Anyone know of or have experience with 2nd or 3rd path occuring without a simultaneous cessation? I have a suspicion this recently happened, but I was under the impression there's usually cessation with a path (certainly was true for 1st path).

In all honesty, I don't care one way or another in terms of attainment, but the past 9 months of dark night were fairly brutal.  A bit like I could see all the suffering in 4k with the volume turned up to 11 but simply had no recourse other than to get wrapped up in a downward spiral of clutching and grasping.  So, if this recent event was a path, I might relax my practice a bit so as not to jump right back into the muck.

To get a bit specific, I've been taking a close look at how the mind and thoughts fit into this reality thing -- both seemed clouded with some 'selfing' that I couldn't quite see.  So I've been particularly keen on watching all the instantaneous micro-activity of thoughts (and the mind's reactions to sensory stimulus) as they arise.    

In any case, I got a pretty big wallop of insight (path or not), and I would say the predominant change following this event was twofold:

- Mind and thoughts have joined the senses as simply arising, having no owner, locationless (in that any seeming location is recognized as a mental fabrication), and just plain empty
- Huge incease in mindfulness and equanimity in day-to-day life (any moments of anger or frustration are caught almost instantaneously, seen as reactive suffering, and quickly discarded)

Time will tell whether this is at least partly permanent, but it seems probable...