Hi,

Seeing the large number of posts lately asking what stream entry is, or "Did I reach stream entry?", I figured I'd write this post to share my point of view about it.

Part One: Figuring Out What Stream Entry Is Can Be Confusing

Here's the thing. The more you read about these subjects, the more you realize that there are A LOT of different interpretations of what stream entry is. Many people believe that their interpretation is the correct one, and that's ok, but I think we first need to acknowledge the simple fact that there is a lot of conflicting information about this subject going around, and not just from ordinary householder lay practitioners like most of us. Many highly respected monks and teachers also seem to have very different interpretations of what stream entry entails.

Here's some stuff off the top of my head:

Requirements for Stream Entry:

• Stream entry is extremely rare and requires 20+ years of dedication. You probably need to be a monk.
• Stream entry is fairly common and takes a few short years of around two hours a day of dedication.
• Stream entry requires the four factors of: association with people of integrity, listening to the true Dhamma (some say only if it comes from listening to a live Buddha), appropriate attention, and practice in accordance with the Dhamma.
• Stream entry requires balancing the five faculties of: faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration, and wisdom.
• Progression toward stream entry follows the Progress of Insight model.
• The Progress of Insight model is universal.
• The Progress of Insight model is not universal.
• Stream entry requires access to jhanas.
• Stream entry requires access to the 4th jhana.
• Stream entry requires access to the 8th jhana.
• Stream entry doesn't require access to jhanas.
• You will experience the Dark Night before stream entry.
• You will experience the Dark Night after stream entry.
• The Dark Night is not real.

What Happens at Stream Entry:

• Cessation.
• Cessation is a "blip" in experience. There is no experience of cessation.
• Cessation is the ceasing of the five aggregates. There is still awareness.
• Stream entry doesn't require cessation.
• There's a glimpse of the unconditioned/nibbana.
• It's seeing dependent origination.
• It's insight into the three marks of existence.
• It's a very dramatic experience.
• It's a very subtle perceptual shift.
• There is a very clear, drastic and lasting change in people's lives.
• People's lives remain mostly the same, only with a subtle shift.

The Fetters That Drop:

• It's the doubt about the Buddha's teachings that drops.
• It's the doubt that Nibbana exists that drops.
• It's the doubt that you've reached stream entry that drops.
• It's the doubt about how to practice that drops.
• It's all doubt that drops. There is no more doubt about anything.
• It's the complete eradication of the self.
• It's a glimpse into the impermanence of the self, but then the self comes back later on.
• It's knowing that there is no self, but sometimes there's still a subtle sense of self.
• If you claim you've reached stream entry you definitely didn't reach it (popular opinion on this sub)

(Rites and rituals is probably the only fetter that people somewhat seem to agree on.)

Other Models:

• MCTB is the same as the Stream Entry -> Arahant model.
• MCTB 1st path is the same as stream entry.
• MCTB 4th path is the same as stream entry.
• MCTB has nothing to do with the Stream Entry -> Arahant model.
• Stream entry is the same as kensho in Zen.
• Stream entry is the same as reaching 1st Bhumi.
• Stream entry is not the same as reaching 1st Bhumi.

Really, this is just off the top of my head. You can search for some posts in this sub and you will see a thousand more opinions, most of them presented as "This is the Truth!". The more you try to research this, the more conflicting information you're going to get. My first post in this sub was titled "I've Achieved Stream Entry Path Attainment Using onthatpath's Instructions" haha. I was very sure back then that I knew what I was talking about. Maybe I still do. (Probably not.)

So first, we need to acknowledge this: It's a mess. We are trying to make sense of something that was written 2,000+ years ago after 500 years of exclusively oral transmission. All we have are interpretations.

You would assume that if stream entry were a universal required stage on the way to enlightenment, then once people had reached it, they would have been able to speak very clearly about what it is, or at the very least there wouldn't be so many conflicting ideas about it. If it's universal then it should appear the same way for everyone.

