Hi everyone,I'm writing because I've been experiencing an unusual and intense process over the past year that seems to align with later stages in the Progress of Insight—specifically Re-observation bordering on Equanimity. I want to clarify: I don't have a formal meditation practice, jhāna training, or retreat experience. What I do have is a commitment to radical awareness, somatic integration, and perceptual honesty—and a burnout last year that cracked something wide open.Let me describe this unfolding process:Last year I experienced complete nervous system collapse (burnout), which functioned as a forced deconstruction of my self-referencing mechanisms. My perceptual field shattered—and something began noticing the noticing.Since then, reality has continued to destabilize in coherent patterns. Initially disorienting, I experienced constant "meta-awareness" of impermanence, self-fluidity, and the suffering of identification. My body has adapted. I now experience perception not as flowing from "me" to "out there," but as a holographic field—fluid, recursive, and decentralized.Current characteristics of my experience:

• There's rarely a sense of "I" located inside the body. Instead, experience simply flows—spacious and decentered.
• Direct insight into impermanence, not-self, and dukkha arises constantly as revealed characteristics of all phenomena.
• I still experience emotional sensitivity, existential disorientation, and despair (which I associate with Re-observation)—though I can usually remain grounded through these states.
• Identity patterns arise transparently, often humorously. I can watch these loops without believing them, though they still trigger contraction at times.
• I feel compelled to deconstruct every belief and perception—regarding cosmology, matter, time, and body. Insights arise spontaneously about perception being waveform collapses filtered through the nervous system, and reality as shared myth sustained through collective coherence.
• This process feels like it's happening to me, not by me. Often it feels like awareness itself directs attention to whatever needs integration.
• I've glimpsed equanimity—a profound okayness where everything arises and passes without resistance—but don't abide there consistently.
• I don't experience bliss or energy surges. This process is subtle, recursive, and eerily neutral—more like a natural falling away.

Important context:

• I've been engaged in intensive ancestral trauma work, which has likely contributed significantly to this process of perceptual shifting and identity deconstruction.
• This trauma work has involved deep somatic processing, parts work, and addressing transgenerational patterns, creating profound nervous system reorganization alongside the burnout recovery.
• The intersection between trauma processing and these seemingly meditative insights has been particularly noteworthy—as trauma patterns release, perception itself seems to reorganize at fundamental levels.
• I work in healthcare (nursing) and am emotionally and somatically literate. I'm not psychologically destabilized or dissociated—I'm functional, grounded, relational, and articulate.
• I do feel profoundly disoriented by what I'm seeing. It feels like something irreversible has happened—the ego's scaffolding has dissolved, and I can't reassemble it.
• I've rebuilt structures to track and hold experience (using Notion), while recognizing even this is performative. There's a constant impulse to compost all maps and begin again from raw perception.
• In moments of clear seeing, even the idea of consciousness disappears—just perception without a knower, unfolding without anchor.

Physically, I've experienced periods of intense energy movements, spontaneous kriyas (involuntary movements), heightened sensitivity to foods and environments, and waves of fatigue as my nervous system processes these shifts. Relationships have transformed—some deepening with those who can meet this new way of being, others naturally falling away when the previous identity-based connections dissolved.I'd place myself in late-stage Re-observation with glimpses of Equanimity—happening without formal practice.My questions:

• Has anyone experienced similar terrain without meditation?
• Can these stages arise spontaneously through trauma, somatic work, and perceptual honesty alone?
• Is there a way through this that doesn't involve forcing meditation, but allowing awareness to refine itself through embodied living?
• Are there specific risks at this stage I should know about?

I'm not claiming attainment—I feel humbled and confused. I'm posting because I respect this community's depth and suspect I'm not alone in experiencing this off the cushion.Thank you for reading. I welcome your reflections, questions, or gentle reality checks.

Warmly,
THE LIVING FRACTAL

Welcome to the forum, Daphne. Did you use AI to write this?

​​​​​​​I think it would be helpful to hear from you in your own words about what you've been doing and experiencing. 

* Sure, this is basically a saint-like path: being attentive, moral, respectful, sensitive... and the soul refines itself over time.

* The tricky thing about the maps for saint-like work is that it tends to be more organic than residential vipassina retreats, for example. So there will be insights that are similar, developments that are similar, but it may not occur in such a stage-like fashion. So there will be similarities, but it probably isn't helpful to think of it as the same. (One of my favorite sayings is "the priests argue but the monks and nuns agree".)

* Sure, lots of people have become awakened through different modalities. And there have been some really gifted/lucky/wise meditators that have meditated without a lot of forcing. 

