Put another way, Truth versus Fantasy
Which of those two pursuits are you more interested in?
I will continue to couch this in my own way (what else) and I invite comment
Dharma versus Actualism (for example)
Dharma means too many things, I’ll get specific – BuddhaDharma (relax)
There is the Eightfold Noble Path – everyone agrees, except Actualists
Part of that path is View. The Buddha said it was important. But why?
People have their own answers. I have mine. Negating the importance of View however IMO is a grave mistake on the path of development (I know there are different tracks of development – I’m speaking generally and spiritually/emotionally)
So, when speaking about View only, is this important to you? If it is not, and you would take whichever color pill just makes you feel better, that that is fine. You are not evil (like that evil dude in the Matrix) but you are missing a critical ingredient, and I think it makes it tough to have a meaningful conversation on a place called Dharma Overground. As Joseph Campbell says, these are two different softwares that require different inputs and yield different results, so trying to combine them can be a real disaster (paraphrase)
Did the Buddha discover something new to the time, or at least, describe, teach and code something new? If you don’t even entertain this idea from your own studies and experience, than I don’t think you should call yourself a Stream Enterer, or anything beyond, MCTB-type or whatever – I think it is disrespectful to serious Buddhist practitioners (if there are those). These are Buddhist terms taken from Buddhist maps by serious (Buddhist) teachers. Lay people were not even allowed this teaching until modern times - whatever you think of that  
When I brought up the kumbhaka recently (the gap between in and out breaths) it was to point to something besides balance. IMO the Buddha did not just prescribe a Middle Way – there’s more. The middle path goes somewhere, it’s not the goal – to feel good and balanced. It was (is) a revolutionary idea that some can not wrap their mind’s around. That’s a hint to something 
When I went into my kumbhaka by accident (breath stopped for many minutes at a time) and experienced a mental and physical ‘purification’, the glow lasting minutes to many weeks or months on end. So there’s something else there besides balance - that's as far as I can go at this stage
Here is why I can’t take Actualism too seriously and why I would negate it as an overall lifestyle or practice, at least the view. It’s called Actualism, and teaches that some things are real and actual and maybe even permanent. That’s horseshit. All Buddhists agree. Scientists agree. Actualists disagree?
This is not to negate the effectiveness of the practice, heroin makes you feel pretty good too, but this (healthier) method of feeling better, I would put in the category of Yoga (this is my definition/terminology). What I mean is, it’s a practical technique connecting to the truth of the moment, the bliss of living and being alive, and the fearlessness that is seemingly at the mysterious core of all creation, or an aspect of it (some have called the Brahma Viharas as an aspect of this Source as well). They even understand Anatta and Duukha deeply and fully. Anicca was the easiest one for me, so it just smells weird. Whiff of Scientology 
Do you have a different view? : )

-Respectfully acknowledging your view.

-Respectfully disagreeing.

-I prefer what you call 'fantasy.'  I make progress.  I truly am a better version of myself every six months.  I am used to rapid progress nowadays.  I would rather win the game ignorantly than have the perfect understanding of it.  By arranging my priorities this way, I make faster progress than I would otherwise.  How do I know this?  Because I spent years trying it the other way.  I have only been able to change when I have aggressively prioritized it.  

-Also, in my 'view', I believe that progress-forward Noah is a further evolution past the previous, truth-seeking Noah.  Truth-seeking Noah spent years wallowing in bipolar disorder, working within the system and against the tides, reading books on spirituality, occasionally meditating, and holding a great respect for the Buddhadharma and all that it entails.  Progress-forward Noah felt an irreverence for the Buddhadharma, became personally empowered to make change, sought out a guide in this journey (feeling deserving of this for the first time), and reached an intermediate goal.  He is now reaping the rewards of this hard work.

-I am now trying to take this same irreverent and personally-empowered outlook into my actualism practice.  I believe that if I held your outlook in my mind, I would never be able to give the practice a chance in the first place.  I also believe that I never would have made progress in meditation in the first place either.  For me, respect=stagnation.

TLDR:

-You might think that I am not understanding what you're saying, or muddling it in with my own emotions and perspective.  This might be true.  My bottom line is that the right understanding or initial philosophical approach matters less than winning the game.

Hi Daniel

I believe that View is of utmost importance, as it shapes and influences all other aspects of one's mind and life.  One's view can promote the development of wholesome qualities of mind, or it can give rise to harmful qualities depending on the views and beliefs that one holds.  