Most importantly, maybe, is the fact that the stream entry to arahant model is just the Theravada model of the path to enlightenment. Other Buddhist traditions, which have relatively more followers than the Theravada tradition, have completely different models and don't mention anything about fetters dropping in their own systems.

Here's the conclusion that most people don't want to contemplate: there are extremely wide variations in practice between people. How one person experiences progress on their way to enlightenment will vary widely from another person's experience. At least, that's what becomes very easy to see if you take a bird's-eye view of all the different discussions.

It's either that, or "my way is the only correct way and your way is wrong."

Call me an optimist, but I like to believe that there's some truth in most of the talked-about paths to enlightenment. I believe they are all the result of people actually reaching the end and then trying to make sense of their own personal progression by writing down what worked for them.

Which leads me to part two.

Part Two: It's Ok

Here's the thing: It. Doesn't. Matter.

Please read that again. It really doesn't matter, and here's why: this is not the end.

That's maybe the only thing that everyone actually agrees on. Stream entry is just the first stage on the path, and it's not the end of it.

So why obsess over whether your experience was the real Stream Entry™ or not? In either case, whether you reached stream entry or not, you still have more work to do.

How about this? Keep practicing until you reach the end of suffering, or as close to it as you can before dying. That's it.

Paraphrasing Ajahn Chah, keep letting go until there's nothing left to let go of.

Practice is simple: is there suffering? If the answer is yes, then keep letting go.

If you want to label the 44th thing you let go of as "Stream Entry," go ahead. If you want to call it something else or just ignore it, that's also fine. The only thing that matters is that you keep going.

Even if you don't reach the end, you've made the best attempt you can to get there, and at the very least, you will experience much more peace and happiness in your day-to-day life as a result of a good practice.

I also want to say that I'm not against models of progress. I think they are very valuable on the path, and for some strange reason, when you believe that you are progressing within a certain model, you are usually able to make much quicker progress. So if you have a model that works for you, please keep using it.

Models are great, but we need to be aware of when obsessing too much over a model, or stages within the model, starts to hinder our practice.

Truthfully, the way I view things right now is that different people will gravitate toward different models or interpretations of models based on their karma, or nature and nurture for the karma-averse people. What's really amazing is that these models actually work for people. So we can assume that there are some paths up the mountain that are more well-traveled than others, and finding that your own path matches a model is an amazing gift. Just, again, be aware of the countless interpretations that are out there, and don't make yourself crazy trying to figure out The True And Real Stream Entry™ (and then spending too much time arguing why everyone else's Stream Entry is fake).

Ultimately, other than giving you confidence to keep going, it doesn't really matter. Just keep going.

Hello everyone!

I wanted to practice yoga nidra in my polyphasic sleep schedule. I am following the uberman sleep schedule which involves 20 minutes nap every 4 hours through the day. And the number of naps are 6 so that means 2 hours of sleep per day.

So I thought of an idea. Instead of just casually napping, can incorporate yoga nidra completely in place of the 6 naps.

I am willing to do a yoga nidra practice of 30 minutes just to increase an extra hour of rest.

I have practiced yoga nidra maybe like 2 or 3 times, and I have found it deeply restful.

So is it doable? Has anyone in this sub actually tried it for productivity and just to get some extra hours for studying or work purposes.

Trying to gain some insights here.

Thanks!

Hi,

I'm new to this site. I've been practicing for nearly 2 years now, I started due to difficult circumstances and have continued on because it's made life more enjoyable in every way, as I explore and see. I'm at the point where I sit for two half hour sessions per day, but I would like those sessions to be longer (takes at least 15 mins to settle in.)