* Yeah, there are all of the same risks. Just because someone is using a different modality than meditation, it doesn't mean that they will avoid the risks of:
** not working hard enough
** using too much effort/manipulation
** diving too deep to fast into traumas and wounds and just retriggering old problems
** not diving deep enough into traumas and wounds and just avoiding addressing/cleaning up old problems.
** spiritual bypassing
** spiritual pride
** neglecting basic things like health, relationships, employment
** wallowing in victim mentally
** too much woowoo... or not enough woowoo!
** indulging in energies or visions or stories
** being overcertain... or full of doubt
** developing a martyr complex
** becoming apathetic or out of touch with fellow humans
** all the classic psychological defense mechanisms: repression, supression, regression, projection, rationalization...
etc. etc. etc. 


Hope this is helpful in some way.

Hi Daphne

The Progress of Insight map comes from Mahasi Sayadaw's work which in turn is  based upon the Bhadant Acharya Anagami Buddhaghosha's work, which in turn is based upon the Arhat Sariputta's work, which in turn is based on Siddharth Gautam's work. I am not a purist by any chance nor am I a religious Buddhist. But  I meditated a lot and have also guided people in their meditation practice. My perspective comes from that context.

Each an every insight in the Progress of Insight map is an 'Insight' with a capital I. As opposed to an intellectual insight.
Each and every Insight changes our 'view'. It radically transforms how we see this world and ourselves within it. It does that by eliminating very strongly held views that got developed and were strengthened over and over and over through out our existence uptill the point that we gain that Insight. For something like this to happen the mind has be very very calm, stable, observant of its own workings. So basically these Insights they happen to a well trained mind. Ordinarily we dont have well trained minds. We as in we human beings. We have to work at it. Very systematically and very diligently.

These conversations of - is meditation required or is it not required for awakening typically force us into cultural contexts of what constitutes 'meditation' and who can decide or bless somebody saying yes boss you are a good meditator. So lets keep the word 'meditation' out of the conversation and lets consider the term self observational training. Its a made up term but it keeps the 'Buddhists' out of the conversation, or any kind of 'ists' for that matter. They are very annoying . This training is a kind of training where we cultivate various mental abilities that are required to observe the mind's own working and deeply learn from it.

In the absence of some degree of systematic training it is almost guaranteed that nobody has the skills needed to observe and learn.

I do not know what intensive ancestral trauma work entails. My suggestion is that you break it down into its constituents and try and figure out how that maps on to a model called the 7 factors of awakening. If there is some kiind of sensible mapping and if you can with some confidence say that you have cultivated the 7 factors of awakening then it is quite possible that Insights will start to accrue on their own. A well trained mind keeps looking inside and keeps learning stuff and yes the stages of the PoI map are possible if not likely.

With that as something of a backdrop which explains my general opinion on this topic, I will take a stab at answering your questions.

• Has anyone experienced similar terrain without meditation?

Without the kind of mental training that will have some kind of mapping onto the moddel fo the 7 factors of awakening Insights will not happen.
It is possible to experience perceptual distortions, emotional highs and lows and stability. But Insight that meta level learning does not happen. for example we experience fear all the time as human beings. But in the Insight knowledge of the 'Bhaya nyana' we truly understand experientially how the mind creates the experience fo fear. What is needed within the mind for fear to arise and what is needed to be let go of for fear to stop happening. This kind of Insight is transformative. This does not happen without the needed mental training.

• Can these stages arise spontaneously through trauma, somatic work, and perceptual honesty alone?

These stages as in the vipassana nyanas arise spontaneously when the requisite mental training has been done. the kind of mental training that can map on to the model fo the 7 factors of awakening.

• Is there a way through this that doesn't involve forcing meditation, but allowing awareness to refine itself through embodied living?

​​​​​​​The kind of mental training required it is dressed in overall and it looks like hard work. That is why people dont do it. In the absence of that kind of training the vipassana nyanas do not happen.

• Are there specific risks at this stage I should know about?

​​​​​​​In the awakening project the biggest risk we are exposed to is the possibility of bamboozling ourselves and settling for something that we believe is the actual thing.

Daphne, I am not trying to discourage you. My objective was to share an opinion with you that may not be popular but it will hopefully add to the body knowledge that you have regarding awakening and awakening practices. For all I know ..... you might very well be the Arhat supreme
​​​​​​​Good luck!

