In my recent post in the Dharma Diagnostic,
Tarin's advice: "yup, thats the fall (into re-observation), do it again and again... or don't (by going on to get stream-entry quickly). this is how it works."

What the hell is this "quickly" thing? It's fucking with my mind. Like, do I just go to McDonalds and order a McStreamEntry?

I don't seem to have found the speed control knob, yet. The only thing that seems to control the speed of my progress is:
1) Extended period of dedicated practice (ie. retreat time)
2) Practicing meditation instead of indulging in distractions

Those are the only two things which seem to "speed" my progress, but it's not really like they speed it up. It's more like, either I'm practicing (and therefore progressing) or I'm not practicing (and therefore not progressing). But, that's it. It's like an on/off switch, not like a throttle.

The other thing I've found isn't really like a throttle, but more like an overhaul or upgrade, and that is:
3) To practice more correctly (ie. to study the Dharma such that I can fine tune my practice)

This leads to a faster rate of progress when practicing, but it's like a system wide thing, and it seems to come with lots of study time and making lots of mistakes.

So, I've found the on/off switch, and the engine rebuild. Where's the speed control on this thing? Is there one? Are you all just fucking with me?

Or, is there a "fall back to Dark Night OR go on to stream entry" switch somewhere? I haven't found that one either.

The best plan I can come up with is to turn the meditation machine on and leave it running for another fifty years or so, while continuing to rebuild the engine as my knowledge of the Dharma grows, and hope that maybe stream entry comes in those next fifty years.

Help?

Hi. Here are some hints. These are taken from dictionary.com (emphasis (bold points) added):

Guts: Informal. Courage and fortitude; nerve; determination; stamina.

Will Power: The strength of will to carry out one's decisions, wishes, or plans.

Sincerity: Freedom from deceit, hypocrisy, or duplicity; probity in intention or in communicating; earnestness.

(1) Regarding "guts" and "will power," these are qualities one can have a lot of, or be lacking entirely. One is a term related to the "heart" (one's desire, determination, or "guts"; this is heart-felt), and one is related to the mind (one's "executive" will; this is not heart-felt). I'm at a loss on how to describe the difference in strong / weak will power and strong / weak desire, but I suspect it is something I do not need to explain.

(2) Lastly, sincerity plays a part in the strength of both. If one is spreading one's "power" over contradicting intentions / desires / wishes, then one is actively thwarting one's own very efforts and this will likely only lead to frustration.

And so the question is:

How badly do you want it? (1)
Really? (2)

Regards,
Trent

I haven't found a "go through nanas faster" switch either. What I have found is that most nanas don't take a long time when you're using the most correct practice techniques for that nana. Navigating through the late dark night into Equanimity requires a shift in concentration from the third jhana style of concentration to the fourth jhana style. So to move into Equanimity and stay there requires a good deal of fiddling with the balance and strength of your effort and attention. More mindfulness is always helpful, so go ahead and keep the mindfulness as strong as you can, especially if you're having difficulty fixing the problems with energy and concentration.

(Just as a note, I use "energy" and "effort" interchangeably as translations for viriya, which is one of the five spiritual faculties. Read the Five Spiritual Faculties section of MCTB over and over and over again. It's ridiculously dense with essential information for any meditator. You'd be amazed at how many meditation problems pertain to imbalance of energy and concentration, or lack of strength in the two of those, or deficiency of mindfulness.)

So, really get to know the differences between the sensations of attention and concentration that make up the dark night versus Equanimity. If you can't seem to stay in Equanimity without falling back down to Reobservation, then notice what style of attention or concentration you're using. Third jhana attention feels like trying to concentrate during the dark night: it's fuzzy and unclear in the center, and dominated by (potentially distracting) sensations around the periphery. You can't get to the Equanimity nana if you're still using the type of concentration that is found in Dissolution and the dark night. You need to open, widen, and homogenize the attention so that it matches the panoramic quality and higher overall clarity of the fourth jhana.

If you find it easy to mindfully perceive the primary object of meditation (the "center" of your "attentional spotlight") as well as peripheral sensations, then that's fourth jhana concentration.

I don't know of any way to explain how to shift your attentional style voluntarily, except to say "incline your mind towards it, and if it's familiar enough, then the shift will just happen." It's just like how you choose to either pay attention to your left hand or your right hand. You just do it because conscious attention is under voluntary control. Just like you can control where attention goes (from a mundane point of view, not from an ultimate Three Characteristics point of view) you can also control what type of attention you're using by inclining the mind to it, as long as you've experienced it before.

