinking about how she must be in much better shape then she thought she was. The next day was agony of the physical kind, with strained muscles and swollen joints.

有些人喜欢通过自己的身体，来释放情绪，他们可能会去跑步、健身，或者打扫厨房、收拾庭院。如果你习惯于通过繁重的身体动作来排解情绪，就需要在此过程中，对以下事实保持一些警醒：你正处于神经高度兴奋的时刻，自我预判或曰迷之自信的力量，恐怕远远高于你实际拥有的体能，所以一定要加点小心，别让自身受伤。本书作者之一的道茜，曾在焦虑不堪的状态下，到一座大山上远足，顿时感到浑身是劲、心情大好；她忽然意识到，自己的现状已经很不错，何必再去渴求更多。但到了第二天，精神痛苦虽然没了，却转为身体的痛苦，肌肉拉伤，关节肿痛。

Try finding music that fits your mood, angry or sad or frantic, and dancing your feelings out. It can be very satisfying to get a cheap plastic tennis racket and beat up your couch. Kneel in front of the couch, raise the racket above your head, and bring it down with all your strength. Keep your eyes open, imagine anything on the couch that you are angry at except yourself, and yell, loudly, how you feel.

你还可以尝试着找些和你情绪相匹配的音乐——比如愤怒时听的歌，伤心时听的歌，慌乱时听的歌——伴随着音乐手舞足蹈，以此表达和释放你的情绪。有个好方法，是买个廉价的塑料球拍，用它敲打你的沙发垫子。你可以跪坐着，面对着沙发，将球拍举过头顶，用你全身的力量，对着沙发狠狠拍打。整个过程，睁开眼睛，想象沙发上，有惹你生气的东西（除了你自己）。一边捶打，一边高喊——把你的想法吼出来。

When you express yourself, you get to know yourself better and work out some of the most intense stress constructively. The least you could wind up with would be a clean kitchen, and you might actually feel good after a self-indulgent afternoon on the beach.

当你把自己（真实的内心世界）表达、释放出来，你将更加充分地了解自己，并且以建设性的方式，将那些令你最为困扰的压力，在相当程度上化解掉。如果你按照上述的方式去做，至少可以让厨房变得更整洁，而且，你确有可能让自己的心情，在去海边疯玩一下午之后，变得更好。

“可怜的小宝贝”

POOR BABY

Try focusing on the feelings in your body: where do you feel these emotions, in your throat, chest, gut? Turning your attention to the physical sensations can intensify them and might bring up tears, but they will move on through even more readily if you allow yourself to feel them on the physical level. If rage comes welling up, you can pound on a pillow. If you start to cry, let it flow, remembering the sense of relief that comes after expressing intense emotion in tears. Janet likes to seek out a tearjerker book or movie to help her get tears out when she feels stuck. (Terms of Endearment has never failed her yet.)

试试看，聚焦于你的身体：我的内心感受，在身体的哪些部位起反应？是喉咙、心胸，或者肠胃脏腑？将注意力转向自身的“情绪敏感带”，可能会导致身体的不良反应更加剧烈，还可能让你涕泪横流；但是，只要你肯正视自己身体层面的状况，一切不适感，都能够更加顺利地过去。如果怒从心头起，你可以捶打枕头出气；如果你开始哭泣，尽管哭个够，并且不要忘记在此过程中，得以渐趋缓解的心绪。本书作者之一的珍妮特，经常会在情绪低落时，特意去看些催泪的书籍或电影，让自己能够哭出来。（获得奥斯卡奖的影片《母女情深》，每次都能为她催泪成功。）

Some people have trouble doing this because they’ve been taught that it’s wrong to feel sorry for yourself. So who else should you feel sorry for? Stay in sympathy with yourself: you feel bad, so be kind to yourself.

有些人难以做出上述之事，因为他们所受的教育洗脑，让他们羞于表达对自己的同情，将顾影自怜视为罪错。然而如此一来，你还能够真正同情其他人吗？（岂不成了铁石心肠、血冷如冰，或者缺心少肺？）一定要保持对自己的同情心，当你情绪不佳时，更要自我关爱。

You can talk to a friend, or your other lover, presuming you have made agreements about confidentiality with everybody who might care if you gossip. Janet has a deal with a good friend of hers for telephone support. She can call her friend up and ask for five minutes of “poor baby,” and if her friend is available, she pours out her feelings and her friend says, you guessed it, nothing but “poor baby” till she is through. This dialogue may sound silly, but don’t knock it till you try it. Comfort is a good thing in hard times.

你可以找个朋友或者其他情侣，对其倾诉苦衷——你尽管把ta们当中的每个人，都视为自己的安全空间，就当ta们都和你有约定，对你的一切话语密不外传。本书作者之一的珍妮特，和她的一位好友，有一项约定：珍妮特给那个朋友打电话求助，如果那位朋友此刻方便，珍妮特就在接下来的五分钟里，对其尽情“吐苦水”，而那个朋友唯一的回答，就是不断叫她“可怜的小宝贝”，直到珍妮特发泄完。如此对话，貌似愚蠢，但是，你如果真正尝试过，看法就会大为改变。在处于困苦时，设法得到抚慰，对你大有裨益。

【练习题】确认彼此，都能相互安慰

EXERCISE Reassurance

Here’s an exercise you can do with your partner to learn how to”poor baby” each other even when times are hard.