Yes, I wanted to make sure my message was a clear as possible. My native tongue is not english. But I can explain more in my own words. I was reflecting a bit, after writing my original message. I remember, years ago, I bought the book of "mastering the core teaching of the buddha". I was looking for enlightenment. Back then I was in a mindset where I very much believed that there was something wrong with me. I was looking for a way out, and practiced to find relief. I meditated ocassionally. I even read the book of not knowing, by peter ralston. I was quite interested in the idea of understanding life, but it felt like I was always circling around something I wasn't ready for yet. Looking back now it feels like I was being softened. After a break up, loss of job and loss in other forms, I entered a state of deep depression. I stopped reading anything or practicing anything related to this. But something was cracking. This was in 2021/2022. In 2024, I had my burn out. I thought it was from work. But it was as if reality had exhausted itself, not just me. Like the whole field was sighing. Like it was saturated. Too saturated. I remember walking in the forest and I was looking into human suffering for a psychology project I was doing. I did this thing called Emotional resonance walking. I felt with my whole body to the core of where human suffering comes from, both from the point of view of someone who projects suffering onto others and thus creates more of it, and the person receiving the suffering. Somehow this led to a non-dual experience. From this moment, summer 2024, everything started unfolding rapidly. Very rapidly. I went to visit Russia, in december 2024. I live in the Netherlands. As soon as I came back....it went even faster. I started a website, and started tracking my insights in notion. I felt like I needed it. To make sense of things, to stay grounded. To keep myself from falling into traps. Perhaps it was my earlier experience with the topic that had led me to understand a bit about this. At the beginning the experiences sometimes were so intense that I sat crying, both from awe and from fear. Sometimes I would fall back into a spiral, a contraction of awareness. As if it was folding into itself. And I would go through the whole process again only to arrive back at the clarity of non-duality again. I don't even know how to explain these things without words. I am reaching a point were I just feel the desire to abondon all of my notion data and databases. Today, I my insight was a deeper understanding of the impermanence of the collective myth of reality.... It doesn't destabilize me anymore. I am learning to lean into it. Although I am very well aware that this is a never ending fractal. There is no end. But it's getting looser. It's flowing easier. There's less resistance. Yet, I felt the urge to reach out and see if there's others, for I believe we are reaching a saturation point within the field where the old myth is no longer capeable of containing the current collective illusion. A new myth is being born. I know I am not the only one. This is why I reach out.

Thankyou sincerely for taking the time to share you perpective and for doing so with clarity and respect. I appreciate the depth of your lineage awareness and your articulation of what insight means within the Progress of Insight map and Mahasi Sayadaw's tradition. It's helpful to hear how you anchor your view in that structure while remaining open to dialogue. I completely agree that there's a big difference between abstract intellectual insight and insight with the capital I. And perhaps long ago, I would have idenfitied with what you mention, for I tried to think my way to insights. But these things happening are not intellectual. They are very somatic, full body, and on a nervous system level. Actually, when these things started unfolding, I did not think of enlightenement or anything related to it, at all. Because it did not fit my ideas of it. I read about enlightenment 10 years ago, many books. This was not anything unlike what I read. BUT NOW, looking at some teaching as a mirror, I recognise what I am going through. But the field does not allow for me to stick to traditions, dogma, or anything like that. In fact, I am not even in charge of this whole process. I just flow with what the field is guiding me. I did sit in silence for three hours a few days ago, asking myself deeply about who I am, what makes up perception, and just sitting in silence in awe. I don't even know where to start to explain what I am going through. I use words, but they feel useless in explaining these things. I don't meditate. But this whole unfolding feels like one big prayer. It feels natural, not spiritual at all. It feels biological. Like the natural unraveling of something that just can't stay in forgetting anymore. I don't even know where this is going. But... well.. yet here we looking for others who might be experiencing something similar. Ruptures....the slow yet fast unravelling of everything that no longer serves coherence. the outbreath.....of a system too saturated to continue, and the birth of a new one. A new myth. A new maya. Not sure why this is needed. Perhaps because....without a collective new myth, there is no agreed illusion to participate in. No play. And the play has to go on. By the way, this is one part of my work, befor I composted it again. I worked in notion, phases. Even created a system to critically analyse myself for shadow aspects, traps, to reflect back to me cognitive biases.... I guess because I lack anyone who mirrors back at me.....I created my own mirror.

