Many meditators "braught up" in modern buddhist traditions seem to think daydreaming and mindfulness are each other's opposites and that daydreaming should be avoided when pursuing enlightenment. Modern versions of the western mystery traditions however, consider the Individuation Process as described by Carl Jung to be an equivialent of the early stages of the Path. Carl Jung seem to have encouraged day dreaming and taught excercises for using it as a tool for individuation.

•Do you think daydreaming is allways an hindrance on the path or do you think it can be used as a tool for spiritual developement?

•Is there mindful and unmindful daydreaming?

•What could the relationship between the Buddhist models of awakening and Jungian Individuation be? My current hypothesis is that complete Individuation=Sotapati since the Ego is disidentified with but there is still some kind of sense of self. 

I think philosophizing is vital to forming the right view (not necessarily buddhist 8fold) or correct perspective upon which to do all the other practicing and mind hacking.  It has been important for me to understand what is happening to my mind, how its structure is changing.  I'm sure this has sped up the process, since there have been times when I didn't form a right view and progress was slow.

This all relates to daydreaming since I philosophize better when I am slightly spaced out.  At these times, I am in a flowing, highly creative state, uninhibited by previous rules.  I would call these states of daydreaming.  Daydreaming=practice

Edit: Also another type of daydreaming I do in practice is when I sort of 'talk myself through' my cutting edge state within a given practice.  So I used to do this for the slippery slope of the equanimity nana all the time; "Okay, we've done this before... easy-peasy... where is the "I", oh thats right, he's nowhere... well then lets just allow this feeling of ambiguity and sit with it... **boom- kundalini rush*** !"  And then for actualism, when I feel a deeper sense of positivity and letting-go coming on, its "alright, first of all, lets make sure I'm not in an altered-disassociated state- okay, good.... now, what is it about this scene that needs to be changed?  Oh thats right, nothing, the actual world is perfect, and its here, right before my eyes... I just have to let it in, just a crack **zwonk- feeling a great cloud of positivity wash down over me, and suddenly I disappear**.

Ok, cool, well I originally meant daydreaming as in spaced-out fantazising, but let's include more types! This far we have, aside from the one mentioned above, these types of daydreaming that can (?) be done mindfully/used as a spiritual tool:

•spaced out philosophizing
•talking to self (about what's going on)

An OT question though:
When do you practice vipassana and when actualis? And, if you can keep it short (it's a huge question), aren't the practices kind of opposing each other? 

I practiced vipassana with my teacher until I reached the highest, most reliably repeatable level of attainment I could, with that technique.  This was technical 4th path, the complete and total recognition of the 'no problem' in all phenomena, inside and out, as they arose and passed.  I went through many cycles, including 3 previous shifts, to reach this point (SE took over a year).  I am sure there are many higher levels that could be reached with spiritual practice, but that there is probably no reliable way to map past 4th.  

So I decided at that point (with no further mapping capability), to switch to actualist practice.  I now solely practice actualism and before solely practiced vipassana.  

Edit: I felt like my wording was grandiose.  

Here's the simple answer: I switched to actualism when I felt that I could go no further with vipassana.

Have you had a look at western occultism, like Golden Dawn-offshoots? Their maps seem to go pretty far. For example, the Tiphareth level (like mid-level) of the Sodalitas Rosae Crucis & Solis Alati, I've heard, probably corresponds to Individuation. I wonder how that relates to buddhist maps, which brings me back to the original subject.

I haven't been able to find any articles summarizing western occultist maps in previous research attempts.  Any good sources?  And yeah, I'll check out the individuation process.

Overall I would agree with your statement that actualism and vipassana are opposing processes.  It seems to be the case that the goal of actualism is most in line with my own goals.

I don't exactly agree they are opposing forces.  But in my mind, I see actualism as having 3 different aspects.  ONe aspect is the general recommended practices and exercises.  THese seem to have helped a variety of people into new levels of understanding.  And although the founder of Actualism strongly insists they are all new types of exercises never done before, personally I see it as inline with some Buddhist teachings and exercises and therefore not an opposing force.  Richard's opinion may differ but it's still his opinion and does not seem he has spent tons of time learning all about Buddhism either.  The other two aspects IMO are Richard's opinions on why and how the effects happen from a theoretical perspective and what that means about the nature of reality.  Those ideas of his seem in opposition to most Buddhist ideas, but you don't need to take on the whole block of theory to just do the exercises.  Heck positive thinking is very much related to old school cognitive behavioral psychology, one of the methods of psych that has a better track record of success. 

But we see this a lot in social groups, people observe a kind of phenomenon and then try to fit it into a belief system type framework.  For instance, sleep paralysis has been held up as proof for things like the existence of the devil and his ability to attack humans or reveal evil people, or from a medical perspective as proof of various physical job divisions in different parts of the brain.  Some spiritualists think it might be representative of one's battle with one's shadow side or somesuch.  But just because one thing has good evidence of existing and being helpful does not mean that the entire framework built around that thing also shares the same evidence of existence and truthfulness, it may be somewhat indicative but it does not automatically hold true.  It coudl be the whole framework is mostly true with maybe just a few niggly areas that aren't quite right or the whole framework could be a giant load of BS, or anywhere in between. 

Personally, I think the actualist exercises are likely good but the theory about why they work may be a bit off. (of course i sometimes think that about Buddhism too.  ;-P)
-Eva 

At minimum, I think daydreams can be a more direct window to the subconscious.  Pay attention to what you day dream and it will give you hints on your psyche.  For instance, ever notice that you have negative daydreams?  Why do you think that is?   WHy not always dream about good stuf f you think you want like money, happiness, or whatever?  Yes we do daydream about those things but for many it's not just only about apparently good stuff, which is pretty strange when you think about it.  Daydreams can reveal a lot of interesting issues if you really explore them.  IMO, daydreams are little narratives you pay in your head that indicate issues of your psyche you are dealing with.  They are weird things in that many people will spend large amounts of time running these little narratives yet there is often a weird division where the conscious mind lets them run and then seems to not think about them much afterwards, unless a big effort is made.  So many people are running these little narrative skits daily or hourly but consciously are ignoring them even if they get really weird and if asked are often unaware of their typical content.  
-Eva 

Am I understanding you correctly?:
You're saying daydreaming can be a spiritual tool if we are mindfully and even more so if we (intellectually?) listen to what they say about the current state of our personality. Makes sense. 

http://alkemiskaakademin.se/Initiation%20and%20death.pdf

http://alkemiskaakademin.se/Initiation%20alchemy%20and%20life.pdf

For a more complete understanding, I'd read up on Kabbalah as much as possible. I'm currently studying Will Parfit's Complete Guide to the Kabbalah. I'm still a newbie though.

From what I've heard from Rosicrucians, the Thelemic tradition seems to overestimate the Kabbalistic progress of their initiatory system, placing the Dark Night of the Soul (which is probably not the same phenomenon as that described in MCT at the Abyss/Daath, when it's actually at the Veil of Paroketh, just before Tiphareth. This could explain why thelemites such as Alan Chapman experienced further enlightenment stages after completing the Kabbalistic map och the thelemic order A.'.A.'.
So there is of course some different opinions on what stages to place where on the Tree of Life (the Kabbalistic map of the conciousness, universe and path to enlightenment).

I've also been told that along the way, the 10 fetters will be eradicated. Some of them, however, if I got it right, will be re-awoken for some esoteric purpose, kind of like the Bodhisattva ideal.