Statement of Purpose

I am not an accredited teacher, I am not an authority figure. I’m a lay practitioner of the Buddha’s teachings, and I’ve been encouraged to share my journey with the larger Sangha.

The Dukkha of Grieving

In my previous post, there arose an epiphany with regard to the relationship between the elements of the five aggregates of clinging (form, feeling, perception, mental fabrications and consciousness), and the availability of self-arising charisms (jhana). At the beginning of meditation I am met with whatever is there, and in the past I’ve obsessed around how to “be” with those elements – which becomes an exhausting process of noting, then letting go, noting, letting go, noting, letting go. Through recent dhamma studies, however, I’m revisiting the Buddha’s advanced meditation instructions around replacing attachment to the aggregates with attachment to absorption in jhana. The Buddha teaches, in other words, that clinging to phenomena (whether pleasant or painful) leads to a world of suffering, so it’s better to cling to self-arising bliss, joy and ecstasy, as this leads to a clear and steady mind that sets the stage for cessation. At some point on the journey, when we’ve given up our craving for (and clinging to) what leads to suffering, we also give up our craving for (and clinging to) jhana – but that’s a ways down the road yet, at least for me.

As it turns out, I’ve been given an immediate opportunity to put all of this to a test.

I found out a few days ago that someone very close to me has died, under circumstances that I’m not entirely clear about. When I say “close,” I mean this is someone I’ve known for 15 years, who has shared a lot of her background and history, who worked on herself in various ways, and who I regarded as a beautiful presence on this planet. Although we lived on different continents and I never even heard her voice, we were more than just friends. I had grown to love her.

And now she is gone, just like that.

It didn’t hit me on day one or two, but the initial shock turned to pain late on the third day, and by yesterday it felt like being smothered by the weight of the world. As I looked into the bottomless well of my emotions, I recognized how easy it would be to succumb to fear, anxiety and depression, as has been a pattern after traumatic experiences during this lifetime. I felt the pull toward the realm of death.

The thought came to me early yesterday, “Well, here’s where you practice.” Morning meditation was a maze of distraction, a chaotic morass of memories and emotions. At the 45 minute mark, however, I arrived at a place where I could choose Door Number Two – pleasurable sensations – in a way that brought a measure of relinquishment and relief. Then, as I left the house to drive to a store, everything flooded back in.

During five hours out and about, I allowed the memories, feelings and fabrications to exist, and did my best to concentrate on my attachment to them. As the minutes crept by, I was able to follow the attachment back to previous life-traumas, to see how I took them on as a part of me, of who I am. I could also see how those traumas have solidified in time, unable to express their impermanence, since I’d fabricated them into (seemingly) permanent aspects of myself. Thanks to a twice-daily meditation practice that produces saturation in pleasant arisings, I began to shift from attachment to trauma into attachment to the pleasant arisings. I dipped in and out during those hours, alternating between overwhelming pain from grieving into overwhelming bliss and joy.

By the time I got home last night, my habitual clinging to suffering had transformed into a loving acceptance.

I don’t know what today or tomorrow will bring, as this is a new experience for me. Never in the past have I given myself an opportunity to recognize my craving and clinging to overwhelming suffering, my attachment to the drama of it all. Always in the past I have spiraled into full identification with the suffering, which guaranteed days, weeks and sometimes months of ups and downs, perhaps physical illness or injury, relationship fractures and God knows what else.

What I’m getting at here is that this is not a case where we flee from our trauma into bliss-bunny states of ecstasy. We don’t pretend that the pain of loss, for instance, isn’t there. We don’t block ourselves off from the awful truth that a person we love is no longer here. We allow the full brunt of it. And… we notice how we turn those aggregates into becoming. In other words, the pain and suffering actually become a part of our self-concept when we lose track of our attachments – but if we recognize when we are losing ourselves in attachment to pain and suffering, we (as meditation practitioners following the Buddha’s teachings) can avail ourselves of self-arising pleasure while the waves of pain and grief do their thing.