Make a list of ten things your partner could do that would reassure you.

Avoid abstractions—focus on behaviors, not emotions. “Love me more” is an emotion and thus pretty hard to act on: how will you know that your partner loves more? “Bring me a rose” is a behavior that anybody with a dollar can perform. Write your list in private, your partner can do the same, and then you can get together and look at each other’s lists. You’ll be surprised at how easy it is to be reassuring when you have a list.

This assignment may be more complicated than it sounds. Many questions may come up in your mind: How could I ask for that? Shouldn’t my partner already know? lf I have to ask for it, does it really count? If my partner loved me, wouldn’t this be happening already?

If you’re having thoughts like these, imagine what it might feel like to be asked for reassurance by your partner. Wouldn’t it feel good to know how you could help? We can’t read each other’s minds, but we do care, and we can help once we know how.

前文刚刚讲到的“可怜的小宝贝”，就是一道绝佳的习题，你不妨和你的伴侣一起演练，确保遇到情绪难关时，能够以此方式，慰藉彼此。

你的伴侣怎样做，最能抚慰你的情绪？列举出其中的十件事物。

上述的清单，要避免抽象化——聚焦于行为，而非情绪。“多给我一些爱”，这个表述就是情绪化的，很难用具体行动来衡量：对伴侣心中的爱意，你如何计算其多少？而“带给我一朵玫瑰花”，就是一个针对具体行为的诉求，对方只要有钱买，便能够实行。建议你和你的伴侣，分别私下就此列出一份清单，接下来，当你们面对面相聚时，可以交换阅读对方的清单。这时，你也许会惊异地发现，原来让彼此得到安慰的方式，竟然如此简单！

上述任务貌似简单，但若真的去做，就可能很难。很多问题都难免在你心中浮现：我怎样才能开口要求这个？这种事，真的应该让我的伴侣知道吗？如果我要求这种事，会被别人怎么想？如果伴侣真心爱我，这些难道不都是早就理所当然、水到渠成的吗？

如果你有了类似的想法，就不妨好好设想下：如果你的伴侣明确直言，向你寻求安慰，会是怎样的情形？只有当你真正明白如何才能有效地帮助对方，心里才会更踏实，不是吗？我们谁都无法读出别人的心思，但我们对所爱之人，确实很在意；只要我们知道如何去做，就情愿为之伸出援手。

谁该受到指责？

WHO’S TO BLAME?

As you get skilled at finding and expressing your feelings, you can try a more challenging task: see if you can write about or talk to your friend about your feelings without blaming anybody. Not your lover, not your lover’s lover, and especially not yourself. This exercise is not easy: you will be surprised how readily we all slip into that blaming mode, but it is very, very worthwhile to learn to have your feelings without foisting them on someone else.

觉察和宣泄自己情绪的技能，你已经知晓，接下来，你需要尝试一项更具挑战性的任务：看你能否在不指责任何人的前提下，将你的情绪诉诸笔端，或者向朋友倾诉。无论对你的爱人，或者爱人的“出轨对象”，尤其是你自己，都不要加以指责。——这道练习题，恐怕大不易。但你也将惊异地发觉，长期以来的我们，是多么容易滑入“指责某些人”的思维窠臼；然而，如若能学会不把自己的情绪，推卸到其他人身上，将为你带来极大的收益。

It also helps to pay attention to how we attribute intention. “You’re just doing this because you want to make me mad”: how often do you suppose that’s actually true? We just about never make anybody mad on purpose; the results are usually unpleasant. It’s easy to invent other people’s intentions for them in order to try to make sense of what you’re feeling … but it can be very hard for them to speak their truth if someone’s accusing them of intentions they never had.

另一个颇有助益的做法，是留意自己“如何归因”。“你存心想要气炸了我，所以才会这么做”——对这样的说辞，你是否经常当真？我们几乎不可能存心让谁气得炸毛。真正的情形是：事情的结果，出现了令人不快的偏差，仅此而已。对其他人子虚乌有的东西，进行凭空脑补，这样做确实能够让自己的情绪，变得易于解释、“理所当然”；同时，这样的凭空指控，足以令人百口莫辩。

Only when we’re all willing to own our emotions, and let our lovers and friends own theirs, does anyone have the power to change and grow.

只有我们下定决心——对自己的情绪负起责任，并且对我们所爱之人的情绪，也不要往自己身上大包大揽，谁的情绪归谁自己管——其中的每一个人，才能拥有改变和成长的力量。

悉心呵护你自己

BABY YOURSELF

When your emotions are overwhelming and chaotic, it can help to ask yourself if there is anything you could do that would help you feel just one tiny bit safer. Let go of the big picture: maybe it’s too big to figure the whole thing out right now. A few deep breaths, conscious relaxation of some muscles, soothing music. Try wrapping yourself in a soft blanket. It may not seem like much, but once you manage to do anything that improves your lot even the littlest bit, you are moving in the right direction to build some confidence that you can learn to deal with your jealous feelings.

