Brian Eleven:
Hello, I'm starting this thread as a place to post my meditation practice experiences. My current practice is following the 6R method as described here:
http://www.dhammasukha.org/Study/books.htm
It is referred to as "Tranquil Wisdom Meditation". I'm no expert when it comes to Buddhism, or any practice, but this feels like the right practice for me to be following currently. Perhaps others are familiar with it.
I have been on the KFD forum for almost a year, but I don't note, so the fit seems to be less and less natural. By that I mean that my experiences don't seem to align with that of other yogis on the site.
...
I should also note that my experience of the stages and paths do not match up especially well with MCTB and others who I have been in contact with. I don't know why.
hey, this just reminded me of an interesting post by
Culdasa (linked by Nick in the comments of
this post):
Questioner:
Lately, I've been curious about the path of insight knowledges as compared to the path of mahamudra. I have two questions:
1. Do the insight knowledges always happen in that order? I suspect not *always*, but maybe they tend to, or they may happen in that general order.
2. The insight knowledges involve some pretty uncomfortable and downright horrible phases (e.g. bhanga, terror, misery, disgust). On the other hand, Mahamudra has been described as the path of bliss... So my question is, who in their right mind would choose to do the insight knowledges and spend considerable time in abject misery rather than taking a blissful path?
Culdasa:
1. Whether or not the Insight Knowledges occur in the same order depends very much upon the method of practice.
They occur in the order given in the Vissudhimagga and in Mahasi's Progress of Insight if a) one is practicing "vipassana (Insight) before samatha (tranquility)" (cf. the Yuganaddha Sutta, AN 4.170), and if b) one is using a method that is designed to make Insight into anicca (impermanence) the first to arise while Insight into anatta (emptiness of Self) is left to the very end.
[For those who might be puzzled about the Samatha that follows what they may have thought of as a "pure" Vipassana practice, please note that the Knowledge of Equanimity Towards Formations is Samatha.]
With regard to a):
If one practices "samatha before vipassana", then the Knowledge of Arising and Passing Away and the Knowledge and Vision of Path and Not-Path will come before the Purification of View and Overcoming Doubt rather than after it. But the View and Overcoming Doubt must obviously still precede the Insight Knowledges themselves.
And if one practices "samatha together with vipassana", then even more variability in the order is possible.
With regard to b):
Knowledge of Dissolution followed by the Dukkha Knowledges is an order that is quite specific to a practice geared towards anicca as the first Insight. Knowledge of Dissolution is the entry into actual Insight with Insight into anicca being the first, and Insight into dukkha being the second. Practices oriented towards a different "entry" into Insight will, of course, not follow this order at all.
2. Insight into Dukkha is a miserable experience if a) one launches into Insight without the "lubricating moisture", i.e. piti (joy), passadhi (tranquility), and upekha (equanimity) of Samatha; and if b) Insights into anicca, sunyatta, and dukkha precede insight into anatta. Deepening Insight into impermanence by someone who still has a strong intuitive sense of being a real, separate Self can be a terrifyingly miserable experience. A "Self" in a world of impermanent and empty "things" to which that Self tries to cling is the very definition of dukkha.
With regard to a):
A mind imbued with piti, passadhi, and equanimity can navigate this voyage of discovery with far more... well..., joy, tranquility and equanimity to mitigate the fear misery and disgust of confronting the reality of the way things are.
And with regard to b):
Of course, to the degree to which the emptiness of Self has been both intellectually realized and intuitively assimilated, to that degree one is effectively immunized against the experience of dukkha during the process of further deepening of Insight into the nature of dukkha.
So to restate your question, "Who in their right mind would follow a method that broaches Insight without first cultivating Samatha, or plunge into the Knowledge of Dissolution and Insight into Impermanence without first properly addressing the issue of emptiness with regard to the perceived Self?"
Here are a few answers that come immediately to mind:
With regard to why someone would not first cultivate Samatha;
- Someone might be unaware that there is any other approach.
- Someone might have been taught that Samatha practices are useless or difficult or dangerous or are to be avoided for some other reason or combination of reasons. eg. "Concentration practices are a waste of time. The only real Buddhist meditation is Vipassana."
- Someone might have been unsuccessful in Samatha practice due to lack of proper instruction, and so has abandoned it in frustration.
- Someone might have practiced Samatha incorrectly in a way that has led to dullness, and so has abandoned the practice as fruitless.
With regard to why someone would pursue Insight into anicca before anatta;
- Anyone who is resistant to and cannot accept the idea that what the Buddha meant by anatta is that there really is not, never has been, and never will be a separate Self other than these conditioned, impermanent, suffering aggregates. This is part of what makes anatta so much more inaccessible than anicca. There are countless Buddhists, Western and Eastern alike, who think, "Buddha just meant that the Self was not in the aggregates, not that there is no Self at all." They feel like they are a Self, and they fully expect to have the mystery of the doctrine of anatta solved and their "True" Self revealed through the practice. You know the one they are thinking of: the Self who has lived countless previous lives, the one that accumulates merit and kamma, the one that is going to be reborn in the future. These are the closet "eternalists".
- Anyone who craves non-existence, who embraces the Dhamma as the path to an ultimate end to the endless cycle of suffering and rebirth, but who can only conceive of liberation in terms of oblivion. The rebirth they wish to escape is, of course, that of a Self that for them does exist, although admittedly in a mysteriously relative and mind-dependent way, but a Self that is all too painfully and undeniably real none-the-less. Since this Self exists in some mysteriously mind-dependent way, it is the mind that must put an end to it. Insights into impermanence and suffering are seen as the path by which the Self will be destroyed and become a No-Self that will not be reborn. These are the closet "anihilationists".
- Anyone who is aware that Insight into anicca is in fact much more readily attained than Insight into anatta. This is quite true and is perhaps the best of all possible reasons for seeking Insight into Impermanence.
You mentioned Mahamudra. First, the actual practice of Mahamudra meditation as such is not to be taken up until one has already achieved Shamata. If one enters into a traditional program of training in Mahamudra by a qualified teacher, the first thing to be introduced is the "ordinary" practice, which is Shamata, the mastery of which precedes the "uncommon" practice, which is Mahamudra per se. If you refer to any of the classic texts on Mahamudra that have been translated into English, you will see that almost half of any given volume is devoted to Shamata practice. Second, Mahamudra is meditation on the emptiness of mind, and mind is the primary locus of our attachment to the false view of separate Self-hood. Therefore, Insight into anatman, the emptiness of Self, is an integral part of the process from the first.
I will provide a caveat for those who might be drawn to Mahamudra. There are some teachers of Mahamudra, many of them Tibetan, who are quite willing to fill a "market demand" by impatient Westerners who want instruction in "Mahamudra" but don't want to bother with the preliminary training in Shamata. The practice becomes a sort of pseudo-Zen where one just "empties the mind" and tries to do nothing at all in a silent non-meditation. I have serious doubts that anything of value can be accomplished through this kind of practice.
If you are seriously interested in Mahamudra, get a book like "Mahamudra: The Quintessence of Mind and Meditation" by Dakpo Tashi Namgyal. Familiarize yourself with its contents, and then go shopping for a qualified teacher who teaches according to the traditional system beginning with the meditation on Tranquility and Insight.
In the spirit of service,
culadasa
i'm not familiar with your practice, but if it differs from noting in some of the ways outlined above that might explain your different experiences.