| re: Joshua D (8/29/15 10:01 PM)
I think you're on the right track, but not quite at the absorption that marks the traditional jhana. According to other, more modern interpretations, what you've experience might be considered as jhana, but I would say if you continue effort (and study viewpoints, find what suits you), you are likely to come upon full absorption, and find it well-worth the effort. I would recommend keeping at it with regular sessions, the longer the better (30 minutes and longer); heroic pushes to do it (or let it happen) NOW have a better chance on the basis of gradually accumulated skill and ease from regular practice.
"After a short period of being fully imersed in the breath, I felt a rush of very strong and pleasant sensations rise up…." Agreeing with Small Steps comments, I would consider this a clear taste of piti ('rapture'). Traditionally, piti is said to arise as as sort of mental celebration of achieving concentration on one sensation (e.g. breath). As also can be experienced further down the road in full absorption, when the mind is relieved of it's otherwise constant activity keeping track of this or that, planning, obsessing, etc., it can experience itself in wonderful new ways.
I would suggest a qualification of Small Steps statement: "When these factors are mature and present, then one is said to be in first jhana." Namely that the presence of the factors, as signifying the absence of the hindrances, is usually considered as 'access concentration' (aka 'neighborhood concentration') rather than jhana. This is, however, a crucial launching pad for going either into jhanic samadhi (absorption) or into khanika samadhi (momentary concentration, aka Mahasi's 'vipassana samadhi').
Access concentration is sort of floating without being bothered, tugged here or there. Both absorbed and momentary concentration involve a more intentionally focused relationship to object(s). With jhanic absorption (using a single object), there's a definitive, a quantum shift of mental state/process that's unmistakable – it's as if the object's image (nimitta) suddenly swallows the mind, the mind falls into the object which then encloses it, and mental motion seems to stop (there are various levels of this). There is also, in my experience, a clear shift in bodily sensation as a sort of fullness felt around the back and base of the skull.
(This relates to a phenomenon mentioned by Ven Vimalaramsi, that I also noticed back on my first retreat (2008): Becoming mindfull of either (externally triggered) pleasure /attraction or displeasure / aversion, there's a noticeable tension at the back of the head. This tension is similar to what happens intension or stress headaches, which I treat often as an acupuncturist (and have experienced myself). With treatment (needles or other), this tension can resolve into a sort of fullness or distending sensation at the same location -- the tension being the muscular tightening due to stress, blocking 'qi' flow (e.g. circulation, nerve transmission, etc.), while the release of that tightening opens the area to a flood of 'qi', and relief. This experience is like what I've felt at the back of the head in jhana.)
Momentary concentration (as in the Mahasi vipassana samadhi) is more an intense focus on whatever changing sensations are arising. (see MCTB for much more on this)
One more point: Small Steps mentions "… (and sometimes) ekagatta: one pointedness" in the jhanic factors. This is a point of contention, especially among the proponents of 'jhana-lite'. I will spell out the details elsewhere, but here just note that the "vitakka: applied attention" and "vicara: sustained attention" (when understood as here translated, rather than verbal discursive mental 'thinking' as claimed by the jhana-lite proponents) can be understood (and is clearly experienced) as sort of 'working' one-pointedness. This interpretation corresponds to the metaphorical description in the suttas: like kneading moisture into dough. The fact that this 'working' one-pointedness in the 1st jhana is replaced by 'ekodibhavam' ('having become one') in the 2nd jhana clearly corresponds to the experience – one-pointedness is simply there in the 2nd, doesn't have to be worked at any more like in the1st. Furthermore, 'ekodibhavam' or the equivalent isn't mentioned in sutta description of the 3rd and 4th jhanas. In this light, the assignment of 'ekagatta' to all 4 jhanas in the commentarial tradition makes more sense – 'gone to one' (ekagatta) as jhanic absorption.
Another piece of evidence is that sutta descriptions emphasize that jhana is "entered into and abided in", which (textual-crtically) suggests that jhana does involve a definitive, quantum-shift state of consciousness, as opposed to the notion, in 'jhana-lite', that if you're experiencing rushes of rapture (piti), but still 'thinking', you can be already in the 1st jhana. That's s/w fuzzy – how do you know for sure when you've "entered into and abiding" in a jhana? From the often voiced questions and discussions here in DhO, some people really don't know for sure, other than in imagination.
P.S. The difference between "applied attention" and "sustained attention"? "Applied" means here directing attention to an object, as in "I thought of that", meaning "that came to mind" (as distinct from thinking as a verbal discursive processing of thoughts about it); "sustained" means holding the object in mind, as in "keeping that in mind..." (also not necessitating a discursive thought process). The terms vitakka-vicara can mean either this kind of directing and holding, or it can mean working out trains of thought. One bit of evidence that the former meaning applies to the jhanic definition is that in the Chinese translations (made ca 1800 years ago), a different Chinese word is used in defining jhana than at other places where vitakka-vicara is used, and that word connotes the directing/holding kind of meaning. |