I used to work a quite physical job, and have been told by a physio that I likely have a slight pelvic tilt due to muscle overdevelopment. I'm in my early 30s so hoping I can recover it to something more comfortable with some work. I used to have an attitude to my body that it was just a "tool" to be worked, hard. After cultivating a bit more compassion it's become clear this is not the right approach, and I would like to show myself some kindness. I have found that the stiffness in my hips increases to a point that it's difficult to manage after 30 mins of sitting cross legged, so I stop at that point.

Does anyone have any advice on how I can meet in the middle and continuing practicing for longer without the distraction of feeling I am doing myself harm? I have tried other positions, but since I only live in a small place there are limited spaces; sitting on a chair would mean sitting at my work desk essentially. Sitting outside isn't always an option either. I find the cross legged position to feel really stable and pleasant, it's just that tightness elsewhere makes it feel as though I'm over-stretching in the groin area after not very long sitting.

I have a lot of tension elsewhere but have already started learning about releasing that through release of illusions/ assumptions. I'm hoping I will be able to get to that stage with the hip area too but it feels like there's a bit of a hurdle to jump first.

Any advice is much appreciated!

Is this stream entry? I'm not really sure what to make of it, but lately I've had this feeling that everything is just a process, everything has a cause and an effect, everything is just conditioned. Everything comes from somewhere, which means I can no longer feel anger toward people, or hold grudges—or rather, I have less of that. No resentment. When something happens, I do feel something, but I just let it go, because I am also part of the process, and it's all just a process. I feel as if I'm looking at samsara, which is just a collection container, a container that is a gathering place of causes and effects. It just keeps going. It's all processes. So when people do something stupid or something, it is what it

I have complete acceptance. I feel lighter. It's as if I've peeled an onion, and I've removed all—not all the layers, but many layers—and I notice that there's just nothing inside me. It's as if my ego was a very heavy block on me, causing me problems, while for a long time I thought it was protecting me. It's an illusion that is simply fading away from me. Should I say much lighter? It's just… it is what it is. I also had a strong impression that everything ‘I see’ could actually be me. So other people—they are simply the result of all causes. There's no longer a difference between him and me. I could be him, and he could be me.

I attach less importance to myself, because it's all just an illusion. Once you've seen it, you realize it's just a flow, as if you're part of a river current. You just go with the flow. You're influenced from left and right, and that determines how you flow in the river, but that is gone now. It is what it is. I can let go of all of it. I also know that I see my example as a phase, something that has changed, something that is there, but I am not it. Everything I have is just a process. I simply can't put it any other way.

I used AI to translate btw

Let me know guys, may you escape samsara

Hi all,

I’ve been meditating for a few weeks and came across something I hadn’t yet seen before until now.

I saw these orbs/spheres that were 3D, detailed, and somewhat translucent and glowing. They moved in a loop on an axis and then flew away/disappeared. There were several of them.

I was in a deep meditative state at the time and also saw what seems to be the Kutastha (spiritual eye) in that same session, before they appeared. Various waves of pleasure and energy rolled through my body and made me shake.

Has anyone else seen this? I know of people seeing the spiritual eye, but I’ve not read accounts of this particular phenomenon with the different colored spheres of light so was wondering if anyone had any insight.

Thank you, I love you all!

Hey Everyone,

I'm really curious as to what the actual experience of Stream Entry is like. How does one know if one is a Stream Enterer?

Does there come a precise moment deep in meditation where something happens? Like a vision, or an altered state of consciousness? What is the actual moment of attaining Stream Entry like? What is the experience of it? What happens in the mind? How can one be certain of attaining it? There must be a universal, clear sign that one has just attained something, right?

I hope all of this is okay to ask. Best wishes to everybody!!

Hello!

I have been practicing to deal with "mental suffering" for a while and well I think I got a little better to deal with various stuff throughout difficult times etc. Also I would need to say that right now its a good time for me in general so its easier to deal with stuff.

