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Stream Entry

link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry

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every time someone mentions this booklet (which i wrote early last year) in a discussion, i get a bunch of pm requests for it. so even though it's unfinished (and looks to remain that way for the foreseeable future), i have published it at:

http://docs.google.com/View?id=dc5p9v23_103gn9z8dg2

this thread can also be used to discuss, ask questions about, and suggest additions or corrections to the above document.

tarin

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 3:54 AM as a reply to tarin greco.
Hi Tarin,

I just finished reading it. I like the 'imaginary' section, which I could understand only a little (for example, resolutions sound to me similar to suggestions in PNL). The tricky thing is "the 4th jhana is hella imaginary". I don't know if it relates to the fact that jhanas are fabrications of mind... A yogi just fabricates his own 4th jhana before reaching 1st Path?

I keep this view as related somehow to the fact that at that point even the practice instructions count less, and it is more important to be there, to stay there, and you're really on your own. Or I misinterpret?

In your hints about dealing with the equanimity stage you always (in the threads too) mention to pay attention to the framework/space/awareness itself/silence, and don't mention strictly the recognizance of formations.
Advertising formations is mandatory (I struggle with that right now) or you could miss that phase and hit fruition too?

I ask that because it seems (just reading the threads here and in KFD) that before Stream Entry a lot of things could go unnoticed (lower nanas 1-3, A&P Event, even Fruitions).

Umberto

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 4:26 AM as a reply to Umberto T..
Hi Umberto,

Umberto Trinchero:
I like the 'imaginary' section, which I could understand only a little (for example, resolutions sound to me similar to suggestions in PNL). The tricky thing is "the 4th jhana is hella imaginary". I don't know if it relates to the fact that jhanas are fabrications of mind... A yogi just fabricates his own 4th jhana before reaching 1st Path?


Here's my take on this: The 4th Jhana is the gateway to the "psychic powers" - in this sense, awakening is a psychic power. The Buddha even listed it as such, like in the the teachings on the "bases of power", Iddhipada. The iddhipada also spell out "procedural learning", something Tarin mentions right at the top of his guide.

Compare with the Western Magickal Tradition's emphasis on magical techniques such as "invocation of the Holy Guardian Angel" as a path to awakening.

Make of it what you like, but don't get too hung up on the issue of "reality" of outlandish things like "imaginary jhana", magical psychic powers, guardian angels: I really, really like the advice given in MCTB regarding the powers: "Much more interesting than the question of what is real is the question of what is causal, i.e. what leads to what."

Cheers,
Florian

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 4:29 AM as a reply to tarin greco.
Thanks, Tarin!

Would you agree if this were added to the Dharma Overground Wiki, where we could insert links to all the technical terms and concepts you use?

Cheers,
Florian

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 4:50 AM as a reply to Florian Weps.
Hi Florian!

my take about the 'imaginary' wasn't about the powers or magickal stuff.
(he reference to PNL means only that resolutions appear to me a form of auto-hypnosis - not to attain powers, but nanas/jhanas/path)

It is more linked to the concept of compound jhana, if you like. I've read the Sheila Catherine book about jhanas and she said that jhanas are fabrications of mind... maybe the mind has different gauge-like qualities, and you can manipulate (unconsciously) and fabricate your own 4th jhana...

But I'm speculating too much now... let's stay close to Tarin's words.

Umberto

ps: monkeymind is my favorite nickname, very good choice emoticon

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 8:29 AM as a reply to tarin greco.
Thank you for posting that link! I was looking around for the article here are elsewhere a couple of months ago and while I could find references to it, I couldn't find the original. I noticed you kept the text formatting REALLY simple. I like that as it is readable in my PDA now.

Thanks.

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 9:31 AM as a reply to Florian Weps.
Florian Weps:
Thanks, Tarin!

Would you agree if this were added to the Dharma Overground Wiki, where we could insert links to all the technical terms and concepts you use?

Cheers,
Florian


I would second that motion!

-- tomo

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 8:42 PM as a reply to Umberto T..
Umberto Trinchero:
Hi Tarin,

I just finished reading it. I like the 'imaginary' section, which I could understand only a little (for example, resolutions sound to me similar to suggestions in PNL). The tricky thing is "the 4th jhana is hella imaginary". I don't know if it relates to the fact that jhanas are fabrications of mind... A yogi just fabricates his own 4th jhana before reaching 1st Path?

I keep this view as related somehow to the fact that at that point even the practice instructions count less, and it is more important to be there, to stay there, and you're really on your own. Or I misinterpret?

In your hints about dealing with the equanimity stage you always (in the threads too) mention to pay attention to the framework/space/awareness itself/silence, and don't mention strictly the recognizance of formations.
Advertising formations is mandatory (I struggle with that right now) or you could miss that phase and hit fruition too?

I ask that because it seems (just reading the threads here and in KFD) that before Stream Entry a lot of things could go unnoticed (lower nanas 1-3, A&P Event, even Fruitions).

