I cannot possibly be honest about who I am, without voicing my opinion, and I cannot participate here and try to improve, without first acknowledging that I feel hurt and offended.
Voicing your opinion is fine, but come on, can't you do it in a less provocative manner?
Here are some examples of provocativeness as i see it:
I also don't apologize for anything.
Of course this was with the intent of discrediting EVERYTHING I was about to say, without actually addressing my points. That having been said, before everyone jumps on the "James is insane, therefore everything he says is wrong, bandwagon."
I thought I would pre-empt that, and actually, raise every single critique of this community that I have... So that they can be addressed, in and of themselves.
As opposed to, addressing, blaming, discrediting, reverse-trolling, judging, condemning, banning, categorizing, separating or just plain hating me.
Ok people have not treated you with complete respect and responded to everything you've said on your terms, but I think your terms are somewhat unreasonable a lot of the time. Your criticisms often fairly wide-ranging and hard to discuss. And furthermore, for the most part, what the blaming, discrediting etc. usually seems to focus on is the way in which you argue and not necessarily the points you make (which are actually made by other people and discussed in a more productive way fairly often around here).
For example, I really don't see the 4-path system as being especially important or interesting. I've heard people make comments like "I just attained stream entry and am more depressed than ever" for example, or people who seem to be struggling with
significantly more emotional difficulties than I am despite being 3rd path. Also I am somewhat doubtful of aspects of the way noting is employed, I don't really see some things like vibrations and the 3Cs of sensations to be too important to mental peace, for me noting is useful in that it keeps my mind from wandering and can lead to stable states of sensate presence in which I am happy and competent and which I would like to make occur more often.
So the reason I don't apologize is because that would be a non-sequitur, you have already categorized, judged me and whatever and if I were to apologize, that would basically, verify what you say. But I don't think it's true.
For example:
1) You imply that I'm crazy. I say that I'm not.
2) You state that I have lied and that is true. And I have apologized for it and confessed it, but my posts were deleted and I was banned. That made me angry. (By this I mean, my attempts at apologies and confession were deleted, and I was banned.)
No I don't think I really have done those things. I feel like I understand how you could have done each of the things you've done here which have been labeled by various people as 'unskilful' (though often in less kind terms). For this reason I don't think you are crazy, I really don't think crazy is a useful term, there's just a question of how much of a person's experience is dominated by proliferating and narratives as opposed to attention to what is being experienced. When I have been really caught up in a lot of narratives of a certain type I could categorize myself as being 'depressed' and when that happens frequently and the narratives gain alot of solidity (as I have experienced at various times) you might get an 'official' diagnosis.
So what I am saying is that you did lie about your mental well-being and attainment status, which is probably as preventative a condition for serious practice as anything else you could possibly do. You have apologized and I really don't hold it against you any longer.
I hope that you will accept my confession so that in the future I may develop restraint and avoid the same behavior.
Let me point out that you could develop restraint, avoidance of the same behavior, mental clarity, purity of mind, etc. without anyone accepting any apology of yours.
Besides, you are appealing to my character to discredit what I'm saying again anyways, which is a fallacy.. I merely ask that you read what I say. And what I said is in the original post of this thread.
No, I definitely responded to your criticisms, and by no means did I link your character to their validity. I think they are valid in some ways and invald in others regardless of who is presenting them. You seem to be replying to the post you expected rather than what I actually wrote. Notice how those expectations come through in your writing and make it hard to really respond to any points you have or to discuss any practice issues you are experiencing.
However, I did practice Vipassana before when I was young boy, and yes, it did lead to intense pain and a feeling of messiness, which this community would probably interpret as being the 3Cs territory. I don't actually know what happened. But there is the possibility that it just doesn't work.
I mean intuitively the method just doesn't seem right, but hey! I could be wrong.
I have actually never experienced those really painful types of experiences noting, but I have experienced them when my practice was simply of poor quality and not very continuous. I have had really extreme emotional lows while practicing which have put me into suicidal ideation territory, but I have had nothing close to that in the last few months when I have turned up the heat and got into a really strong noting rhythm. It's likely that the lessons I learned from all those difficulties are playing a huge role in my current success, reminds me of an Ajahn Chah quote which goes something along the lines of "you have to break down and cry at least three times in your practice before you can really begin practicing."
When I got into that difficult territory my 'practice' was basically sitting around and worrying about enlightenment, doubting that I knew how to get enlightened, whining that enlightenment was too hard... then at various times thinking I was enlightened, telling people I was enlightened, getting mentally hysterical thinking about how close I was to getting enlightened etc.
These days I would definitely describe my mind as far more clear and pure and relaxed than it was back then, and mostly my practice is what I described above with 6-sense noting and, when my mind seems to be reaching a sort of 'peak' of equanimity, clarity etc. I drop the noting and just stay silently with the sensate experience (for as long as I can keep that up at a high level).
Anyway, I hope some of this can be of use to you. Personally I hope that you start a practice journal, keeping it simple and non-speculative, and that the people in this community can stop bringing up the past such that you can get over it. How would you describe your practice these days?
Alternatively you could just practice on your own and only post occasionally with clear practical questions, this is what I try to do, though usually by the time I am finished writing out my question I figure out that it was just a useless self-sabotaging doubt interrupting good practice.