当你的情绪，严重到难以掌控、陷入混乱，一个自救方法是询问自己：有没有什么能够做到的事情，能让自己感觉好点——即使只能为自己多带来一丝一毫的安全感，也行。切忌“一揽子搞定全部”的幻想，立刻搞清事态全貌，多半太难实现。做几个深呼吸，刻意放松一些部位的肌肉，听听舒缓的音乐：这些都可以尝试。你还可以躺在柔软的垫子上，把身体蜷缩成一团。这些做法似乎都起不到多大的作用，然而，当你为改善自身处境（哪怕只有一点点改善），努力做些事情，你就由此步入正轨，树立起“我能学会处理好内心醋意”的自信心。

Give yourself permission to take good care of yourself while you learn to work through jealousy and other hard feelings. Learn to nurture yourself. What are the things you find comforting? Give them to yourself. Hot chocolate? Warm towels after a long soak? A long session with your most beloved movie or computer game? Your favorite teddy bear? Effective self-nurturing often happens on the level of body awareness, so nice physical experiences—massages, hot baths, skin lotion, flannel pajamas—can give a sense of comfort and security even when your mind is anxious and your thoughts are a mess. Give yourself permission to take the best possible care of yourself. You deserve it. When you anticipate feeling jealous, make plans to occupy your time. It may be too much to ask that you always have a hot date at exactly the same time as your lover: most people’s schedules are too complicated, so what do you do when your partner’s date comes down with the flu? Do you cancel your date? The people you make these dates with might be counting on you, the time they have with you might be important to them, and their feelings might get hurt. Third parties have a right to some predictability in their lives too.

当你为克服醋意或者其他的痛苦感受，而努力摸索时，一定要促使自己：做好自我照顾。学着为自己打气加油、滋养呵护。最能为你带来舒适感的事物是什么？喝杯热巧克力饮？好好泡个澡再裹上温暖的毛巾？让你喜欢的电影或网游，多多陪你度过一段时间？或者是你心爱的泰迪熊？先找到它们，再给与自己。最有效果的自我滋养，通常都会让你的身体，有所感知、有所觉醒；因此，美好的切身体验——例如按摩、热水澡、肌肤养护，或是换上轻柔的法兰绒睡衣——能够在你焦虑不安、思绪纷乱之时，为你带来舒适感和安全感。你要尽最大的可能，好好关怀自己，这是你理应得到的，天经地义。当你预感到自己将要醋火上头，就要赶快做好计划，把你接下来的时间“填满”。在这个节骨眼，指望你的炮友立刻前来和你相约，恐怕不太行，因为大多数的日常时间都安排得很满（无法专门为你随叫随到）；换位思考下，如果你在约会前夕感冒了，会因此而取消约会吗？那个和你约定见面的人，很可能正在翘首以待，和你见面可能对ta而言非常重要；无论你因为什么理由失约，都可能伤害了ta的感情。相关的“第三方”或曰其ta人，也需要对你俩的日常时间安排，有个大体靠谱的预见。 【按照很多美国人的习惯，见面需要提前预约，走亲访友都是如此。——译者注】

But even if you can’t round up a hot date for yourself, you can probably find a friend to watch a movie with, talk obsessively (with due attention to confidentiality, of course) on the Internet, grind your teeth, eat cookies, chew your fingernails, whatever works. We do not recommend drinking and drugging, as getting high might very well increase the intensity of your disturbance and disinhibit you enough that you might forget your commitment to experience your jealousy without acting on it. A certain amount of escapism is fine, but if you anesthetize yourself so that you feel nothing at all, you will lose the opportunity to develop skills at dealing with all the feelings you’re having.

不过，即使你无法组织一场激情约会，大概也不难用以下几种方式替代：找个谁和你一起看电影；在网上尽情聊天（当然要对所聊内容，确保不会泄露隐私）；咬牙切齿或者大嚼饼干；实在不行还可以啃自己的指甲，或者随便做点啥。至于喝酒或者嗑药，笔者绝不推荐，因为靠这类方式获得快意，代价是加剧你的身心失调，更会让你忘记“不要迷失于醋意，为此付诸行动、做出错事”的初衷。逃避现实，如果没有超过一定程度，是可以的；但是，如果你自我麻醉到对所有情感都麻木不仁的地步，妥善应对内心情绪的技能提升，都将因此而与你无缘。

Acquiring these skills takes practice, like meditation or learning to skate. At first you feel stupid and wonder why you’re doing it, and it doesn’t work very well. But if you practice taking good care of yourself, after a while your view of the world changes a little, and it becomes a much more friendly and welcoming place, because you’ve created it that way.

自我关怀的技能，需要实操历练，才能为你所有，就像掌握冥想技能或者学会滑冰。在实际练习的开始阶段，你会觉得自己在“冒傻气”，也会对“这样做究竟意义何在”心怀疑虑，其效果也很难有多好。然而，只要你坚持练习自我照顾，一段时间过后，你眼中的世界图景就会有所改变，变得更加友善、热情，因为你为自己创造了一个不断变好的世界。

【练习题】关爱自己的15种方式

EXERCISE Fifteen Ways to Be Kind to Yourself

Write a list of fifteen easy things you can do to be kind to yourself: for instance, “Go to the store and buy myself a flower” or “Soak my feet in hot water and give them a rub.” Sometimes it helps to ask yourself:“What could I do to feel a little bit safer, or better, or taken care of?” Put the items on your list on index cards. The next time you feel upset and could use a kindness, pull a card and do what it says.