Umberto


hi umberto,

i wrote the paragraph containing the sentence from which the phrase you quoted came (the sentence in full reads, 'I have strong reservations saying this sort of stuff because it can be so easily misconstrued, but if you haven't gotten path yet, a fruition is what you're looking for, the entrance to a fruition arises out of the 4th vipassana jhana (equanimity regarding formations), and 4th jhana is hella imaginary.') with reservations about the way it could be construed or misconstrued, and yet i elected to retain it in the writing to serve as a transition to the conclusion in the paragraph following. that paragraph, and the one following, refer to the later parts of equanimity stage where the integration of physical and mental phenomena (as causal occurrences happening on their own) is nearing completion, the sense of which is of being lost in a very quiet daydream or of slowly falling asleep - as such, the quality of fabricating (via exertion) is completely absent. if you've ever been the last one to leave an empty office where, having stayed late into the evening to finish, you now find yourself in the quiet of closing up and shutting off the lights, appreciating the serenity and stillness of the once-familiar environs, you will know what i mean.. leaving the building is a matter of due course, and so there is no push, no hurry, to do so, as the drift through the motions carries a sense of the ordinary, with no extraneous awareness of its extraordinary nature (as there is, from that perspective, neither anything extraordinary nor any awareness extraneous).

regarding practice instructions, doing the practice is what carries forward the sequence of insight-knowledges, which unfold progressively with the shifts through the jhanas, and which progression cannot be fabricated from scratch but only given rise to by proper conditions, which conditions are brought about by the practice. if these conditions are there, then the intent to move through the knowledges (and thus the jhanas) bears the intended fruit (for example, it is due to the proper conditions that are now firmly in place that a stream-enterer is easily able to call up any of the knowledges at will). however, if the conditions are not there, then what will result from the intention to call up, say, 4th vipassana jhana (equanimity regarding formations) will at best be an emulation based on the nearest available approximation from another jhana, which rendition may look and to some extent even feel like the genuine article, but which, as causality continues to unfold, will be revealed as having been otherwise (as it, not having been 4th and not having been caused by what caused 4th, will not produce the effect that 4th produces.. which effect is, for the purposes of insight practice, the very point of reaching 4th). thus, if you want to do this thing properly, it is important to follow practice instructions diligently and scrupulously, building a strong foundation of attention and continuity, developing faculties of sensitivity and concentration that allow you to perceive vibrations and subtlety, discovering different widths of perspective that allow you to perceive the different ways and places in which phenomena occur, and enabling a sufficiently resolute clear intent that allows you to move so far forward into this thing you forget about ever looking back.

regarding formations, i say keep investigating the three characteristics of those things you mention that i mention ('the framework/space/awareness itself/silence') with clear continuity, not missing a single moment, along with investigating the sensations that imply anything and everything else.. and if you're not missing much formations will show up, and if you're really not missing anything fruition will soon happen.

tarin

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/13/10 8:46 PM as a reply to Florian Weps.
Florian Weps:
Thanks, Tarin!

Would you agree if this were added to the Dharma Overground Wiki, where we could insert links to all the technical terms and concepts you use?

Cheers,
Florian


hi florian,

please feel free.

tarin

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/15/10 7:35 AM as a reply to tarin greco.
Okay, it's been added to the Wiki: ReformedSlackersGuide

I was very enthusiastic adding links - many of them are still dangling. I'll be cleaning this up.

Cheers,
Florian

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/15/10 9:29 AM as a reply to Florian Weps.
Awesome!!!

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/18/10 12:01 AM as a reply to tarin greco.
the prisoner greco:
if you've ever been the last one to leave an empty office where, having stayed late into the evening to finish, you now find yourself in the quiet of closing up and shutting off the lights, appreciating the serenity and stillness of the once-familiar environs, you will know what i mean.. leaving the building is a matter of due course, and so there is no push, no hurry, to do so, as the drift through the motions carries a sense of the ordinary, with no extraneous awareness of its extraordinary nature (as there is, from that perspective, neither anything extraordinary nor any awareness extraneous).


Absolutely golden. Fantastic analogy.

As to people missing stuff: people miss aspects of the stages all the time.

As to formations: even if you don't notice: "Ah, that was a formation," or, "Ah, these are formations," one who attains to stream entry will have perceived reality in the integrated way described by the word formations, regardless of whether or not they knew to call them that. This is a requirement, but it is not so onerous as one might think, and, if set up right in practice, is very natural.

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/19/10 2:05 AM as a reply to Daniel M. Ingram.
Thank you guys. You are SO inspiring.

RE: link to the reformed slacker's guide to stream entry
Answer
1/20/14 5:06 PM as a reply to tarin greco.
Just listening to Daniel's talk at Cheetah House. He was recommending your book. I've been teaching at a regional jail and have been looking for things to give them. Thought this might help. Thanks,
Don Wilson