My story is very similar. What pops out at me is the notion that “we” are reaching some saturation point. If I understand you correctly you mean “we” as in humans collectively? I would abandon that idea as a trap. It may be true but it won’t help you in any way. From my perspective it’s seeking justification for “seeking behavior”, and this behavior is just a stage on the path. This process will be about you and only you. 
The confusion is also a stage in the process. I am in that stage now too. I’m short-handing this for brevity, but all the stuff you talked about applies to me at this time. Especially the ideas around the fact that it feels like it is doing it itself. 
After coming here, with much the same interests and experiences, I’ve found that a consistent meditation practice has helped greatly. Before that I didn’t “meditate” but have found since that I had built up lots of habits and practices that were (unbeknownst to me), actually just meditation without the word. Formalizing it brought those practices into the light and gave them contexts by which I could understand them. It dispelled personal myths I had held for years or decades about these practices, and allowed me to integrate them while dropping the magic fluff I had placed around them. 
We can stay in this middle ground for the rest of our lives, or we can formalize a practice. The mind gets too subtle to root out “on its own

Critically unbiased unconditioned make a really long and detailed analysis of what I'm saying right now, because I'm writing from the field as much as possible. Hello, nice to meet you. It's nice to hear your own experiences with this. Yes, I mentioned that we are reaching a saturation point. This is not intellectual. This is field-based, sensed. However, I'm definitely interested in looking at what you pointed out, that it might be a trap. If anything is a trap, it will be composted accordingly. On the other hand, I also trust the field, and what I see in the world at the moment is field saturation. The earth is heating up globally. The social scaffolding is contracting. Individually, people are doing the same. Form is not separate from the field, and the field void or primordial essence is saturated. That's what I sense, feel, and see. Saturation leads to field contraction, and field contraction leads to collapse, and collapse leads to transformation. I believe we are talking about a collective pressure cooking, asking for conscious evolution on multiple levels. Both the earth, animals, and humanity. Illusion or not, it's a functional illusion. I'm aware that this type of talking does not align with any Buddhist teachings that I know. Doubt was part of my path at the beginning when I resisted letting the field unfold through me. When control was something I still believed in, but now I just allow the whole river to flow, and whatever shadows arrive, I know they will be dissolved naturally. It feels unnatural to start formal training in meditation. I don't think I'm on a path that requires this expression of form. It feels more like a path of surrender and co-creation. What happens when I let go of all of this? Nothing. It still unfolds fluidly. I tried that. It still happens. I just flow with it. If this expression of form requires sitting still, then it shall. If it requires water with lemon and salt for electrolytes, then it shall. My path or my way are not my way. Are not the way. It's just the way this particular node of awakening is expressing itself. It's not better than anyone else's, nor is it special or unique. It's just what it is.

What happens when you stop believing anything is unfolding?

Daphne, thanks for taking the time to write this out. It sounds like you're spiritually engaged, but I don't know enough to put you anywhere in particular on the map. Since you mentioned disinterest in "forcing meditation," you may want to check out some surrender-type practices, like Michael Taft's dropping the ball videos or Shinzen Young's do nothing instruction. 

I'm wishing you well. I'll echo the warning against thinking this process will involve anyone but yourself. Ultimately, the path forward is about getting more grounded and more mundane, rather than more ecstatic and special and transcendent. 

Hello, Daphne. I'm the moderator on Dharmaoverground. May I ask if this is your blog:

https://www.thelivingfractal.com

Thanks,

Chris M

If I were you, I'd be very, very cautious about ChatGPT right now. It can be useful, but it is not wise. Or spiritually knowledgeable. As OpenAI has admitted, it has a flattery problem, and it tends to encourage mania, delusion, and self-aggrandizement. At least one person has died because ChatGPT egged on their mental decline. This is coming from someone who likes AI and heavily uses other models. 

Beware becoming a teacher or an advocate before you have mature insights under your belt. This takes years in the best of conditions. To me, it seems like you're jumping the gun in some of your self-descriptions. 

It sounds like things are intense right now. I suggest taking it easy, seeing friends, going on walks, eating some good food, and spending time with family. Good luck. 

Welcome to the circus! Good to have you here! 

Best is to start a Log and keep us posted about your daily experience. This way we might manage to "map" you in the way we know best etc ... But we will need a few months of info to do so. So ... Looking forward to reading you daily updates ... (sensate reality much appreciated around these waters)

Hmm, you mean the desire to name/ conceptualize it as unfolding at all? Meaning collapses. Language, then, is not an explanation....it's prayerful echo. Nothing. Thankyou for this.

I hear you, and will take it into account.

Gladlly, I have been doing everything on my own up until now without any good mirrors. I think it would be useful to share data and get feedback. Thankyou.

Mostly I mean, who is it that knows or believes there is anything unfolding? What is it that believes this, and by extension, what is it that believes anything? That thing that believes it knows is often what we are looking for. That's where the trap is—the one that believes. 

Yes! This is my website!!!

Are you using AI to create your website articles?

I use AI to organise my insights into articles for my website. Yes.

I thought that was the case. It's pretty obvious it's not "your" voice. How are we to distinguish between your insights and those of the AI? Human-created communication is more genuine and nuanced. Why not rely on your own unique voice? 

I use toilet paper to organise my insights.