Seems odd and perhaps counter-intuitive, but I’m finding that it really can work this way.

The thing to remember is, it’s not the content of our suffering, but our relationship with it. That’s where we can make skillful choices that eventually deliver us from the endless round of becoming.

The Ending of Dukkha Depends on the Jhanas

As a lay practitioner trying to piece together a solid foundation in the Buddha-dhamma, I thought I’d share an epiphany that has arisen lately.

Recently I revisited the Jhana Sutta, Anguttara 9:36. I couldn’t find a translation from Jeffrey Brooks (Jhanananda), so I printed out the versions from Thanissaro Bhikkhu (https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN9_36.html) and Bhikkhu Sujato (https://suttacentral.net/an9.36/en/sujato?lang=en&layout=plain&reference=none&notes=asterisk&highlight=false&script=latin).

In this teaching, the Buddha comes right out and says that the aim of the Four Noble Truths – to permanently end suffering caused by craving and clinging to the 5 Aggregates – DEPENDS on attaining and absorbing in all eight jhanas, both rupa (material) and arupa (non-material).

Than Geoff’s (Thanissaro Bhikkhu’s) opening:

I tell you, the ending of the effluents depends on the first jhana… the second jhana… the third… the fourth… the dimension of the infinitude of space… the dimension of the infinitude of consciousness… the dimension of nothingness. I tell you, the ending of the effluents depends on the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception.

For each of the jhana stages it’s said:

He regards whatever phenomena there that are connected with form, feeling, perception, fabrications, & consciousness, as inconstant, stressful, a disease, a cancer, an arrow, painful, an affliction, alien, a disintegration, and emptiness, not-self. He turns his mind away from those phenomena, and having done so, inclines his mind to the property of the deathless. “This is peace, this is exquisite – the pacification of all fabrications, the relinquishing of all acquisitions; the ending of craving; dispassion, cessations; unbinding.”

In my twice-daily meditation practice and during waking mindfulness, I’ve been watching and experiencing what Than Geoff calls “effluents,” or what Sujato calls “defilements.” For me, this is the constant bubbling up of thoughts, feelings, sensations, emotions, stories, fantasies – the churning, chaotic mass of tantalizing diversion that jumps from one thing to another, always changing, always triggering trauma, patterned reactions and behaviors. I would typically spend the first third to half of my sits attempting to really “be” with these things, to note them, categorize them, go deep with them, run them through the Three Marks (Anicca, Dukkha, Anatta), then formally let them go – before returning to the bliss, joy and ecstasy that patiently waited. Instead of engaging Samma-Samadhi, I was engaging a mental obstacle course.

The Buddha, from my recent reading, prescribed jhana as the only skillful, essential, indispensable “replacement” for the aggregates of clinging, which are impermanent, not-self and pathways to suffering. Until we have relinquished craving and clinging, he recommends repeatedly accessing self-arising bliss, joy and ecstasy. Yes, jhana is impermanent and not-self – but it does not lead to suffering (except, perhaps, a tiny, subtle bit of stress due to clinging), and is in fact a requirement for total unbinding. At the point when we’ve honestly achieved dispassion for ALL craving and clinging… it’s time to abandon the path itself.

From this, I returned to Jeffrey’s suggestion that we remember a recent successful sit at the moment we sit on the cushion. My sense is that the craving and clinging are not eliminated by virtue of becoming absorbed in jhana… but our experience of letting go becomes much more skillful and effective as absorption deepens. There’s no need to fight it out with phenomena; we’re much better off immediately replacing mundane phenomena with jhana, from the perspective of which our mind-resources are freed up to access the clarity and skill required for true relinquishment.

This teaching answers the question I’ve been carrying around lately: How much work must I do to let go of my craving and clinging for the elements of the 5 Aggregates? The Buddha is clearly answering that we can simply recognize how all phenomena are detrimental and toxic, then just head into deeper and deeper jhana states – and from there, really let go of arising phenomena.