写张清单，列举出15种简单易行、能够抚慰自己的方式：例如“去商店，给自己买朵花”或者“热水泡脚，按摩双足”。有时候，询问自己“为了让自己感到更安心、更舒适，感到被关爱，我可以做些什么呢？”，也大有帮助，能够解决问题。将这些关爱自己的方式，写在卡片上，以备随时查询。当你下次心情不佳时，抽出卡片，看看上面写了啥，照此善待你自己。

当你没有一起生活的伴侣

WHEN YOU ARE THE THIRD PARTY

All these ideas about taking good care of yourself apply whether you are single or partnered, but those of us who live alone have to make special preparations to avoid becoming isolated with our feelings. (We’ve written about this at much more length in chapter 19, “The Single Slut.”) You need to reach out to close friends or perhaps get to a support group or a munch in your area. Make agreements with friends to listen to each other’s feelings. And don’t forget to plan time for serious communication with your nonresidential partner. Being single, or other than the life partner, does not mean you will never feel jealousy or any other difficult feelings. When we are dating, however intensely, we rarely make time for serious discussions of our feelings, our differences, or, for that matter, how we each understand and appreciate the relationship we are having.

以上所述的自我关爱方式，无论你单身生活还是已有伴侣，都普遍适用。然而，若是一个人过，有必要做些特别的准备，以免让自己变得“隔绝七情六欲”（针对于此，笔者将更多详情，放在了本书第19章，“单身舞曲：尽可骚情，但互不‘拥有’”）。你要勇于向贴心的朋友求助，也许还能在你所生活的地区，找到能够相互支持的人群。和你的朋友们，做个“对彼此的心理感受，都能耐心倾听”的约定。同时，也别忘记那些并未和你同居的伙伴，和ta们约个时间，作倾心之谈。独自生活，或者没有长久的伴侣，并不意味着你永远不会吃醋，也无法避免其他类型的负面情绪。当我们和其ta人约会时，无论怎样激情四射，也很少会专门抽出些时间，就彼此的内心世界、彼此的种种差异，以此对当下彼此的关系，分别作何感受，进行严肃认真的探讨。

To make time, a lot of poly people place a special value on actually sleeping together, and the sharing of coffee, the slow awakening, and even ordinary old breakfast. If each time you connect with your sweetie is intended to be hot and heavy sex, it can be hard to make space for simple conversation, talking about feelings,hearing feelings. If you don’t sleep together, try getting together for lunch or brunch at some other time, or make a date to hike in the country or on a beach, or visit a botanical garden or a museum.

不少多边关系者，都对“共度时光”——一起过夜，一起喝咖啡，一起赖床，或者只是一起吃顿平常的早点——颇为珍视，认为其价值不可替代。如果你和你的甜心宝贝，每次约会都只以热辣的性爱为目的，这样就难免一直“没空”随意聊聊天——相互聊聊各自的心情，相互倾听。为此，笔者建议：如果你们平时不在一起睡觉，那就尽量在约炮之外的时间，经常抽空一起吃饭，或者相约去郊外或者海边溜达，要么就一起去植物园、博物馆。

将醋意挺过去

Tough It Out

When no better plan is available, there is nothing wrong with gritting your teeth, biting the bullet, and hanging in there till it’s over. Dossie remembers her first challenge after she decided to never be monogamous again:

（在你醋火攻心、情绪恶劣时）如果没有更好的（自我安抚的）可行方案，不妨索性咬牙切齿，或者啃点啥硬东西，对负面情绪不作其他更多干预，顺其自然等它折腾完。本书作者之一的道茜，一直记着她在下定决心“不再进入一对一封闭关系”时的心理挑战：

I had been casually dating a young man and had told him at great length that I was not available for partnering and had no intention of ever being monogamous again. He came over to visit at my home when my best friend was there, we all got a little stoned, and he came on to her. She thought he was neat and didn’t know I was involved with him, so they started necking right in the middle of my living room. Eeeek! My thoughts went racing as I watched them, thinking:“Well, it’s not like I want to marry him, and I don’t think I feel like joining them, and I don’t think my friend is bisexual anyway, so what do I do?” Miss Manners has said nothing on the appropriate etiquette for this situation. For a while I sat frozen, to tell the truth, and finally I thought to myself, “Okay, so there’s no script, I’ll have to make one up. What would I be doing if my friend and my new lover weren’t rolling around on the floor with their braces locked?” I guessed I’d be finishing taking the notes from the tarot book I was reading, so I went upstairs and studied, gritting my teeth. Focusing on my notes gave me at least a little relief by occupying my mind. Eventually they left, and I got through a strange and lonely night, not feeling necessarily great, but at least proud of myself that I had survived. I felt not at all damaged, really okay. What I got a grip on was my own strength, so…funky as it was, this was my first successful run through jealousy.

