RE: Mahasi Sayadaw's Fruition training practice

End in Sight, modified 11 Years ago at 8/30/12 3:56 PM
Created 11 Years ago at 8/30/12 3:56 PM

Mahasi Sayadaw's Fruition training practice

Posts: 1251 Join Date: 7/6/11 Recent Posts
This came up in a conversation I had with Yadid.

Mahasi Sayadaw suggests that one who has attained stream entry should practice to lengthen the duration of their fruition attainment, extending fruition to a half hour, an hour, or even more.

* Has anyone tried this or trained in this way, or known of someone who has? If so...

* How was it done, what were the benefits, etc?

* What is the difference between NS (as explained in MCTB ) and a lengthening of fruition attainment?

* The Visuddhimagga seems to say that fruition attainment occurs as a form of jhanic attainment; one reaches a path, and on the basis of the jhana involved with that path (depending on how one was practicing), the fruition attainment associated with that path involves the jhana factors of the relevant jhana in some way. (Bhante G has an accessible discussion of this.) What is the relationship between fruition and jhana, however you understand those terms?

Not sure if this will be a productive thread; I suspect not many people here do this kind of thing nowadays. But perhaps I'll be surprised!
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Nikolai , modified 11 Years ago at 8/30/12 5:28 PM
Created 11 Years ago at 8/30/12 5:24 PM

RE: Mahasi Sayadaw's Fruition training practice

Posts: 1677 Join Date: 1/23/10 Recent Posts
End in Sight:
This came up in a conversation I had with Yadid.

Mahasi Sayadaw suggests that one who has attained stream entry should practice to lengthen the duration of their fruition attainment, extending fruition to a half hour, an hour, or even more.

* Has anyone tried this or trained in this way, or known of someone who has? If so...

* How was it done, what were the benefits, etc?

* What is the difference between NS (as explained in MCTB ) and a lengthening of fruition attainment?

* The Visuddhimagga seems to say that fruition attainment occurs as a form of jhanic attainment; one reaches a path, and on the basis of the jhana involved with that path (depending on how one was practicing), the fruition attainment associated with that path involves the jhana factors of the relevant jhana in some way. (Bhante G has an accessible discussion of this.) What is the relationship between fruition and jhana, however you understand those terms?

Not sure if this will be a productive thread; I suspect not many people here do this kind of thing nowadays. But perhaps I'll be surprised!


Is 'fruition' according to Mahasi, conscious or unconcsious (as in the infamous momentary blip/black out/conk out)?


It has already been stated that phalasamapatti (fruition attainment) first begins to occur when arising from nirodhasamapatti. This phalasamapatti being free from raga (passion), etc., it is also called suññata(the Void). As it is free of ræga-nimitta (one of the attributes of sentient existence), it is also known as animitta. Moreover, as it is free from passionate desire such as raga, etc., it is also called appanihita. As such, phassa which is also included in this samapatti is also known as suññata, animitta and appanihita. As phassa (contact) takes place by dwelling upon Nibbana, which is known as suññata (the Void), animitta (the Unconditioned), and appanithta (freedom from longing or desire), with attentive consciousness of mind, it is called suññata, etc. The answer, therefore, is that the three kinds of phassa, viz: suññataphassa, animittaphassa and appanihitaphassa first begin to take place.

For better understanding, it may be stated that when arising from nirodhasamæpatti,contact takes place with suññata-nibbana, a condition devoid of kilesa-sankhara to which the mind has been directed as its sense-object. Contact is also made with animitta-nibbana which is devoid of or free from any sign of nimitta. Then comes mere awareness of contact with appanihita-nibbana, a condition free from vehement desire, which is the sense object that has been contemplated.
http://www.dhammaweb.net/mahasi/book/Mahasi_Sayadaw_Culavedalla_Sutta.pdf



Here it seems he is talking of what is occuring directly after nirodha. Is nirodha the cessation of senses? Is phala, i.e. fruition attainment, a conscious experience? Conscious or unconscious? This may influence the answers to your questions.

I did this for awhile: http://thehamiltonproject.blogspot.com.au/2011/07/yogi-toolbox-lengthening-fruition.html. Is it the same thing?
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Daniel M Ingram, modified 11 Years ago at 8/31/12 12:35 AM
Created 11 Years ago at 8/31/12 12:35 AM

RE: Mahasi Sayadaw's Fruition training practice

Posts: 3268 Join Date: 4/20/09 Recent Posts
Bill used to talk about extended Fruition duration. I chased it for years and totally failed to have Fruitions that I could be certain had any external duration of any appreciable timeframe except this one time long ago (circa 1997) where I thought maybe...

There seems to be individual variation on how Fruitions happen for people. Some can get multiples, some can only get one/day max, some seem to describe duration by external time measures but the gap for them is the same, meaning there is just the in, the out, and nothing in between beyond the sense on retrospect that there was a discontinuity, like some frames of reality were edited out and the thing was spliced back together. Some can get Fruitions only after long practice on a cushion, others in daily life sometimes, others in daily life easily, others by mere brief inclination, and this may vary by the phase of their practice.

Bill used to really strive for duration, and apparently would spend hours calming and restraining and stabilizing the mind to achieve it. Kenneth Folk would know more about his practice and might be worth asking about it.

I wish I could add more,

Daniel
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Andy W, modified 11 Years ago at 9/4/12 8:40 AM
Created 11 Years ago at 9/4/12 8:40 AM

RE: Mahasi Sayadaw's Fruition training practice

Posts: 59 Join Date: 10/13/10 Recent Posts
Ah, this is very interesting! This April I went to Dhammacari, a hardcore Mahasi centre in Germany, where they make you stay awake for 72 hours at the end of a two week retreat. On the penultimate day, you are told to make this resolution before you sit:

Within this 60 minutes sitting period, may the Phenomena of Arising and Ceasing appear as often as possible.


In other words, may I experience a ton of fruitions. This worked well for me: I had loads, all very clear. On the last day, we were given a harder task, expressed in this resolution:

Within this hour, may I experience the State of Meditation without consciousness of outside phenomena for 5 minutes


If we were successful - i.e. if we felt that time was somehow "missing" when the bell went at the end of the sit, we could change the resolution to 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and 60 mins, incrementally. I didn't manage this at all, but it sounds a lot like what you might call extended fruitions.
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