Forum: Practical Dharma

I think I made this thread twice because after the first time I didn't know where it went after I posted it. So, mods/admins if you can, please delete one of them and file the other in the right area. I am not sure how overground is structured or how it will change. Thx.

I think most traditions have a sense of the awakening process potentially taking more than one lifetime. Without getting into any of that in a potentially dogmatic or doctrinally conflicted way I would like to pose a more practically important question to the group. Given that many traditions may be generating stream entrants, etc. and/or bodhisattvas, etc. on a more or less regular basis, there should be some people around and about in this world who are not here as 'worldlings' in the first place and may not know what they are except that they are not typical humans. I think this explains a lot of things about exceptional people of various sorts but that is another issue really. We could also add pacceka-bodhi or independent enlightenment processes to this group but they seem like they are loners and solo artists anyways and so they may be less likely to seek out groups other than perhaps pacceka-buddhas. Then again I am a pretty serious loner so who knows?

So, my questions:

Does anyone here have any reason to sense or think that they may have reached first fruit, etc. before this birth? Do you know anyone who has this sense? Have they expressed why they have this impression?

What is it about the conscious qualities or overall nature of this mind/body and it's senses and perceptions that leads you or someone else to sense or think this?

What would be a realistic way to make such determinations, based on the knowledge available in this group about the nature of mind and being at each level of fruition or by means of any other useful criteria and how this would be different from a worldly baseline were it to re-arise again?

I wouldn't dare speculate on this to the degree that you are asking, but in my early teens I had an anomalous urge to meditate. It was a really intense need to sit, even though I didn't know what I was doing or why, hadn't read anything and didn't have any influences in my life that had introduced me to it. And after I sat that night, I didn't do it again for over 5 years. So I've often wondered where that impulse came from, it was certainly a harbinger of things to come.

I've heard U Pandita say that everybody has to regain the Arising and Passing in each new lifetime. Not sure, but I seem to remember hearing that the Tibetans agree with this.

I dunno Trip, but it seems that most of the people lingering around this community have had experiences throughout their life which seem oddly coincidental. Vince and I had a conversation about a month ago where we shared some good laughs about a few of ours. I think they make for some of the most intriguing stories out there! So although I will avoid metaphysical discussion like the plague, having folks share those stories would be kick-ass in my book.