Well the 11th ñana, Equanimity, is related to 4th samatha jhana rather than the arupa jhanas although, in my own experience, encountering these "vibrational formless realms" usually occurs around the point of gaining "Equanimity regarding Formations". Variations of the samatha jhana? I don't know if that's how I would describe them but I see where you're coming from.
Just looking back over some of the things you wrote, this was really good, I think I missed it at the time. (Having just done another 30 day in April With Sayadaw U Pandita Jr I think I learnt and experience alot more. This was facilitated by Sayadaw U Pandita Jr in a non intellectual manner, he taught very simply compared to Sayadaw Vivekananda). Yeap, get what you mean, they aren't formless in the sense that a distinct arupa jhana is, but formless in the sense that the body is experience more as an energy field, which is why, as you stated, that they usually occur around "Equanimity regarding Formations". Correct.
About to go back through this whole post, was having a really hard time, after the 70 days, only been a week since the 30 days, but things are looking alot better. Maybe because of the hubris of hoping for stream entry on the first long retreat, isn't as evident this time. I was not really at all practicing for about 5 wks or more after the 70 days. So I was really dark nighting it, sorry if i was grumpy.
As for your notes, there's not a lot of info to go on there. If you've done 60 days of a 70 day retreat then what do you think prevented you from attaining Fruition?
Why are you so sure that you've got to High Equanimity? What sensations did you note, what implied this?
I ask this from a sceptical point of view as I've mixed myself up trying to map "in the moment" and speculating rather than simply noting accurately. It's easy to get confused and waste your time.
In the first retreat, had barely got a sense of what High Equ. is and hadn't really made a distinction between, the later stages or intervening stages of High Mastery. By that last statement I mean, vibration are flowing fast but they come in waves, so to the newbie, me, one can appear, to past through to a predominantly vibrational state, predominantly is the key word here. There are still a few solid areas that are arising and passing away with light to moderate pressures, aches & coarser heat. So it is my guess that one is sitting on the edges of either sit of High Mastery. I say either side because the other day i was meditating and got to some flow, and the whole body was vibrational for a period, but the mind was nowhere near calm enough to be in High Equ. I think it was because i'd done 2 hours of yoga with some pranayam (yantra yoga) as a prelude to my practice.
Why didn't I attain this retreat? My feeling is I learned alot, got used to extended period of high Equ and was able to get there sometime a few time in a day. And 2 out of 3 day was Equanimity, maybe thirty-fifty percent of my time awake was in equanimity. But my Mind, would not shut up, it kept on flickering me in and out of the stages i was in. I had prepared very poorly for that retreat. I hope to prepare alot better for the next, by keeping my mental health alot more stable. The Other reason i may have not attained, is continual attentive mindfulness. This is really hard to keep up when re-ob comes on, so developing tolerance and focusing ones practice to develop tolerance during the difficult time will really push up the base level of ones experience or centre of gravity. I was a bit slack at the start of the retreat and didn't push the pain envelope, if pain came around 1hr 15 or 1h 30, I didn't keep it going for the next 15min like i should. This means when of if the pain passes, one might push on for a longer sit because ones tolerance(the 7th factor equanimity) hit a high or was strengthened. That's probably the main reason, and somebody came later and gave us a cold/cough in the last 7 to 5 days.
An excellent level of practice is required, doing "enough" won't build the momentum necessary to get the required 'escape velocity'. It might though, but it's likely to take considerably longer to get to Fruition.
Very true.
It's all transient, unsatisfying and not-self after stream entry too, and after that as well. Cycles is cycles is cycles till you're done, and then they're still cycling anyway. All of the ñanas are stages, not states, it may sound like a really picky thing to mention but, as you know, there's a difference between a samatha jhana and a vipassana jhana. Would you want to solidify the 10th ñana?!? emoticon
Interesting, I'm intrigued at what your getting at here but, i'm not getting it at all, please tell me more.