Yes. That's exactly it.

Basically buddhist texts are written in a kind of code that sounds philosophical or religious -- and of course they work on that level -- but the real essence of it is how they practically get applied to our actually lived life in our actual body. 

So "dukka" is basically "stress"

"absence of greed, aversion, and indifference" is basically "tranquility"

"meditation" means many things but it includes "cultivating equanimity"

etc.

Once you learn how to decode buddhism, it becomes very very practical. You might like this series of talks by John Peacock 

https://www.audiodharma.org/series/207/

Oh, very cool, someone also took notes on all these lectures and posted them in a file:

http://dmail.awakenetwork.com/forum/kfd-archive-wetpaint/13067-buddhism-before-the-theravada-notes

I would say that buddhist practices are about developing basic sanity and as an co-occurance there are deeper/subtler insights into the nature of self... but many times people put the cart before the horse and think that buddhism is about insights into the nature of self that "give you" basic sanity.  

In reality, practice is exactly as you describe: you become of where you are physically-emotionally-intellectually "knotted", you put awareness on that feeling of stress/ill will/resistance (which can be difficult, it can be "difficult to find" or "scary to investigate"), but then when that experience can rest in awareness, without us wanting to change it or push it away, then the body-mind figures out how to understand the experience and let it go. This last stage tends to "happen" rather than being something that we make happen or "do".

"Vipassina" is "clear seeing" -- in meditation we clearly see our stresses, how they are created and held in the body-mind, and this leads to "nibbana" which is the the "extinquishing" of the stresses.

Hope this helps! 

Sounds to me like what you are doing is exactly what the meaning of shamatha is, eg calm abiding/tranquility/concentration. It's the second of the "three trainings" that is usually emphasised in every school of Buddhism.

Rob Burbea, in his book "Seeing that Frees", on the benefits of shamatha: "deep rest and rejuvenation of the whole being, emotional (and at times physical) healing, vitality, openings of the intuition, emotional strength that is yet pliable, increase in the heart's capacity and in our availabilities to others, steadiness of energy [...] we will find that it nourishes us profoundly and widely

We might think that concentration is a type of intense laser type state but I think the point is that that type of focus arises out of a type of alive tranquil wellbeing.

Okay, but if people understood that they should be trying to relax they could take advantage of more appropriate techniques. When you come home from a busy stressful day at school or work, sitting down to meditate is not really the best technique. At that point when the mind is very turbulent it is much more effective to do something like yoga, qigong, or progressive muscular relaxation.  That's why on Buddhist retreats they may do bowing practice or chanting before sitting meditation. But many people think when they are at home they can start right away with meditation.

And it's very easy to assess the quality and progress of your practice if you understand that the goal is to get relaxed and stay relaxed. If meditation is not helping you relax, you know there is a problem or a limitation and you can try other techniques.

It's also easy to understand how attachments cause stress if you start noticing how relaxed or stressed you are at different times.

It seems to me that everything is very easy to understand and easy to do if you look at it from the standpoint of relaxing. Particularly for modern people who like to know how things work before they will have faith in a practice. If you explain that meditation and other relaxation techniques strengthen the parasympathitic nervous system which counteracts the stress response, you have a very simple scientific and philosophical basis for the practice.

Why do modern teachers and authors make it complicated and difficult when it could be clear and simple? 

There are very many people who will never go on a retreat or live in a monastery but who are trying to practice Buddhism because they are attracted by the promise of the end of suffering and they would benefit hugely in a practical and in a philosophical sense (as I explained above) if they understood Buddhism in terms of relaxation. With the relaxation approach it is easy to understand how the process works which helps the practitioner do the practice correctly, they understand their goals and get immediate feedback on progress. If they see it working they get encouragement from that. If they see it is not working they can try to make some change to get it to work. This makes the system very effective for them.

Many people are never going to reach the advanced stages no matter how Buddhism is taught to them, but they can still benefit immensely from a daily practice particularly if they understand the basis for how the practice works. It seems to me they are being neglected. 

My question for the teachers is: what is your job? Giving people what they want? Or giving people what you want them to have? The stressed out commuter listening to her audio book on Buddhism while stuck in traffic on the way home after being yelled at by her boss at work doesn't want to eventually understand dependent origination, non-self, emptiness, or her true nature at sometime in the future. She wants to feel better today.

And I am not saying Buddhist meditation should be taught as just another relaxation technique. Secular forms of meditation do not teach that attachments, which are the cause of suffering, feel like stress and the way to end suffering is to let go of attachments by realxing the stress by which attachments manifest themselves. The truth that letting go of attachments leads to the end of suffering is what distinguishes Buddism from secular meditation.