One way to think of the Progress of Insight would be to plot it on a graph. It might look like this:
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It starts out flat, rises to a climax, reaches a peak event, descends to a trough, stabilizes, then resolves. In order to better show the resolution, we could add an upright bar at the end, like this:
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The first time through the complete cycle might take months, usually years, and, by definition, results in the First Path of Enlightenment, using traditional Theravada Buddhist language. Having made it all the way through once, you now "own" it, and can learn to review all of the territory you have covered. Even without further practice, you will naturally cycle through this territory. At some point, though, the mind seems to get tired of this first package and moves on. You find yourself at the beginning of a new Progress of Insight.
The second complete cycle might again take months or years, and results in Second Path. But then the cycle speeds up and repeats many times before Third Path is reached. At times a complete cycle might take just a day or two, often a few weeks. At times, it feels as though you have completed the cycle in a few minutes or even a few seconds, or many cycles in one second. I don't know if there is an exact number of cycles that must be completed in order to attain Third Path. If there is, it might be in the hundreds or thousands. In my own experience it is not feasible to keep count. I've only spoken to two other people about this, and neither of them could nail down a number. Suffice to say that by Third Path one is thoroughly tired of cycles and wishing they would end.
They don't end. They do become less annoying though, as, with attainment of Third Path, the focus turns away from what is changing, toward something deeper and more stable. I remember feeling, at times, as though I were in the eye of the hurricane, looking out from a place of calm as the winds whipped around me. While working toward Fourth Path, the cycles are still coming fast and furious, sometimes several or many in one day, but often one cycle every week or every few weeks.
It is important to note that through all of this there is the feeling of being pulled toward some inevitable conclusion, a sort of dharmic gravity pulling you toward the core of existence. You sense that, if given enough time, the maddening instability of the cycles will resolve. It does, with the advent of Fourth Path, or arahatship. If fact, it is the feeling of finally being "off the ride" that I believe is the defining characteristic of arahatship.
The cycles, however, don't end with the Fourth Path. Rather, they become a natural part of life, like the breath, or the sleep cycle, or the seasons and the year. Just as one doesn't get tired of breathing or sleeping, but surrenders to the natural rhythms of life, someone who has reached Fourth Path has integrated the cycles into his or her daily rhythms. And although we may get tired of the seasons, as we do when it is very hot in the summer or very cold in the winter, we are deeply confident that it will soon change. The Progress of Insight is like that for somebody who has come to the end of the process that I think of as physio-energetic development. I use that word in order to distinguish the Progress of Insight from a psychological process. Psychology involves the contents of the mind, i.e. thought, and the cycle I'm speaking of has very little if anything to do with that. Rather, it involves an energy that is felt in the body, and is therefore physiological. Although we don't yet have the scientific tools to measure this energy, I won't be surprised if we someday do. Meanwhile, cultures around the world have been talking and writing about this energy for millenia. The words kundalini, chi, and ki, among others, all refer to this physio-energetic phenomenon. The chakras are nexuses of energy, and when developed, are stable places where the concentrated mind can rest. This resting is called jhana.
What then, does the early part of the cycle feel like? It feels solid. Here again, is the graph:
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We can divide the graph into five parts:
1. __ (The opening, as in "the opening act.")
2. / (The ascent.)
3. /\ ( The peak.)
4. \ (The descent.)
5. __ (Consolidation and Resolution.)
1. The opening act is the flat line at the left, understanding that the cycle moves from left to right. (As it is a cycle, this whole process might be more accurately represented as a circle, but I have deliberately chosen a linear graph for ease of understanding.) In traditional language, what I am calling the opening act includes the first two insight knowledges, Knowledge of Mind and Body and Knowledge of Cause and Effect.
2. The ascent. The third isight knowledge, Knowledge of the Three Characteristics.
3. The peak. The fourth and fifth insight knowledges, Knowledge of the Arising and Passing Away of Phenomena and Knowledge of Dissolution, respectively.
4. The descent. The 6th through 10th insight knowledges: Fear, Misery, Disgust, Desire for Deliverance, and Re-observation (the dukkha ñanas).
5. Consolidation and Resolution. Includes the 11th insight knowledge, Knowledge of Equanimity, the 12th through 15th insight knowledges, including Path and Fruition, all four of which are said to happen in one moment, permanently completing the cycle, and the 16th insight knowledge, Review.
First insight knowledge, Knowledge of Mind and Body
So, the opening stage feels solid. The easiest way to picture this is to imagine a new yogi on his first retreat. (For lack of a non-awkward alternative, I'm going to adopt the convention of the generic masculine pronoun, with apologies to the majority of humankind who do not consider themselves male.) The idealized imaginary yogi, on the first day of his first vipassana retreat, will reach a concentrated state and have his first insight. He will see that he is not his body, and he is not his thoughts. He will further see that mind and body are two separate things, with each influencing the other. He may even see a thought arise, as separate from "himself," the knower of the thoughts. This is an enormous development, as he has not previously considered himself to be other than his thoughts. This is the beginning of a meta-awareness, a stepping back from experience to be able to dispassionately observe experience, an ability that will strengthen throughout his life.