The Kayagatasati Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 119)

Here’s a reading of the fourth of four Phala Nikaya Suttas, an advanced teaching on Mindfulness of the Body. It goes deeply into the jhanas, as well as ten other attainments.

If you’d like to read along: https://www.greatwesternvehicle.org/pali/Phala_Nikaya/kayagatasati.htm

The Phala Nikaya: https://www.greatwesternvehicle.org/pali/phalanikaya.htm

Mahasatipatthana Sutta (Digha Nikaya 22)

Here’s the third of four main Phala Nikaya recitations. The Mahasatipatthana Sutta is considered an advanced training, specifically on the Four Cornerstones of Mindfulness (or Awareness). There is a brief discussion toward the end of the four material jhanas. This is an essential text for practicing Theravada Buddhists, one you’ll want to read many times.

If you’d like to follow along, here’s a link to Jhanananda’s translation, which I’m using for this video: https://www.greatwesternvehicle.org/pali/Phala_Nikaya/mahasatipatthanasutta.htm

A comprehensive list of Phala Nikaya Suttas: https://www.greatwesternvehicle.org/pali/phalanikaya.htm

Satipatthana Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 10)

Back finally from nursing a voice-distorting cold, here’s the second installment from the Phala Nikaya (Buddha’s teachings on Attainment), the Satipatthana Sutta (MN10). This is an intermediate teaching on the Four Paths to Mindfulness and is worthy of frequent study.

If you’d like to read along, here’s a link to the version that I’m using.

For a list of Phala Nikaya Suttas, go to this link.

Anapanasati Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 118)

Here is the first of four recordings of Phala Nikaya Suttas that take the aspirant from beginner to advanced levels of Samma-Samadhi (Right Meditation or Gnosis). In the Anapanasati Sutta, the Buddha teaches the gathered monks about mindfulness of the breath in meditation, giving in-depth instructions that put this practice into wider context with reference with the whole of the Buddhadhamma. This Sutta is worth reading several times, especially the numbered sections, in conjunction with getting established in a daily meditation practice.

Here is a link to the translation I’m using for this recording.

Comparing the Buddha’s Teachings with Direct Experience

Last night before bed I found a handful of comments for this site that have been in moderation for over 11 years. I don’t know if I just missed them, or if I was unprepared to deal with them back then. One of them followed my article on the Dark Night of the Soul. Another was a common criticism, and unfortunately I couldn’t find it this morning, but I do remember the essence of it.

After morning meditation I decided to make a video attempting to answer these criticisms, which is what you see above.

Link to first comment.

Parking Applied & Sustained Attention

Here I explain a couple of concepts that may be useful for skillful and more effortless navigation of the meditative absorption states, called jhana in the Theravada Buddhist tradition. Thanks to my longtime teacher and friend Jeffrey Brooks (Jhanananda) for the first tip about remembering previous ecstatic states.

It’s good to be back.

Fruit of the Contemplative Life Forum

The Great Western Vehicle

Trade-Off

Twenty-some years ago, flat on my back doing “trance work,” I felt a tingling in the forehead between the eyes. I pictured the tingling as a small feather moving in a dime-sized circle, pleasant and subtle. After a while I got up and noticed that the sensation persisted.

Soon I was flat on my back again, engaging trance work with the intention of getting out of my body. While I did pop out for short moments, the feather-touch-between-the-eyes is what wanted to happen. The dime-circle spread out to baseball size, and then my head was encircled by a gently-vibrating “halo,” which I pictured as golden and bright. I got up from trance work and noticed that the halo persisted.

Over the days, weeks, months and years to come, this small sensation in my forehead enlarged and matured to encompass my entire body. New centers of energetic vibration got “turned on” in the process, corresponding to the chakras with special attention to the lower two. In meditation the routine included a rocket blast of energy down there, firing up through the spine to join the pleasant sensations in and around the head. I would get up from trance work or meditation to find that, while the intensity and focus of these experiences decreased, the energy itself never subsided, never turned off.

I became and have remained saturated in jhana/samadhi, on and off the cushion, all day, all night, no matter what the circumstances of my waking life.

