Hello everyone, i am new to DHO. I sent kenneth folk over at kenneth folk dharma a message but havent gotten back a response so ill post it here hoping that someone will respond with adequate knowledge. Ok so first i will give a little background on myself. I have never really meditated or anything, i knew about buddhism in general but that was it. I started my spiritual path by doing A Course in Miracles and practicing unconditional forgiveness on a daily basis for about a year. This led to some great experiences. Then one day i had an experience of God-Consciousness, or quasi-enlightenment as i like to call it now because at the time i thought i was enlightened lol. This was followed by a psychotic breakdown with paranoid delusions, anxiety, and all types of fears in general, this lasted like 3 months. Once i felt i could continue practicing i started to research into buddhism and specifically meditation. I read Daniel Ingrams book and many other sources even the suttas themselves. There is a feeling of desperation for awakening and freedom. I looked up into celibacy and many other things such as the chakras and kundalini stuff. Its been like 2 months of meditation, with at least one hour of meditation daily. I am now increasing it to 2-3 hours as i have more free time now. I am doing jhana practice as a basis for insight practice. eg. i go into first jhana and as the buddha said " when the mind was most purified, bright, unblemished, rid of defilement and pertained to imperturbability" i do insight into the 3 characteristics. I seem to be making no progress though. I would like to know where i am on the path of insight. Have i crossed the dark knight? it sometimes doesnt feel like it because i still have a bit of paranoia and anxiety in general. Where am I? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Extremely likely to be dark night territory.

There is one big important thing to know about if you suspect you're in the dark night: Like you've noticed, it can cause anxiety, and even paranoia. It can also cause delusions. There is one particular type of delusion that it triggers VERY commonly: "This isn't working." "I'm not making any progress." "Meditating is stupid." "I'm doing it wrong, and I have to figure out the right way to do it before I can continue." Note that the root motivation underlying all of these is avoidance -- and realize that the actual way to make the unpleasantness go away is to meditate through it, whether or not it feels like you're doing it right, or whether or not you feel like you're making progress.

Now, with that said, it is possible that your meditation technique isn't as effective as it could be. Once you're in jhana, how do you do the insight practice itself? You said you do insight into the 3 characteristics, so could you give some specific details on how you do that, and what happens?

Your anxiety is born when you try so hard. Let go and then you will be free of it.