Our imaginary yogi has reached the first insight knowledge, the aptly named Knowledge of Mind and Body. He has not, however, fully penetrated the object, which, as we shall see, is the very heart of the vipassana technique and that which gives it its unique transformative power. Having not yet penetrated the object, the yogi's experience can be described as solid.
A traditional example can help to illustrate what is meant by solid in this context:
You are walking down a country road and you see what appears to be rope lying across the road, its ends disappearing into the brush on either side. As you approach more closely, you notice that the rope is not lying still, as one would expect from a rope. It seems to be moving ever so slightly. Moving closer still, you realize that it is not a rope at all. It is a line of ants crossing the road in both directions. Finally, you see that that line is composed of individual ants, each of which is composed of many constituent parts constantly in motion. At this point you have penetrated the object. The object of perception, which at first seemed to be a solid rope, is revealed to be an illusion.
This practice of deconstructing apparently solid objects of perception into their constituent parts is vipassana, which is translated into English as "seeing clearly." The yogi at the level of the first insight knowledge, however, has not yet done this. True vipassana doesn't begin until the fourth insight knowledge, Knowledge of the Arising and Passing Away of Phenomena. It is for this reason that the A & P, as I call it, is the most important of the insight knowledges, and that which opens the door for the development and final integration of the physio-energetic process called the Progress of Insight.
While the stages of the Progress of Insight are described by the Theravada Buddhists as insights, it seems clear that there is something at work here that goes much deeper than thought. In order for similar insights to appear to diverse individuals in an invariable sequence, there must be something structural underlying the thoughts. This sequence of development must be somehow hardwired into all human beings. The very fact that there is a map of insight suggests that every yogi goes through a similar process. While this seems incredible, considering the infinite variability of individual human minds, there is ample precedent for it; the key is to see it as a fundamentally physiological, as opposed to mental, phenomenon. It surprises no one to hear that each of us started out as a zygote, developed into a fetus, was born as an infant, progressed through early and middle childhood, blossomed into adolescence and finally became an adult. Upon reaching adulthood, our progress along what I would call the vertical axis of development reaches its zenith; at that point, if we are to develop further, we must do so along the infinite horizontal axis of mental, psychological and spiritual growth. Similarly, the fact that a yogi's progress along the vertical axis of development through the ñanas, jhanas, and Paths is predictable and mappable points to an underlying physiological or physio-energetic development. (While other thinkers have used the idea of vertical and horizontal axes of development somewhat differently, I have chosed the vertical axis to represent development through ñanas because that is what feels most intuitive to me. The actual experience of gradual enlightenment involves an initial upward movement of energy within the body. Later, this energy is seen/felt to exit the body from the crown chakra, curve back down, and make a complete circuit. In short, it feels more vertical than horizontal.)
In fact, it was this predictability, this repeatability of the process across individuals, across cultures, and across millenia, that first drew me to vipassana and Theravada Buddhism. Until I met Bill Hamilton in 1990, I had been reading mostly zen literature, and had come to think of enlightenment as some nebulous, airy-fairy kind of wisdom that some people possessed for some inexplicable reason. So, when Bill began to speak, during our very first meeting, about a kind of enlightenment that could be systematically developed by anyone, I was immediately hooked. Over time, I came to understand that vipassana is simply a technology by which to achieve a development that, while completely natural and organic, is optional. Most people, for better or worse, will not develop this potential. Many will live their entire lives without even knowing it exists. Some will be told of its existence, but will not believe it. Such is the way of the world.
Second insight knowledge, Knowledge of Cause and Effect
On the second day of his retreat, as our ideal yogi continues to deepen his concentration, he will reach the second insight knowledge, Knowledge of Cause and Effect. This is the direct, intuitive understanding of karma, as experienced in his own life. With his mind quiet and undistracted, he will feel in his gut the pain of his past unskillful actions and the joy of past good deeds. Much of his time on the cushion and walking around the retreat center will be spent reflecting on past actions and their karmic fruit. These revelations are by no means ordinary thoughts, but rather deep intuitions backed up by physical sensations. When he remembers the time he sent flowers to his mother for no reason except that he felt like it, he will feel a deep happiness in mind and body. When he remembers the time he shoplifted candy as a child he will feel pain, and will instantly make the connection between cause and effect; skillful action leads inevitably to happiness, while unskillful action leads inevitably to suffering. Karma is no longer an abstraction to him, but a law of nature. He has attained the second insight knowledge, Knowledge of Cause and Effect. But he has still not fully penetrated the object.