Regarding actualism, I see the benefit of the practice in and of itself- that is, if I understand it correctly, living in the moment with appreciation and joy and regarding unskillful states of mind as silly and unnecessary.  The personal beliefs of the creator of this practice are, in my opinion, besides the point.  

Experience trumps view, you only need enough view to promote good practice.

For example, 3 minutes of instruction (view) in the gym and 200 hours of actual workout will get you significant strength improvement.

200 hours of view-slaying on DhO will get you a headache.

I really like my argument, probably too much, so I'm hoping you-all will tell me how it's wrong.

Matt

Three minutes of the wrong instruction (wrong view) and 200 hours of actual workout will not allow for much growth and may even lead to injury.  As a bodybuilder, I see this too often in the gym.  Wrong methods and/or wrong diet leave many gym-goers stagnant and without progress.  I'm sure you can see how this can apply to other areas of life.  Of course, experience can help shape and improve one's views according to the results that one reaps from any particular method or activity.

I know from experience that correct view is of the upmost importance for one's inside and outside life. upmost important is not allowing the smallest inside lie at any moment, on any subject. If there is still a pinch of it, that indulgence hinders what i feel like flowering inside. Clear, clean view of innerself 

".. So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late"

re: Daniel - san (9/27/15 2:21 PM)

"There is the Eightfold Noble Path … Part of that path is View."…
"Did the Buddha discover something new to the time, or at least, describe, teach and code something new?"

To paraphrase Than-Geof: the Buddha discovered and taught a set of highly skillful views that can help train towards not needing any views at all to see and know...

Most people think that 'right view' is important.  Even the Actualists, they may hate the term 'right view' but they have a view, a belief system, that they think is important and that they think followers should also have.  The problem is when you get down to what actually is right view exactly?  Then there starts the arguments..
-Eva

Truth, but I do enjoy Fantasy.

Yes, and by Investigating the Buddhadharma, and even conceptually understanding it, and I mean really investigating , and using all the wisdom and intellect one can muster, one should be able to see how practical and beneficial the Buddhadharma is, then I would not see how one would not see the Wisdom in following the Buddhadharma.

Unless a person just is not ready and simply does not care, or just does not understand.  And I think that it is mostly because people just do not understand.  People say they do, Richard the Actualist says he does.  But, he does not, he points out alot of unrelated suttas, but never really explains the Buddhadharma path that he says is 180 degrees from his own path.  

But, you Daniel-san, from what I can see, your ideas and writing resonate with the experience of the Buddhadharma as I have been experiencing it.  
Yes, to me , a Stream Enterer, knows the Path, and knows and has practiced enough to not be shaken from the Path, the mind by this point has been trained enough that the Buddhadharma has become part of daily living and starts to unfold on its own, as the seeds have sprouted, and the practice has become habitul, and almost automatic , in a sense.  By practice I mean the Full Buddhadharma practice, not just the meditating.  I think this is what is meant by being in the Stream, a metaphor to actually being carried along in a Stream towards Nibbana.  Now, this is not to say that one can not help out and swim a little, or that one might not get entangled by life from time to time.  As far as I can tell there are never any guarantees in life, and one should not rest upon their laurels.A little different view on the Actualism Method.  From what I see, Actualism combines Mindfulness of the present moment, and the Effort invoved with arousing and maintaining a wholesome state of mind, i.e. happy and harmless.  This practice, if practiced continually, could and should make changes to the way a mind both views and reacts to and within the World, as it is all one and the same.  But, the limitation with the practice is the lack of wisdom and understanding of many other aspects of human potential.  There seems to be no further development of Jhana, which allows one to eventually arouse Joy, at will, Metta, which develops the Gamma Brainwaves, Right Mindfulness which develops real time Equanimity, Wisdom which allows one to have Compassion arise.  Just a quick example of some development possibilities with Buddhadharma.  And , to add, these are not the same as emotions described in Actualism, in Actualism the emotions are of the more self centered variety.  The Brahma Viharas do not include the idea of a self, at least when experienced in full.  So the Actualism Method may have a different flavor of development, different formula, different result.  

To me, snapping off the Brain Stem metaphor in Actualism sounds like shunting.  Whereas in Buddhadharma, there is Wisdom in Understanding the signals coming from the different areas of the brain, thus not ignoring any aspect of the human body.  Perhaps retraining the mind and the reactions, so that craving need not arise, again, due to lack of delusion about how things work.