This may require effort, especially in the beginning. It's true that in most of the dark night, you don't generally need to increase effort because its partner, concentration, is what needs strengthening and correcting. (More Five Spiritual Faculties? You can't escape them.) My experience has been that good results come from increasing concentration in the dark night, up THROUGH the worst part of Reobservation (the Crisis sub-nana). Then when you're in the second part of Reobservation (which is quite aptly named Defeat/Acceptance), you're clear to start using effort to switch your attentional style to the panoramic fourth jhana attention and stabilize it there. Once you're stable in Equanimity, you can work on increasing the panoramic and clear concentration.

Here's what you really came for: when you're falling out of Low Equanimity back down into Reobservation, you need to incline the mind to stay in the fourth vipassana jhana. In Low Equanimity, you may need to watch your mind closely to see the beginning of the fall to Reobservation. If you catch it early, it only requires a minimum of effort to get yourself back into Equanimity. If you fall all the way back down to Crisis Reobservation or Desire for Deliverance, then you have a harder climb back up to Equanimity.

Yes, the insight maps say that meditating in equanimity usually feels effortless, but if you read the fine print, you can see that the effortlessness feeling doesn't always arise at the very beginning of equanimity. It may not feel easy and effortless until you get to the later, more mature substages of Equanimity.

As to how long stream entry can take, it's said that if someone with no insight experience did completely correct insight practice with the Five Spiritual Faculties all running at full strength, they could become an arahat in 7 days. I don't doubt that, given the ridiculously rapid improvement in my insight practice that occurs when I follow good instructions precisely. Dipa Ma is said to have guided a relative with mental retardation to stream entry in a total of 14 days, because the relative wasn't wasting meditation time thinking and contemplating and reflecting on difficulties. She just followed the instructions exactly as she was told, and boom!

So, recap! My recommendation is to make your practice more correct. And when you start getting really fucking tired of not having had stream entry yet, apply the correct techniques for moving from the late dark night into early equanimity. When you're in early equanimity, use effort and concentration to stabilize it.

Thanks J Adam G,
That sounds like a good description of everything I've discovered over the last few months, almost in order of how I learned it (first how to get into equanimity from dark night, and then learning how to stabilize in equanimity). Now, it's like if I fall into dark night, I generally go through it in a matter of minutes or at most hours, and then back into effortless equanimity. If I meditate with more effort, I just stay in effortless equanimity for hours and hours and days and days and days. Effortless days on end. More and more unending days of effortless equanimity. I did a 50 day retreat and it was mostly effortless equanimity. I learned a fuckload about myself, about the nature of the universe, tons of insights, lots of energy shifting in my body, lots of progress, lots and lots for days on end. But, no stream entry, and it seems like it'd take another few months of this before stream entry, it just seems like I've got that much ignorance that it'll take a few months of high equanimity to burn through enough insanity to finally hit the bottom. That's just how it seems to me, it doesn't seem like I have some control over this part. When I try to control it at all, I generally start to drop back down to Dark Night. When I really just let go and surrender, it just goes and goes and goes, but it doesn't seem like I have some choice about the progress. I just sit. That's all I do is just sit, and the universe unfolds and unfolds and unfolds. And, I note more and more, and my awareness becomes more inclusive and more equanimous. And, it still seems like a long way to go. So, that's sorta where I'm at.

It really looks like if I was looking at a bathtub draining, the water just drains and drains and drains, but it takes a while. It doesn't seem like there's much to get it to go faster except keep practicing, and continue to fine tune my practice by building awareness and making sure I'm practicing more correctly, but it's like damn, there's a lot of water in the tub.

There's something about me getting stream entry quickly (like say in the next hour) that just seems like it wouldn't make sense. Like, it wouldn't fit with the laws of nature. It'd be like if the bathtub just all of a sudden drained in two seconds. Like it seems like mangos take a while to ripen, and a skyscraper takes a while to build, it just seems like things take time sometimes - and that's just nature. So, I get confused when I hear this idea of "quickly." Like where else in nature does "quickly" have any significance?

It confuses me because either:
1) I'm not understanding this "quickly" thing wrong
2) The teachings on do it "quickly" are not realistic or useful teachings
3) I'm understanding it, and it's useful, I'm just somehow not doing "it" (whatever "it" is)
4) Or... maybe I'm just ranting about useless stuff and none of this matters anyway because I'm not going to stop meditating, and the practice is where shit really goes down anyway.

Thanks for the thoughts. Greatly appreciated.

- Daniel

Hey Daniel,

What are you doing when you get up into equanimity of formations stage? Are you noting? Or are you just aware of sensations? What exactly are you doing when you say you get to that stage? Are you starting to see how the sensations that make up the "I" will blip in an out of any bare sensate experience?