Third Insight Knowledge, Knowledge of the Three Characteristics
The three fundamental characteristics referred to so often by the Buddha in the Pali canon are Dukha, Anicca, and Anatta. These three Pali words are worth teaching in their original Pali form, as the English translations, especially in the case of Dukkha, do not capture the full sense of the words. Dukkha is usually translated into English as "suffering," and this is as good a single-word translation as any. But the word dukkha also carries the sense of "unsatisfactoriness." The Buddha said "Life is dukkha." In fact, that was his First Noble Truth. The idea that life is inherently unsatisfactory is fundamental to Buddhism, and is often repeated by Buddhist teachers in order to motivate students to meditate. The Buddha promised that, by applying his techniques, ordinary people "could come to the end of dukkha." Is that true? The short answer is "yes." The long answer involves explaining a subtle and profound word game. For now, let's just say that to be enlightened is to completely internalize the experience that, although there is suffering, there is no one to suffer.
Anicca means "impermanence. Like the rope in our story, things are not static. Even the most solid-appearing things are made up of small things, and ultimately, everything consists of energy in motion. Modern physics teaches us the same. The Buddha, 2500 years after his life and death, has been vindicated. Anicca is indeed one of the fundamental characteristices of existence.
Anatta is the Pali word for "no self." Just as there is no rope lying across the road, there is no inherently existing self. It is an illusion, caused by a misperception. To look closely at the myriad processes that make up our sense of self is to see through them. To see through them is to have no self. Anatta.
On the third day of his first retreat, our ideal yogi experiences all three of the fundamental characteristics first hand. Above all, he feels dukkha. As he sits on the meditation cushion, his knees hurt, his back is giving out, he has a headache, and he feels sick to his stomach. Dukkha, to be sure. He goes to the meditation teacher to beg for relief. Could he sit in a chair, instead of on the floor? Perhaps he could skip a few sittings? He might even ask if he might go home and return when he feels better.
But the meditation teacher has seen this a thousand times before. He knows the map, sees that the yogi is about to make a breakthrough in his practice, and manages to convince the yogi to stay. "Stay just one more day," he encourages, "and we'll talk about it again tomorrow." The next day, of course, our yogi attains to:
The fourth insight knowledge, Knowledge of the Arising and Passing away of Phenomena
The fourth insight knowledge could be said to be the most significant event in a yogi's career, and is often the most spectacular. The nondescript name, Knowledge of the Arising and Passing Away of Phenomena, in no way does justice to the reality. This is the peak spiritual experience, often a completely life-changing event. While for some people it can be fairly subtle, often it involves unitive experiences, "God-union," "the white light," mystical visions, and sublime ecstasy. It signals the beginning of true spirituality, and while it is often mistaken for a culminating event, it is really the germination of the seed that will later come to fruition, first in the partial resolution that is First Path, and later in the final resolution that is arahatship.
So, what are the mechanics of this remarkable event? What is actually going on in the yogi's mind/body? Viewed through a purely mechanistic lens, the yogi has managed, for the very first time, to completely penetrate an object. He has reduced a seemingly solid thing to its component parts. A body sensation that was previously experienced as a solid pain in his knee while sitting is now experienced as waves of subtle tingling sensations. Thoughts, instead of sitting there in the mind like stones, are seen to arise, live out their brief existence, and then vanish cleanly into the nothingness from whence they came. For a few days around the attainment of the fourth insight knowledge, all is right with the universe. The secular yogi feels enlightened, the religious yogi feels touched by God, and both expect to live out the rest of their lives at the crest of this infinite wave.
Waves, however, are not infinite, but temporal and cyclical in nature. Returning to our graph, we see that the fourth insight knowledge exists at the very peak of the cycle.
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And because following the peak of every wave is a trough, there is trouble on the horizon. Mercifully, the first part of the descent is pleasant, though that may be viewed as a knife that cuts both ways as it does not prepare the yogi for the horror of what is to come. Next in line is:
The fifth insight knowledge, Knowledge of Dissolution
Returning, for a moment, to the energetic model, we can say that up until now the energy within the body and mind has been rising, and has reached its apex with the fourth insight knowledge. With the fifth insight knowledge, Knowledge of Dissolution, the energy is clearly perceived by the yogi to be subsiding. This is a very chilled-out stage, akin to post-coital bliss. The yogi is in love with the world and everyone in it, but feels no compulsion to do anything about it. Things are fine, just as they are, and the yogi can sit in the meditation hall for hours, grooving on the cool, diffuse, tingling sensations of the body. Before, at the peak of the cycle, it was possible to see the beginning, middle, and end of a thought or sensation. Now, only the end is seen. It is like driving in the slow lane on the highway, with no rear view mirror. All you can see is the receding tail lights of the other cars as they pass you and disappear in the distance. There is no oncoming traffic. The mind is markedly unproductive at this stage. By the time a thought is recognized, it is already gone. Conversations are difficult. One is grateful for the safe and undemanding environment of the silent retreat. This happy stupidity does not last long, however, as the dukkha ñanas are coming hard on its heels. We are about to enter the true low point of the cycle, territory so daunting that it has been the undoing of many a yogi.
Continue with, The Progress of Insight (part two)