我曾邂逅一个年轻男子，长篇大论地告诉他，我不打算和任何人长期搭伴生活，更不打算再涉足一对一的封闭关系。有一次他来到我家，当时我最要好的女票也在那里，我们几个都有点喝高了，该男子来到我的女票跟前。我的女票觉得那个男孩很是清纯可人，也不晓得他和我的关系，便在我的卧室里，和他搂着脖子亲吻。纳尼？！我注视着他俩，万匹羊驼一齐奔腾在心：“卧槽，我尼玛并不想和他结婚，不过我现在也不想加入进去跟他们玩3P，无论如何，我之前从不晓得我的女票是个双性恋者。所以，我现在该怎么做才好？”不过我在表面上，依然端着架子没有爆发，啥也没说啥也没做。就这样呆坐了好一会，我终于恍然大悟，于是对自己暗道：“放心吧，没啥事，他俩都是即兴而为，谁也没有事先的剧本；包括我自己在内，也只能靠临场发挥。反过来讲，如果我和女票和情人，没有勾搭在一起，我又该做些什么呢？”我忽然想起，我正在读一本讲塔罗牌的书，边读边做笔记，目前即将收尾，于是我独自上楼，继续学习那本书，同时忍不住咬牙切齿、心怀怨念。当我把精力（从吃醋之事）转移，集中于我的读书笔记，心情便稍有舒缓。他俩终于完了事，离开了，而我则度过了一个异样、孤独的夜晚——要说感觉有多美妙，显然是扯淡，但至少令我感受到了“我依然活得很好，那件事并没把我如何”的自豪。我一切如常，并不觉得自己受到了什么打击。相反，我的力量，由此得到了确认。所以，这件事也算不赖，它让我第一次成功地摆平了醋意。

刻意踏入内心的雷区

GO FOR THE ICK

Here’s a good question to ask yourself as you seek to understand your jealousy: “What are the specific images that disturb me the most?” Chances are you are already imagining along these lines, so you’re not likely to make yourself feel worse by thinking about the scary stuff on purpose.

当你对自己心中的醋意，进行探究、寻求理解时，不妨这样问问自己：“最令我心神不宁的脑补境况，究竟是什么样的？”当你刻意去想象这些境况时，就拥有了很多种可能、很多种选项，至少，刻意思考令你惧怕的事物，不至于让你感觉更糟。

Those disturbing images, the ones that really bother you, are not telling you what your partner is doing—you actually don’t know what your partner is doing. The images you see in your mind are the perfect reflection of your own fears. One way to come to terms with your fears is to acknowledge them: “Yes, I’m afraid of that.” You can take it even further and work through the fears by envisioning the worst possible scenario that you can imagine. Go ahead, wallow in it. Elaborate it until it becomes ridiculous. Maybe that other guy has a dick three miles long, that girl is a perfect replica of a living Barbie doll. Maybe you can laugh at your fears: that’ll take the sting out of them. Silly is the opposite of powerful, so disempower away.

那些最令你不安的脑补境况，其中带给你最大困扰的一种类型，是你无法随时了解“我的伴侣正在做什么”。这是个实实在在的问题。你对这个问题的脑补，精准地映照出你内心的恐惧。要想与自己内心的恐惧“达成和解”，其中一个方法，是坦然承认自己的恐惧：“是的，我确实害怕这种情况发生。”面对这种恐惧感，你还可以“再前进一步”，也就是尽量去想象有可能出现的最糟糕剧情。你尽管这样试试看，踏入这个“雷区”并且“赖在这里不走”，不断详细地脑补各种“灾难”，直到其中的荒诞，不言自明。如果你担心有个“大阴人”或者“小妖精”横刀夺爱，最后也许你会脑补到，某大哥的老二足有四千八百米长，某小姐其实是芭比娃娃长大成了精。回顾自己的恐惧，估计你会笑出猪叫，恐惧也就自然而然地烟消云散。滑稽荒诞，是对一切强权最有力的瓦解。

Reality is almost always less terrifying than fiction. You can counter your fears with reality testing. Our minds, like nature, abhor a vacuum. We get nervous. Think of the last time you were waiting for someone to return a call or a family member was significantly late coming home. Did you call the highway patrol? Send out frantic texts? Imagine terrible possibilities? We all do this. Janet and her partner have an agreement to call each other before they leave a lover’s house for the trip home, just to help prevent this kind of worry.

现实往往没有脑补幻想的那么可怕。你可以通过现实检验，来瓦解恐惧感。“自然厌恶真空”，我们起心动念，也同样如此：客观现实内容的缺失，会让我们变得神经质。回想下，上一次你在等候某个人的回信，或者某个迟迟未归的家人，是怎样的情形。给高速公路的加油站打电话询问？没完没了地给那个人发信息？想象各种糟糕透顶的可能状况？我们谁都可能会这样。本书作者之一的珍妮特，和她的生活伴侣之间，有一项约定：当其中的任何一方，和其ta情人滚完床单准备离开时，一定要给另一方打个电话。这样一来，就能避免上述的脑补焦虑。

When we don’t know what’s going on, few of us are able to just say“I don’t know” and stop thinking about it. We fill in the blanks, and in order to do that we make something up. What you see when you fill in the blanks has nothing to do with reality, it is a picture of your own worst fear. So now you know what you are afraid of, and nothing about what is really happening.

我们在拿不准“接下来会发生什么”时，很少有人能够承认“我不知道”，并且不再继续徒劳地去想这件事。相反，我们会通过脑补来“填满空白”，这让我们自欺欺人地感到“我并非无所作为，而是确实做了些事”。然而，当你的脑补填空，根本无关事实，你所“看到”的世界，就只有你所最担心的最坏情况。换言之，通过上述方式，你会明确你到底恐惧什么，而你的恐惧，和“真正发生了什么”，完全两码事。

Pay attention also to your imaginings that are less dangerous, less anxiety-ridden. This is where you feel safer. You may be surprised to find that imagining your lover in the midst of sex with someone else is less scary than you thought it would be, or maybe images of kissing bother you more than intercourse, or whatever. Try writing down your imaginings on index cards, then putting them in order from the most to the least scary. Then you will know what parts scare you the most and what the safer-feeling parts are. Now you have something to turn your mind toward that will help you feel a little bit safer, which is your first step on the road to becoming perfectly comfortable.