Thanks Trent,

Yes, I'm building sincerity (or burning through layers of insincerity), as I continue to authentically will my way forward and burn through layers of hesitation, fear, etc (and build courage, nerve, etc). But, how do I do this more quickly? It just seems like I can only strengthen a sincere will power as quickly as the conditions can support it. Every time I sit, the will to progress strengthens, and sincerity strengthens, and courage strengthens. This is what I observe anyway.... And, it seems like it could just take a few more months of burning through insincerities and fears and mixed determinations (that's just a guess, of course)

It just seems to me like nature is built for different things to take different amounts of time, and this is the beauty of nature. Like if everything in the world just happened quickly, what kind of world would this be? Or is this just me making an excuse or misunderstanding nature?

I am now reading Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind... and he was very clear that the whole idea of "quick progress" is absurd in Zen (at least from Suzuki Roshi's point of view). In fact, out of all the Dharma I've studied, this is so far the only place I've seen that speaks of making "quick" progress.

I appreciate any response or more feedback.

Thanks,

Daniel

Hi,

Consider this: anything that happens is going to happen right now. Whether that now is five minutes from this now, or whether that now is ten years from this now, it is still going to happen now. The future, when it happens, happens now, and the past, when it happened, also happened now. With this in mind, any change you do to yourself, any motivation you find, any intent you have, anything you figure out, is all going to happen right now. It is with this understanding that you may come to realize that time as a precursor to effecting progress is practically arbitrary. The reasons why a person does not progress are never due to time, because time does not run out, nor does it pass, nor does it go anywhere. For instance, it takes a lot of energy to do hardcore insight meditation or to employ the methods to gaining an actual freedom...but this does not mean one needs some amount of time, it means that one needs to sleep and eat adequately to refuel the process. Realizing it has nothing to do with time as some sort of object allows one to stop waiting for some arbitrary chunk of it to pass, but instead allows one to realize and do precisely what one needs to do to continue forward (in this case: food / rest if necessary). For another instance, one does not need time to get motivation for something, it is either that one is actively looking for motivation and finds it relatively fast or that one is waiting for motivation because of time. The person who waits because they think that's the thing to do, simply waits until something motivational slaps them in the face and inspires action (such as waiting for severe emotional pain to enter one's life to spur their practice).

It is best if one treats time as being a non-factor in these matters and to proceed with that as an assumption. And any time that one finds oneself worrying about time or putting things off due to time, it behooves one to investigate just why it is really being put off or being worried about, because the reason is not actually related to time (it is something "deeper," more rudimentary or more precise, something related to the process or oneself, etc).

Waiting only brings more waiting!

Regards,
Trent

Hi Trent!
Sorry to barge in on this thread...
But I have found myself just wanting to stand in a square somewhere screaming "GIVE ME PROGRESS ALREADY!!".
"I feel like I still haven't crossed any of the steps on the map.
Give me steam entry NOW!"

But then I read your post. Very nice.

In some TIME (there it is again) I'll probably go back to obsessing about what I feel like a lack of progress, but I thank you very very much for your description of progress as related to time...

Thanks Trent,
I liked your post about "time"... however, this makes me more confused about the word "quickly" means then? Isn't "quickness" dependent on time? Isn't progress dependent on time? or no? Would that mean that "progress" happens in the timeless now (so to speak)? And, that something can happen "quickly" - but also outside of time?

Switching from "time" to "energy" seems like an interesting switch of perspective. I think the same situation still applies. The last two years have been a long path of learning to handle pretty intense energy unlike anything I'd ever experienced before. It doesn't seem like the kind of thing like my body would've been able to just handle all this energy in a couple days of meditating. It feels like my body has actually had to become accustomed to thousands of volts of life force flowing through it. I'm not saying that I'm going to "wait" for my body to be "ready" for the energy of stream entry. But, also isn't it a bit unrealistic to assume that the world of mind and mater doesn't have a process of cause and effect and that things grow (with time, or with energy, or with whatever)

I sat this morning, and I did really strong insight practice for about a half hour, and my body was going wild, sensations I'd never felt before, lots of energy flow - very intense. Screaming like a little baby. A deep happiness I haven't felt since childhood. etc... It seems like after that, it is very hard to maintain strong insight practice and just power through to a higher intensity level. It seems more like "Fuck! That's going to take some integration" Sometimes it seems like even just a few minutes of very strong insight practice can create a very intense shift which may resonate for days or weeks.