Speaking with others who have found jhana/samadhi in whatever way it came to them, I’ve discovered that my experience is not unique. There is something about the process of dipping into deeper states of contemplation, coming out then going back in, over and over and over, that gradually integrates the absorptive experience such that it never fully dissipates. I don’t know how this plays out in others, but for me there have been two diverging outcomes:

1) peace and tranquility gained through long meditation sessions have gradually permeated my moment-to-moment existence, always calling me, always inviting me, always guiding me to surrender to peace and tranquility.

2) anxiety, trepidation, fear, anger, resentment and all manner of over-sensitive emotional suffering have risen from the depths, releasing in ways that I would never have chosen for myself or anyone else.

These polar extremes are ever-present:  I am either contentedly basking in peace, joy, ecstasy, tranquility and equanimity, or I am wracked with emotional turmoil, projecting onto others while condemning myself for failing to act like an enlightened being.

What I’ve come to realize is that there is a profound trade-off when one experiences the self-arising bliss, joy and ecstasy of jhana/samadhi, which completely saturates the contemplative over time.  The trade-off states that we are allowed to experience wondrous and succor-providing “Divine” energy on an ever-present basis – but this energy will inevitably put us face-to-face with every conceivable shadow from the depths of our being, and we will be required to confront ourselves at a level of honesty that is brutal and transformative.  The nature of this transformation is, for as long as necessary, destructive – i.e., it breaks us down at the ego level, and it never, ever lets up.

So it is a bitter-sweet proposition. On the one hand, there is never a moment when I’m not blessed with self-arising bliss, joy and ecstasy, with instant access to peace, tranquility and well-being. On the other hand, the relentless effect of this Divine energy is to chip away at my self-conception, challenging all beliefs about myself and the world I live in. It brings up heavy-duty dark emotions and spews them forth at a moment’s notice. It brings shame and embarrassment, it throttles self-confidence, it exposes me as a raw, gaping wound for any and all to see – or at least this is how it often feels. Once it begins, there is no turning back – and there is never a guarantee that a particular outcome is in the offing. There is just this experience of being blissed-out all the time, even as the fabric of my world comes under constant questioning without answers – just more questions, more anxiety, more desperate yearning to land on something solid.

What it teaches, finally, is that surrender is not just a noble intention. Surrender is absolutely required, and surrender must be total. This IS a gift and I am gratified that it has happened… but I am also fully aware that jhana/samadhi WILL have its way with me. I can either let go of my own agenda and allow it full access to my driving mechanism, or I can kick, scream and otherwise resist with every ounce of my ego-based strength, somehow thinking that I can produce for myself a pleasant outcome that won’t force me to deal with the darker aspects of my being.

Technically, I am in the thralls of the Dark Night of the Soul, symbolized as a Great Divide between the 2nd and 3rd “material” jhanas.  Back in 2009 I wrote:

When engaging the four material jhanas, many hurdles must be negotiated. Emotional hurdles, psychological hurdles, physical hurdles, spiritual hurdles. Hurdles having to do with entrenched beliefs. Hurdles having to do with cultural conditioning. Hurdles having to do with relationships

The biggest hurdle for most contemplatives occurs at the boundary between second and third jhana.

Symbolically, this boundary depicts a “lull” after some initial spiritual epiphany, a “coming down from the mountain” that leads to deflation and disappointment, not to mention a pining for getting back to the sublime states hinted at during the spiritual high.

There’s a lot of that going on, for sure… but I can report from the depths of the Dark Night that there is no “getting back to the sublime states hinted at during the spiritual high.”  There is only one defeat after another, requiring one surrender after another, over and over as I learn how to relinquish my ego’s hold on how I think things should be.  I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is the slow, gruelling death of a self-identity that must be completely blotted out in order for new life to begin.  This is what I bargained for, this is what I get.

From both personal experience and encouragement from past and present mystics, I gather that there’s no point in rushing things, and the only sensible choice is to let go, surrender, release, relinquish… and know that I was never in charge to begin with.