On the surface Actualism looks as if it trains the mind to shunt off any idea of a self or recognition of emotional states, burying them deep in the unconsciousness, though I could be wrong.  As it is also described to investigate the reason an emotional reaction arises  and worked through. which, to me, may be a path to rationalizing and shunting.  Which leads back to Insight, or Vipassana, where basically anything and everything within the mind can and will come to the surface, and can be dealt with properly with Equanimity and Wisdom, thus dealing with issues directly and efficiently with the tried and true well worn path of Buddhadharma.


As for kumbhaka , your experience is interesting, I guess I never went deep enough into that.  Mostly I will rest in kumbhaka after doing Moola Bhanda, and cosmic orbit,  letting the mind energy just settle in the skull area, and let the Silence, just be...

This may sound all dogmatic, but really it is just an experience, that is perhaps what I say about the Buddhadharma may sound redundant and repetitive.  Not because of Dogmatism odes it sound repetitive, but because the experience itself of Buddhadharma is the same, and the same for many.

My explanation of Dogamtism as a misunderstanding,

If someone were to say over and over to use a saw to cut a board, and others were repeatedly say ing to use a saw to cut a board.  Then people coem along and say, no no, try a razor, and othere may say , no, no try a pocket knife, and others till may say use a hammer.  But the Buddhadharm is like explaining to others to simply use a saw.  But by knowing the saw works, and has the same effect over and over, the explainig to others to use a saw to cut a board may sound Dogmatic.

Buddhadharma is a saw.  Sawing is work.  Sawing does work.  Dogmatism.  Bow wow


Psi

Dogmatism is when something is stubbornly and repeatedly asserted to be true in the face of considerable evidence and witnesses to the contrary.  Just saying something over and over by itself is not enough to yield dogma although in some of the simpler cases you might be nearing the neighborhood of 'trite.'  ;-P

I suspect a big part of the power of Actualism and its results is the emphasis on working on it every waking moment you can.  There seems to be a strong emphasis in Buddhism on what happens during meditation on the mat and comparatively speaking, very little on what happens the rest of the day.  For most people, the rest of the day is the big majority of their lives.  Sure, in the literature that is spoken of, but when the rubber hits the road here in current time America, off the mat practice for most seems to be thought of more as an issue of eating vegetarian, donating to save the whales, voting democrat, speaking slowly, drinking kombucha and wagging fingers at those that don't.  And I am not saying any of those things are particularly bad (other than the wagging), but I think that they are not the kind of deep personal daily indepth scary soul searching necessary for really strong progress on the path.  Maybe its just my bias but the ones that have made a lot of progress seem to often speak about their off the mat practices, not just their on the mat practices.   

Hi Vince. I agree. I think intention (towards compassion for example) inclines the mind/heart that way. Focusing on equaminity etc - like magic


I disagree. When studying a teaching I also study the teacher. I have nothing against the present moment and cultivating bliss (Actualism in a nutshell?) but there is more, that's all I'm saying. Not more than the present moment, that goes without saying, just more to the teaching, more to the practice. Plus their view is intinsically flawed, so I am extra cautious 

Well I agree with the paraphrase and the paraphraser Chris, in theory. but wait, in that theory, a Buddha needs no view? how about an arahat? hmmm...in a nondual world yes, but

thanks, my view that view is important?


with what?


I don't think the two are necessarily at odds Noah, I know I couched it that way, my bad. Magic (the sort that Daniel is really into) is also Yoga (my definition). I do yoga - I think that's good. I think Actualism is good - I am into your practice! I just think the Actualist view is F-ed


Does he always talk about himself in the third person? Tell him that's weird. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water New Noah. There's more there


I like irreverence, can't you tell?! I'll try another way. Stream Enterer is a Buddhist term, as is the Four Path Model - the Buddha/Buddhists invented and defined it. Part of the definition is that you are not even on the model if you do not understand anicca or accept the Buddhadharma as dharma, or at least descriptive of truth in a general way. True Actualists do not understand anicca, so they shouldn't mix and muddle buddlist terms


I had to google that. Does this mean you didn't read the whole OP?