I'd love to just sit down and "power through it" and just "go for stream entry quickly"... but I really think that's just my ego talking! And, i think my ego is getting egged on by the dogma about "quickly"... and I think what I really need is to go at the "perfect pace"... neither too fast, nor too slow. The more perfect the pace, usually the more quickly I progress anyway. But, it doesn't seem like it's up to me to decide how fast that progress happens, but rather to just keep fine tuning into whatever the "perfect pace" is for me.

Thoughts? corrections?

Lots of grattitude and thanks!

- Daniel

I

Hi and you're both very welcome,



The concept of "quickness" typically uses the concept of time as a basis, in simple form it could be (the sum of effect divided by time) wherein the measurements of highest return may be regarded as having had more effect occur per unit of time; ergo "more quickly." But from this example, you may be able to see that time is simply a constant used for measurement, and not a malleable condition that acts as a force upon the effect(s). It follows then that progress is not dependent on time, it is dependent on an array of conditions (which were represented by "the sum of effect" above) and it is that sum that can be measured based on the agreed-upon concept of time passage.



No, there is no "timless now," there is this eternal moment in time, and nothing exists outside of time. Have you ever noticed that the time is always "now" irregardless of whether it is 2pm or 2am?



I have made no such assumption...the world of mind and matter are only ever actually the same world. Here in this universe, in eternal time, the various conditions (energy, understanding, motivation, patience, practice, and so many more) that cause an effect (stream-entry) may align in a way that causes that effect "quickly" or "slowly" which are relative comparisons in and of themselves and which are based on a concept of time passing (the time never actually passes, it is always now). You can actively set out to cause such an "align(ment)" or you can wait for an arbitrary amount of time to pass in which you then decide to actively set out to cause such an "align(ment)" or perhaps you win the statistical lottery (this is unlikely to happen, so to speak) and the conditions passively fall into place ("align") while you wait. Do not mistake me, the concept of time is a very useful one, it just seems to cause problems for practitioners when it is taken to be something actually existing.



"Fuck! That's going to take some integration" eh? Why?



Perhaps it is your "ego talking," or perhaps it is your "soul" doing the talking...how do you know which is which and why does it matter either way? I cannot think of a way to achieve stream entry without wanting it and giving yourself permission to achieve it...

Speaking personally, the "perfect pace" for 'me' was as fast as 'I' could possibly seem to do it, and 'I' was in that over-drive mode for years to get where I am now...'I' threw caution to the wind, so to speak. What is it that makes up the "perfect pace" for you? Have you set limits on your ability to progress based on beliefs about "dogma about 'quickly" or beliefs about yourself or anything else of the like? That might be worth investigating.

Best,
Trent

Trent that "go for it regardless of what happens" is bull. Do I sense a bit of pride in there? Oh wait, no, I must be projecting

Daniel, I am personally convinced that one should be careful when energy levels get high. The amount of energy bioenergy stored in a healthy human body at any point (excuse the pun) in time is enough to get you physically and/or mentally incapacitated and even dead.

Now, the body has a few mechanisms in place to prevent this from happening, to keep things in balance, if you will. These mechanisms come into action after energy has build up a lot, when you pass a certain point and the body won't have any more, so it calls in some sort of emergency "shut down." There are also mechanisms which can access a lot of energy very quickly --- fear is an example, it uses a chemical agent to power you up, but the most powerful source of energy is kundalini, which is related to the sexual function.

Now, if one has an awakened kundalini, then it is unwise to "power up" any sort of practice. Because there is really NO LIMIT to the amount of energy that can be drawn from this mechanism, you can really take it to the brink of catabolic breakdown! See for example www.biologyofkundalini.com, or read gopi krishna's "living with kundalini" to get an idea of the wild and violent extremes kundalini can go. This is WAY MORE INTENSE than anything I've seen Daniel Ingram describe in his A&P's. Kundalini is a powerful physiological force, it doesn't just change your mind and give you some hallucinations, it has the power to changes your entire body.

I am convinced that people from pure insight traditions simply don't know what this is, or what to do about it. One way of knowing the status of your kundalini is to check how the base of the spine feels, close to the tail bone. If you feel a vibrating pulse in this place, then kundalini is awakened. If you feel a very strong tension here (it was even painful in my case), as if something wanted to "break through upwards," this might mean that kundalini is "aroused" but not awakened. If you do not distinctly feel a big tension or a buzz in the base of the spine, then maybe all this stuff you are feeling isn't related to kundalini at all.

So, how is it?

Thanks again to both of you.

RE: Kundalini
When I read your question, Bruno, I felt the base of my spine, and felt a very subtle and light tingling. I don't know about all the kundalini stuff and don't really want to get into it if I don't have to. It doesn't interest me much. Nothing has been too extreme yet for me, I don't think.

