RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 2:52 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 2:52 PM

Rapture? Jhana1 experience

Posts: 1310 Join Date: 5/4/20 Recent Posts
I just posted this to my log:

Oh my God! I don't know what I just experienced! I will need help unpacking this as I have never experienced anything like this in 8 years of meditation

The Concentration practice was excellent, focused on the A Spot in the nostrils and then wham! There's this big sensation there like its exxpanded twice the size and twice as much air is coming in. What was that?

It gets better. I was very Calm/Relaxxed when I entered Noting. I was getting tingles all over, my mind felt very clear and light. I begun to feel like I was floating. It went deeper. I started to get goosebumps as waves of bliss, energy, joy went through my arms and legs. I've never felt like this. Did I experience Rapture? I think so. Was it a Jhana 1 experience?
Olivier S, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:04 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:04 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Sounds like it ! Was it very effortless or did you have to do stuff to sustain it ?
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:06 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:06 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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effortless
Olivier S, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:10 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:10 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Probably second jhana then. Try to do it again ? emoticon
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Papa Che Dusko, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:44 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 3:44 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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emoticon Great stuff Sam emoticon emoticon emoticon Keep at it! There is nothing finer than when vipassana and samatha join in together emoticon 
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 5:54 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/1/21 5:54 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Thank you  olivier for your diagnosis and Papa Che3' for your support.
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 12:09 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 12:09 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Guys, is this considered an Awakening experience? Not THE Full Awakening but a monor awakening
Martin, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 3:02 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 3:02 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Good stuff, Sam! That sounds like the real deal to me.
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David Matte, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 3:38 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 3:38 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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That sounds like quite a surprise experience. Was it a jhana?Jhana refers to state meditative absorption. Did you feel absorbed with the rapture & happiness? There is a feeling of being fused onto the object of concentration in absorption. 
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Papa Che Dusko, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:22 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:22 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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It's a progressive mind development Sam. 1st Jhana leads to the 2nd, then 2nd leads to the 3rd and so on. Same with Nana stages. One leads to the next in a progressive way. It's a result of your good practice. 

Many awakened mind moments (read noting/noticing/payingattention) lead to it and will lead to other states/stages. Prize each Noted experience more than these Jhana states emoticon Yes enjoy them but they are not "being awake". The noted/noticed matter of fact experience IS emoticon 
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:24 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:24 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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David Matte
That sounds like quite a surprise experience. Was it a jhana?Jhana refers to state meditative absorption. Did you feel absorbed with the rapture & happiness? There is a feeling of being fused onto the object of concentration in absorption. 

It came as a suprise but I felt absorbed with the rapture and happiness, onto the object of concentration.
Small Steps, modified 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:54 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/2/21 4:54 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Good work! Sounds like an experience of Piti. If it were me, I wouldn't spend too much time wondering about it, but just try to work on experiencing/stabilizing things so they can re-arise it with some ease. Remember, Piti is one of the seven factors of Awakening... Cheers!
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:24 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/6/21 12:14 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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I just met with Abre and with expertise and going over the experience in detail (plus another one yesterday) she believes it was a strong A&P. My description focused on explosive words, like the nstrils suddenly getting twice as big. Then the intensity of the rapture, the bliss, the feeling that this was it.  I described it as the best experience of my life. She took me through the Access To Insight description for A&P line for line and I totally match. I now have an unshakable faith.

It was also based on I had another experience yesterday:
OMG! It's happened again. I had a potential Jhana1 experience. The start to my concentration had been filled with discursive thoughts. As I concentrated deeper, I remember the moment. All of sudden thoughts dropped while at the same time sense perceptions dropped. It's like I stepped into an acoustical chamber. I totally relaxed into Bliss. This when on unttil the stupid timer interrupted it to signify time for noting. But I couldn't note. I was getting waves of bliss, while my body felt light. Just pure Joy, no worrries.

She said not to get attached to it for that would lead too a corruption of insight,
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:14 AM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:14 AM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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It definitely sounds like jhanic factors are developing. I wonder why Abre would consider it to be possible stream entry. That seems far-fetched to me. Everything you describe are classical signposts for getting stronger concentration leading to first jhana. Good work! An advice that I wish I had followed myself is to keep your shamatha going every day, longterm, parallelly to your other practice. Otherwise you'll lose it and need to do the hard work again. 
Martin, modified 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 9:38 AM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 9:38 AM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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That is interesting. I have noticed that concentration has a momentum, and so I have been "keeping it up" in part for the reason you mention but I have not heard anyone confirm my suspicion that it may be a use-it-or-loose it type thing. I can take breaks of a weak or so from concentration practice but my ability is weakened when I come back to it, much like a sport. 
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Nirasanka, modified 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:00 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:00 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Your description, Sam, sound like a classical experience of the 1st Jhana, involving the typical feeling of goosebumps, a strong (cold) shiver running down the spine and a somehow also similar to an electrical shock (but only to a specific degree) - piti.
With regard to my own experience I use this feeling as a sign that I entered into the 1st Jhana. Just try to be aware of the feeling, don't try to change it (sustain it) or let you distract by it; remain focused on your meditation object. The feeling will then slowly fade away and when you remain concentrated on the mediation object, you will feel then that there is a positive emotion arising, it's the 2nd Jhana, etc.
The piti feeling is the same, ackording to my experience, as that one that appears when one enters the "virbational state" right before an out-of-body experience (OBE). I knew it also from the practice of Qigong.
Sam Gentile, modified 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:23 PM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/7/21 4:23 PM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö
It definitely sounds like jhanic factors are developing. I wonder why Abre would consider it to be possible stream entry. That seems far-fetched to me. Everything you describe are classical signposts for getting stronger concentration leading to first jhana. Good work! An advice that I wish I had followed myself is to keep your shamatha going every day, longterm, parallelly to your other practice. Otherwise you'll lose it and need to do the hard work again. 
Linda, I mispoke. I was incorrect. Abre never said Stream Entry.
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 3 Years ago at 2/8/21 4:13 AM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/8/21 4:13 AM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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Ah, that explains it. Good. 
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 3 Years ago at 2/8/21 4:17 AM
Created 3 Years ago at 2/8/21 4:17 AM

RE: Rapture? Jhana1 experience

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I wouldn't consider the shivers and electrical stuff typical for jhana at all. That's unstable piti eruptions, and the electrical part of it is classic A&P. The stable buzzing beginning in the hands and spreading  leading to pleasant absorption sounds more jhanic to me.