there was a four or five year period where i meditated at least five days per week. i'm nearly religiously pragmatic and had a lot of success with daniel's book. who knows about attainment, but i'm rather confident i reached two attainments. first path, which for me was insight into impermanence, and second path, which for me was insight into non-self.

then, i somewhat drifted away from meditation. i got a lot of what i wanted out of it, and slowly but surely, my practice dwindled to once a week or once a month. still, i benefit a lot from my practice and insight, but with the new year here, i wanted to push a bit further.

i've practiced for the last few nights, and, as always, immediately enter access concentration, and quickly can distinguish between physical and mental sensations, and then being observing the causality of these sensations. then, the appearance of the three characteristics. in about five to ten minutes, i can move through the first three jhanas, and with a bit of effort get into the fourth (i'm talkinga about samatha jhanas, not vipassana). although, everything does feel a bit force, and i no longer really have the "muscle memory" to distinguish these things from one another.

i'm wondering if anyone here has any recommendations to books, chapters, videos, or personal advice/anecdotes for those who previously was really "into the system" but kinda fell out. i feel i'm fortuante to not have to "start over" or whatever that really means. i'm also not married to any claims of attainments, i don't really care, just sharing my own personal experience for my own notes. maybe i've achieved nothing, doens't really matter.

any thoughts?

I used to do just samatha and my discipline was great. I enjoyed a nice obsessive groove and meditated tons. Every day usually. Sometimes several times a day for several days to go deep.

Then I started doing samatha + vipassana and my practice got very erratic. That was a crazy time. It's too powerful for me. Or samatha is too violent. I mean, can I say that?

Now I just do vipassana and my practice is  fabulous. I meditate every day. (I count on it, the power it gives me). I've skipped twice in 10 years. Shifting to twice a day is... something I'm working on. No big multiday grooves like with samatha tho.

​​​​​​​So there you go.

Here's a big difference. When I'm doing samatha it's a special thing, apart from the rest of my life. Something I focus on, withdrawing from everything else. But when I'm doing vipassana I'm  addressing my whole life. It's part of my whole. So there isn't a transition there, when I do it and then stop doing it. Not a big transition anyway.

When I do samatha I do all these things to make myself perfect for it. No drugs, fasting, solitude, etc. But  when I do vipassana I do it no matter my state.

I mean it's good to practice those other disciplines too, but the space in which I do vipassana is not a special space like with samatha. Vipassana is utterly  omnivorous like that. So again,  ther eis not really a transition between the practice and the rest of my life. No awkward threshold to cross. 

Why does popcorn get saggy? 

Humidity? Lack of enthusiasm?

Hmm ...