RE: The nature of time.
Trent, I really enjoyed reading your response, and spent a lot of time thinking it over, inquiring with the questions you posed, and just meditating to find out for myself what's true.

Overall, I think I've learned a few things from this thread, but I don't really think my question has been answered. What I was looking for was a possible resolution between two seemingly contradictory teachings. Both of them seem to be useful for me, but there is also some conflict in my mind as well.

Here's a quote from a spiritual teacher which seems to state exactly the point of view I'm investigating. This following statement makes sense to me...
"For some people this actually takes quite a long time. For some people what I'm talking about is just sort of very very quick, you never know. It can happen in seconds or years. Everybody's sort of different." - Adyashanti

And, at the same time. I'd love for it to go quickly if that's possible, too.

This is where I stand now .... please correct me if you see anything that might be incorrect....

- The practice could be to really just lean on the desire for quickness. I think this is put well in the phrase "keep going" from MCTB. Or "further" from Jed McKenna. Staying with that part of me that knows I'm not done yet seems to quicken things.
- Following that same idea is to keep intending further and further, and intending quicker and quicker. (ie. how badly do you want it?)
- Another thing I found which seems to be the "quick switch" is Memento Mori... or the contemplation of death. It seems that death is really the only thing that makes time relevant anyway. Quickness would have no meaning if my lifespan were infinite.
- Ultimately, there is nothing which anyone can "do" to speed things up or slow them down. And there's no real reason to anyway. Things proceed according to their nature, and according to the conditions which govern their unfolding. Some things still take longer than others to progress.

That's what I've got. Sorta a paradox, it seems.

Thoughts? Comments?

I'd still like to know how to "quickly" attain stream entry. I've been meditating... and still no "stream entry" yet. Though regardless, the meditation seems to be progressing quite well.

- Daniel

Hi Daniel,



In what way do both seem useful to you?



But in fact, ultimately, it is only you that can "do" something to speed things up (or slow them down), by willfully aligning the "conditions which govern their unfolding" so that the processes can "proceed according to their nature." And there are many "real reasons" to do so...do you not suffer? Do you not see reports of the wars and rapes and murders and suicides and corruption and loneliness when you turn on the television or open up a news web page? How on earth do you plan to make progress if you have no motivation? You might as well spend your time tending to a garden instead of meditating, at least you have some possibility of seeing fruit.

Has this ended the "paradox" you constructed?

Best,
Trent

I realize I am late to this discussion, but I'll throw in my belated two cents:

Equanimity can handle it, whatever it is, if it really is Equanimity, meaning that if you are getting to equanimity, there is no limit really to the mindfulness you can pour into it, to the presence you can bring to seeing the whole thing, as it will be just fine.

Thus, I recommend you overshoot in the following way:

Go for complete panoramic mindfulness of everything, including space, intention, investigation, effort, doubt, fear, surrender, with all these qualities and aspects being integrated with space and awareness in a bit, sweeping way that is like volumetric waves of attention moving through space, through everything that seems to be you, completely, fully, continuously, such that the goal is to have the whole fluxing thing sync and move through the whole of itself and then pulse and vanish or alternately move through one of the Three Doors on its own.

Don't worry so much about fine vibrations or little picky details except occasionally to ask what you are missing in a big picture sense, definitely don't worry about issues in any traditional manner, but revel in volumetric, 3D, open, sweeping, all-empassing Three Characteristics of the whole transient field all together, like space dancing, like you are swinging the vast sword of mindfulness in a way that just grabs up space with it and everything in it all through you to the end. This is big picture mindfulness, big, open, vast, flowing mindfulness that cuts through the center point by including it and everything that seems to be you.

Resolve, resolve, resolve with everything you have to get stream entry. Do this again and again. Incline your mind however best you can to that again and again without restraint. Total, natural, wonderful commitment is key.

Engage with what the paragraphs above mean deeply. You are simply missing something close to home. Identify that, include it, repeat again and again.

Thanks Daniel,
That sounds spot on, and I must now go sit with it.

Hi Trent,
I feel a bit overwhelmed by all the questions you've asked me so far, and it's tough to respond to it all, as it seems like I could go way off topic and into lots of theoretical discussion. But, I'll give it my best shot.




Both seem true and liberating.



I think so.


Yes, I do.

Well,
this thread has been helpful to me in many ways. But, I don't think my original question was ever really addressed (except for J Adam G), so I'm gonna start a new thread now and just drop the question for now.

Thanks though for all the thoughts ont he matter.