那些令你不那么恐慌、焦虑的脑补想象，同样值得留意。这些内容会让你感觉相对安全一点。你可能会惊奇地发觉，想象你的情人正在和其他人做爱，其实并没有你所认为的那么可怕；或者，当你想象你的情人正和别人接吻，或者做其他的什么事情，比想象ta和别人做爱，更令你心神不安。试着将你种种胡思乱想的脑补，分别在卡片上做个记录，然后根据“这件事对你而言的可怕程度”，来进行排序。由此你就可以明确，你所胡思乱想的哪一部分内容，最令你惊恐，哪一部分内容可以带给你些许安宁。如此一来，你就拥有了能够自我安神的“转念方向”，这是令你身心舒适的第一步。

回想你所珍视的美好事物

REMEMBER THE GOOD STUFF THAT YOU CARE ABOUT

Make a list of everything you value about your relationship and put it aside for a rainy day. Be an optimist, turn your mind to the positive end of things. Value what you have and what you get from your partner: the time, attention, and love, the good stuff that fills your cup. Avoid being the pessimist who focuses on what is not there, the energy that goes somewhere else. That energy is not subtracted from what you receive; relationships are not balanced like checkbooks. So when you are feeling deprived, remember all the good stuff you get from your partnership.

在你的亲密关系中，有哪些方面、哪些点滴，是你所珍爱的？赶紧列张清单，记下上述的每一点，这张清单将成为你的“过冬粮食”。列清单时，你要做个乐观者，着重思考所有事情的光明面。你的亲密关系，让你拥有了什么？你的伴侣，带给了你什么？例如，共处的时光，彼此的倾情，相爱的感觉，杯中的美味——这些你都要珍惜。要避免成为悲观者，切莫纠结于“没有得到什么”、“流入外人田的肥水”。须知，伴侣“流入外人田的肥水”，并不等于“克扣你所应得”；亲密关系的逻辑规则，截然不同于“有借必有贷，借贷必平衡”的账簿。为此，当你感到自己“被别人夺走了什么”时，不要忘记你正在从伴侣关系中得到的林林总总。

【练习题】那么多的珍贵之物

EXERCISE Treasures

Make a list of ten or more reasons why you are lucky to have this partner. Make a list of ten or more reasons why your partner is lucky to have you. Try carrying your lists around with you for a few days and adding things as they come up. Maybe you and this partner could both make lists and share them.

针对“为什么说，和ta成为伴侣是我的幸运”这个问题，列出10条（或更多条）正面的理由。同时，也要针对“为什么说，和我成为伴侣，是ta的幸运”，列出至少10条理由。在接下来的一段日子里，将此清单随身携带，并根据新发生的事情，不断补充清单上的内容。你和你的这位伴侣，也许都在做这个清单，之后可以相互分享。

Sharing

You and your partners need to practice talking about jealousy. When you try to pretend that you’re so perfectly enlightened that you never feel jealous, you deprive yourself of the opportunity to work with your feelings and share support with your partner. And when you try to protect yourself and your partner from jealousy, you are engaging in a deception that can only lead to more distance and can never bring you closer.

你和你的每个伴侣，都需要一项练习：彼此谈论关于吃醋的话题。当你故作姿态，显得你开放到了完美无缺的程度，永远不会吃醋，此时，你无异于自我剥夺了和伴侣一起进行“情绪分享与互助”的机会。进一步讲，如果你试图让自己和伴侣，从此都能绝缘于醋意，那就等于陷入了一场自欺欺人的骗局，导致“克服醋意”的初衷，反而与你渐行渐远。

A couple we know tell us that they have developed a convention in their relationship that each can ask the other for what they call a “jelly moment”. In your jelly moment, you get to say what’s bothering you. Perhaps you feel scared and jealous, nervous about saying goodbye for the weekend, small and silly, and your knees are feeling like, well, jelly. Your partner’s commitment is to listen, sympathize, and validate. That’s the response: not “Okay, I’ll cancel my date with Blanche,” but ” Aw, honey, I’m sorry you feel bad. I love you, and I’ll be back soon.”

笔者认识的一对伴侣，说ta俩之间有个“果冻时光”的约定，所谓“果冻时光”，就是当任何一方有了什么困扰之事，都可以对另一方提出倾听要求，双方就此进行倾诉与分享。也许只是看似愚蠢的小事——比如两个人在周末道别，谁都可以找别人约炮，这令其中的某个人忽然感到慌恐，醋意油然而生，心里打哆嗦令膝盖也像果冻一样发软。这时，另一方的责任义务，就是倾听、共情，并作出确认 【也就是让对方明确知晓自己的倾听与共情，明确知晓自己充分理解对方的倾诉内容，和话语背后的情绪感受。但并不等于要向对方承诺什么，更不等于非要主动作出什么妥协。——译者注】 。适当的回应，不是“好，我不去和她约炮了”，而是“亲爱的，我很抱歉让你不开心，我爱你，等我和那个人嘿咻完，会尽快回到你身边”。

When we tell our partners that we feel jealous, we are making ourselves vulnerable in a very profound way. When our partners respond with respect, listen to us, validate our feelings, support and reassure us, we feel better taken care of than we would have if no difficulty had arisen in the first place. So we strongly recommend that you and your partners give each other the profoundly bonding experience of sharing your vulnerabilities. We are all human, we are all vulnerable, and we all need validation.