Yes Eva, but Buddhists agree on certain things. Three C's, Eightfold Path, the Twelve Links of Interdependent Origination. I am not aware of any arguments there
There is an explicit teaching, some wise teachers have advised that wavering from the basics of Buddhist Right View can be dangerous, and I can see how that would be the case. I'm not Buddhist but I see the Four Noble Truths, I see the Three Characteristics. Someone helped me see that. If I had an Actualist teacher I may think some things were actually permanent and it would F- the entire teaching up 
Happy and harmless sounds good, but no compassion? My spidey sense is tingling. Did you read Saints and Psychopaths? Shinzen Young has also talked about the real Dark Night, and it's not what people are discussing here. They say higher on the path and the stakes become bigger, and IMO at later stages adopting wrong view (in the most general of ways) has real potential for disaster  

Me too. AKA Life


It was years ago Psi and it required constant shamatha mediation for days of sitting, and a full night, to sink into - it was real work. I also think I'm pretty good at one-pointed focus - it was on my second ten day Goenka retreat when my kundalini exploded out my butt and through my top. I had some side effects (understatement here) so I had to chill from the spiritual life for a few years - focused on my business. Now I want to go back on retreat again next year and clear out the energy pathways. I've been clogged up for awhile - ugh, City life, working too much, stress...

I agree, a most beneficial practice path is a 24/7 practice path, it always was, always is, at least when one remembers. Moment to moment, like a constant flow, a stream so to speak, every action, thought , word, deed, habitual pattern, interaction, hormonal release, energy field,  all that stuff can be included into the folds. Basically anything that one can be aware of is either grist for the mill or building blocks.

 And maybe this is just my bias, but it also seems, that the big progress is made with the intentional transforming of the mental/emotional states.  In other words, for rapid progress one has to get right down into the core, right into the action, the base feelings and sensations, and work at it right at the bud.   And learning to shift these states over quicker and quicker , while at the same time learning to maintain the balanced state of mind once equillibrium has been acheived. 

But, yes, I also agree, it is very trite.  

Sometimes I wonder, since the practices themselves are simplistic, what are we all even discussing sometimes?  

Stories?  

Psi


And so castles made of sand, fall in the sea, eventually.

Jimi

Eva M Nie:
...  The problem is when you get down to what actually is right view exactly?  Then there starts the arguments..

Unfortunate, even sad, that we're so conditioned to take our own individual angle-of-view as automatically applicable, shoudl be self-evident to others. And such a relief to figure this out, and be able to play with it, see the inevitably multiplicity of angles as a working basis for the hard work of communication.

Back at the OP/beginning: "Truth versus Fantasy"
It's all fabrication and appearances – the word 'fantasy' has the same root as the word 'phenomenon'. Is 'truth' just 'fantasy' anchored and validated in correctly understood experience?

Also OP:
"These are Buddhist terms taken from Buddhist maps by serious (Buddhist) teachers. Lay people were not even allowed this teaching until modern times - whatever you think of that"
I'm not so sure that can be so broadly documented. Yes, in some instances, and especially in the context of the onslaught of Western colonial influence (war and subjugation,cultural disruption) in recent centuries.

But over the larger span, G. Buddha had numerous, successful lay followers. Over the centuries in Indian, Chinese, Japanese, South-East Asian countries, I'm aware of solid documntation that (at least educated, aristocratic) lay people were privy to, and successfully practiced hardcore dhamma.

History written by the colonialists (that is to say, all major Western countries, up through the mid-20th-century, arguably even today, having been s/w blinded by a sort of superiority complex attitude) should be taken with a grain of salt.

re: Psi (9/27/15 11:36 PM as a reply to Daniel - san.)
"As for kumbhaka , your experience is interesting, I guess I never went deep enough into that.  Mostly I will rest in kumbhaka after doing Moola Bhanda, and cosmic orbit,  letting the mind energy just settle in the skull area, and let the Silence, just be..."

If y'all will pardon a minor off-topic diversion here:

A week ago Sunday, Than-Geof did a day-long teaching nearby, as usual beginning with a body-scan sort of guided meditation (paraphrase: "getting the body into position to meditate, as pre-condition to getting the mind into position" as he puts it). The same formula he uses regularly (presumably from his Thai-Forest teachers, whose teachings, btw, were the day's topic):
focus breath below the navel, smoothing it out there;
move to the solar plexus, doing the same;
then center of the chest … base of the neck … and center of the skull…
(further back of neck and out to finger tips, then down spine to lumbo-sacral area and then down out toe-tips)

(Some may take this as a chakra system, but I see it as closer to a Daoist model – the three 'bony cavities' of the body and the junctures between them.)