当我们向伴侣坦言自己心怀醋意，这在很大程度上，等于自曝软肋。如果伴侣能以尊重的态度回应，愿意倾听并接纳我们的感受，并且帮助我们抚平情绪，我们会由此得到比平常无事时更大的舒适感。因此，笔者强烈建议，你和你的伴侣，通过向对方坦诚分享自己的“软肋”，来共建“相互紧密联结”的体验。你我皆凡人，谁都有本难念的经，也都需要得到其ta人的支持和认同。

Your strategies for surviving periods of jealousy will stand you in good stead for the rest of your life, and you will use what you learn about yourself from this practice over and over. All of the techniques listed above are applicable to other difficult events, like job interviews and writing your resume. Now you not only have a repertoire of ways to deal with bouts of jealousy but also to handle other painful emotions that may come your way. So when you get this far, congratulate yourself. Celebrate your successes: Write “I am a genius” two dozen times with lots of bright colors. Buy yourself something nifty. You’ve done a lot of hard work, and you deserve a reward.

那些让你“安然闯过醋意难关”的策略，对你未来的日子，也将大有裨益，成功经验会被你不断应用，不断强化。上文谈到的所有技能，不仅适用于醋意，也能用来应对其他难题，比如求职面试和写简历。你所拥有的这一系列方法，不但能够应对醋意发作，也能掌控处理你所遭遇的其他类型的痛苦情绪。所以，当你读到这里，应当恭贺自己。为自己庆功，不妨用各种鲜亮色彩，书写二三十遍“我是天才”，再为你自己买些漂亮可爱的东西。你已经做出了很多艰辛努力，此刻有必要奖励下自己。

一条性灵提升之路？

A Spiritual Path?

So when you grow beyond your jealousy by doing the healing that your jealousy is calling on you to do, you’re also stepping out of old paradigms and familiar assumptions, into the unknown, which is scary. Working to change your emotions requires that you open up, be willing to feel, flinching when necessary, to become more conscious. Isn’t that what spirituality is, an opened and expanded consciousness?

当醋意成为你自我疗愈的路标，让你由此自我成长，从而将醋意“驯服在你麾下”，你就由此跨出了自己的旧有格局；你所长期信奉的很多价值预设，也被你甩在身后，成了老皇历。你从此登上“新大陆”，再无“导航”，这也难免令人恐惧。不断调整、改善自己的心情，需要你敞开心扉，用心感受，以及在必要情况下敢于认怂、退缩，做个更加理智的人。所谓的性灵修炼（或曰“灵修”、“身心灵”），不就是如此吗？所追求的精华内核，都无非是边界开放、不断拓展的心胸和智慧。

Jealousy can become your path, not only to healing old wounds but also to openheartedness—opening your heart to your lovers and to yourself as you open your relationships to fit in all the love and sex and fulfllment that truly are available to you.

醋意可以成为你的前进之路，既能疗愈旧的创伤，也能塑造一颗开放的心灵——让你的内心，向你的所爱之人敞开，向你自己敞开；正如同你的开放式亲密关系一样：所有适合你的爱情和性行为，以及情爱关系为你带来的满足感，都能与之适应，被充分包容。

A final note about love: One remedy for the fear of not being loved is to remember how good it feels to love someone. If you’re feeling unloved and you want to feel better, go love someone, and see what happens.

最后还有一条爱心提示：针对“不再被爱”的恐惧，解药之一是，回忆下你深爱着某个人时的感觉，是何等的美好。当你觉得自己失去了别人的爱，并且想要改善自己的心情，那就去把你的爱，给与其ta人，看看接下来会是怎样的进展。

篇外篇纯净的爱

INTERLUDE Clean Love

CAN YOU IMAGINE love without jealousy, without possessiveness—love cleaned of all its clinginess and desperation? Let’s try. We can take some thoughts from Buddhism: What would it be like to love without attachment? Or to open our hearts to someone with no expectation beyond another heart opening in return? Loving just for the joy of it, regardless of what we might get back?

没有醋意妒忌，没有人身独占，也没有执著和绝望——如此纯净的爱，你能够设想吗？让我们一起尽力追求吧。我们可以参考一些佛教理念：爱的目的就是爱，自性圆满、了无挂碍，而不依附于其他——对这样的爱，你觉得如何？真心换真心，舍此无他求，你愿意吗？爱，何必贪求对方的回馈？你在对别人付出爱情的过程中，也收获了足够丰厚的欣慰，难道还不知足吗？

Imagine seeing the beauty and virtues of a beloved and letting go of how their strengths might meet our needs or how their beauty might make us look better.