Anyway, I usually sit, sorta 1/3 lotus, and get into a mild access concentration for listening to Than-Geof's (or any dhamma) talk. This time, however, when he led us to the center of the head – whoosh… the mind slid into full absorption (briefly). Nice effect, perhaps a new tool. Tried it a couple of times since then, and it appears reproducible.

(The Daoist connection also triggered by psi's mention of 'cosmic orbit', which I take as refrence to Daoist techniques made famous by, for instance, ManTak Chia – the macro- and micro-cosmic orbits of qi-circulation. But to further quote psi – I could be wrong. Anyway, that center-of-the head thing, in hardcore internal alchemical Daoist practice, aligns with 'opening of the third eye', which as described by an accomplished Daoist teacher I studied with, sounds a lot like some sense of 'opening the dhamma-eye'. In the Daoist terms: the pinnnacle of realization, seeing in all directions at once, near and far, and in both space and time… Doesn't that sound juicy?)

Yeah, but I wouldn't simplify it into that statement.  I would just say that while right view is important, I prioritize other things over having the right view.


Well I don't know if I'm actually directly disagreeing or not.  I just prioritize differently.



Thanks!  And thats good enough for me.  Practice makes perfect :p



Yes, always in the third person.  This is one result of his spiritual practice.



Word, I hear ya.  I just disagree.  I think Sotapanna is just one who has experienced certain waves of minds which have effected the energy body in a particular way.  I don't think the content of my thoughts (certain ones about understanding reality, for instance) matter in terms of measuring this type of progress.  I think the form or process through which they are percieved matters.  It seems to be a journey whose outcome changes the quality of all perception, but not the contents of the beliefs, emotions and thoughts which are percieved.



Naw I think I was saying that I wrote too long to read.  Not you dude.

Well first, I don't know if what we just agreed on between you and I is agreed on by everyone else.  I don't hear it talked about much, the potential usefulness of digging into the origins of every thought, every emotion, all the time as much as possible.  So I'd guess people talk about all the rest of the stuff!  ;-P  Also, although it sounds trite, it still took me years of digging into my brain to get some major traction (there was a LOT of crap to dig through...) so perhaps there would have been a lot of things to talk about if I had anyone to discuss with at the time.  Some of the stuff, it seems so obvious now, I keep wondering why it took half a lifetime to get there LOL!   

When I went to a zen meditation group near me, they just talked mostly about observing the breath, that was mostly it. Plus you had to breath DEEPLY, I got a lot of nagging about that, but I had asthma back then so I couldn't do it even if they said it a million times anyway so that got kind of irritating.  ;-P  At some point, it was time to go in and talk to the sensei about any questions I might have and I wanted to ask something like 'well is that it?  I don't see the point of it!'  but of course that sounds super rude so instead I just said I didn't have any questions.  ;-P  Sometimes they gave a lecture about something like dukkha, you can't get permanent satisfaction from physical items, etc.  And although I agreed, that seemed obvious so I just didn't really know where to go with them and their stuff.  And so I ended up finding my own path. 

Years later, I finally found here and learned a lot about all the stages and stuff, what other people do, etc, and it was very interesting.  I wish they had more of it at the zen school.  Maybe they thought I didn't need it becuase I was a beginner but I am not religious so there is no reason for me to do any of that stuff if someone did not tell me a reason as to where I could go with it. Sure meditation is relaxing but it was a lot more efficient for me to learn to relax my mind or alter my mood without having to go to a special place and sit on a pillow and so that's what I did. 

Anyway, maybe it's just me and I am kinda weird sometimes (my friends would agree on that), but I am not sure if the nonreligious will feel a reason to sit and meditate if not given some idea why they should.  I remember one person at the temple talked about how time would seem to stretch out and I was thinking well that's it?  Still a lot of time and money spent just to experience minor alterations of perception.  ;-P  I guess that is why i ended up going a more psychological direction instead, it seemed more logical at the time.  Psychology is known to improve happiness and that was my goal.  And although it worked for me and so obviously I am going to think it is the next best thing since sliced bread, I can't really say how it might stack up against other angles of attack.  Maybe some of the trainers who work with a lot of people might have a better idea though.  :-)
-Eva