想想看，邂逅一位如此美好的爱人：此人魅力四射，同我们的欲望，自然而然地产生交集；而我们自己，也在和这个人的激情互动中，变得更加美好。

Imagine seeing another in a clean light of love, without enumerating the ways in which that person does and does not match up to the fantasy we carry around of our perfect mate or dream lover.

想想看，还有这样一个人，对我们心中“完美伴侣”或“梦中情人”的标准，不脑补预设，更不刻意迎合；此人满怀着纯净、光辉的爱。

Imagine meeting another person in the freedom and innocence of childhood and playing together, without plotting how to make this person give us the kind of love we wish we could have gotten in our actual childhood.

想想看，在我们无拘无束、天真无邪的童年，遇到一个玩伴——那时的我们，绝不会成天盘算着“如何让这个小伙伴，尽其所能给予我想要的东西”。

But…but…but. What if you open your heart to someone and you don’t like what happens next? Suppose that person gets drunk? Or treats your open affection with scorn? What if this person doesn’t fulfill your dreams? What if this one turns out just like the last one? Suppose all those things do happen. What have you lost? A little time,a brief fantasy. Let it go, learn from it, and go find someone more worthy of your love.

但是、但是、但是——如果你对某个人敞开心扉，结果却令你大失所望，这可怎么办？就当那个人，被酒精蒙了心？还是就当你所付出的真心喂了狗？如果那个人没能满足你的幻想期待，事态会变得怎样？倘若那个人最终变得和你之前遇到的人一个德行，这又将意味着什么？——然而，即使你遭遇到上述这一切，又有何损失呢？无非是花了些时间，经历了一场短暂的迷梦。那就索性顺其自然、随它去吧！从中吸取经验教训，并且，继续寻找更值得让你去爱的其他人，仅此而已。

Love doesn’t much take to being stuffed into forms, which is what everybody’s fantasies and imaginings are: custom-built plans for a constructed individual they’ve created to solve all their problems. Your authors have dream lovers too. But people are not made of clay or stone, and it won’t work well to approach them with a chisel. Look what happened to Pygmalion.

爱情并没有一个固定的形态，并非每个人的激情愿景，都得照着同样的模子来。每一个人都是社会建构的结果，都有属于自己的、个性订制的人生规划，都有各自的不同问题需要解决。本书的两位作者，也有自己的梦中情人。然而，人类并非泥塑或者石雕，谁也无法按照自己的理想标准，对其他人进行“修凿”。相反，不妨想一想传说中的皮格马利翁——毫无保留的信任和接纳，足以“金石为开”，真正的佳偶，就是这样形成的。

How many times have you rejected the possibility of love because it didn’t look the way you expected it to? Perhaps some characteristic was missing you were sure you must have, some other trait was present that you never dreamed of accepting. What happens when you throw away your expectations and open your eyes to the fabulous love that is shining right in front of you, holding out its hand?

你已经有多少次，将爱的机缘拒之门外，只因为这份爱，不尽符合你的期待？那些潜在的爱人，ta们的一些人格特质，可能与你重合，却被你无视；也可能显而易见，却是你从未设想过自己会去接纳的。既然如此，又何妨将你对爱的种种预设，通通抛开，尽管对出现在你面前的美妙爱情，睁大双眼凝望，伸出双手迎接？

Clean love: love without expectations.

纯净的爱，就是不带价值预设、不求对方回报的爱。

Washing your love clean doesn’t require advanced spirituality or weekly psychoanalysis. You’ll probably never let go of every single attachment-at least we’ve never managed it. But maybe you can let go just for an instant; your history, worries, frets, and yearnings will still be there to come back to when you need them.Just for now, take a look at the nifty person who is standing right in front of you.

把你心中的爱意“洗净”，并不需要更高层次的心灵境界，也并非要你每星期都去进行精神分析。也许，你对任何一段关系，都无法做到顺其自然、放下执念——至少，笔者不足以说服你。然而，你或许可以在一个较短的时间里，一切由他去；至于你的往日，你的顾虑和渴求，都依然不变，在你需要时召之即来。此时此刻的你，不妨对正处于你面前、触手可及的对你有爱之人，用心看一看。

【译者注：这篇《纯净的爱》，附在探讨醋意的章节之后，作为其“篇外篇”，因此必须处处结合“化解醋意”的语境，而不要孤立地、断章取义地将其作为普适性的爱情指南。本书两位作者阅人无数的背景和能力，其他很多人都没有可比性。就大多数人而言，与人相爱，都不可以完全放下对“是否公平合理”的警觉性，要防止以爱之名的身心操控。当然，“不带条件，不期待从中获取什么”的纯净之爱，其正面意义也很可观。例如，相爱完全可以是短暂的，不必“天长地久”；再如，对热恋中的“期货”承诺，从“此生只爱你一人”、“无论如何都永不分手”，到“我爱你，所以我的富贵，我的房产，都与你共享；我的家传公司，你将来就是副总”之类，都别太当真，或者说，从相爱之始，就不要将此类种种，当作爱情的附加值，更不要当作爱情的“酬劳”乃至爱情的目标。爱情的报酬和目的，就是爱情本身；爱或者不爱，只看这个人，此时此刻是否和自己“对味”，就足够了；将来如果感觉彼此不再对味，受够了，那就分手，好聚好散一别两宽。——尽管上述的爱情观，可能过于理想化，很多人都难以完全做到，但不妨朝这个理想目标，去渐近尝试。】