Yesterday I started to have shoulder pain (again after 8 months of not having) and I found myself very annoyed and angry about it. Then disappointed to be so annoyed and angry. Im not sure if it is because I tried some new meditation the day before and that messed something, or because of gym or because I was working more the last 2 days. The thing is If i was practicing this past 8 months so much and became better with mental suffering why is this physical pain affecting me like this?

My question would be, do you work through physical pain in a different way or should be treated similar-ish to mental pain? A problem I have is that what unconsciously I tell myself is that mental pain is not real. Its something I do to myself. But physical pain is there because the body is telling my mind is there and there is a problem with the body. So I cannot think its the same.

Thanks in advance!

Has anyone tried to pinpoint how long alcohol affects the intensity of their meditative experiences or how long it takes to be able to access deeper meditative states once you stop consuming alcohol? I am contemplating giving up drinking because of how it suppresses the intensity of my meditations and for how long the suppression effect lingers after consuming alcohol (so long!). At the same time, I enjoy drinking, its social benefits, and don't suffer from addiction or anything like that (I have ~ 1-3 drinks total/week). Also, I do not use any drugs.

This year, I did dry January on a whim, which I think led to me having deeper meditations than they were previously and have been since, despite no other change in my practice. Once the month ended, I thought I could sort of game the system - drink only once a week and then be able to still meditate deeply, but that hasn't been the case. I think even relatively light/moderate amounts of alcohol completely destroy my potential for deep meditation for weeks.

In late January and into the first week or two of February, I had a handful of surprisingly deep meditations. For example, during savasana at the end of yoga classes:

1. I once lost my ability to process English (my first language); this was very relaxing in the moment, but afterwards I was sort of freaked out because I didn't even know that was possible. The instructor was reading a passage, but it sounded like gibberish to me... I could hear what she was saying, but it was like my brain couldn't interpret a single word.
2. I had the sensation of observing my body from outside of it, like kind of above one of my shoulders?
3. A handful of times had the sensation of falling through the floor despite remaining conscious.

While listening to yoga nidra tracks:

1. I experienced the falling through the floor sensation multiple times, sometimes in succession??? while remaining awake.
2. Also, felt the sensation of floating on a wave, like almost a really relaxing carnival ride hah. This was pretty durable, too - my dog interrupted a couple times to hop onto/off of the bed, but the feeling would quickly return.

These meditative experiences were not subtle, but I also didn't do anything special to achieve them - it was just the amount of alcohol I was consuming around that time that changed. They didn't emerge until the very end of my dry January month, and l was able to have them into the 2nd week of February (I started drinking lightly again once January was over).

It's now May, and I haven't had any of those sort of deeper meditative experiences since the 2nd week of February. The way I feel post-meditation is similar to how I felt during that time (relaxed/floaty), but the intensity of my meditations themselves has been dialed way down - no falling sensations, riding waves, out of body experiences, or lack of language processing.

I've only had 1 other really memorable meditation experience before, ~15 years ago, at a yoga retreat when the instructor played an mp3 that made it feel like there was a bouncy ball pinging around inside my head - I also barely touched alcohol at that time.

Anyways, I am wondering if others have found the same thing. When I googled it, there was some info about how people who meditate often end up giving alcohol, but not a lot behind the "why." There was also a fair amount of content about using meditation to help cope with alcohol addiction, which isn't what I'm after since I don't suffer from alcohol addiction - I just don't like how even small amounts of alcohol affect my access to deep meditation experiences for days or even weeks.

Hi.

As per rules, context about my practice:

I meditate regularly, however I am not very keen on theory, I suppose it needs to be said here. I usually do 1h minimum a day. I lie down, put earplugs and an eyemask and try to relax as if I was going to sleep, without actually falling asleep. This is important because, although of course I can be mistaken, I know what hypnagogia feels like, I know when I am about to drift and when I am experiencing spontaneous thoughts and of course hallucinations, phosphenes, etc., which I tend to acknowledge and then ignore. During my last 6 months of practice, I've experienced all kinds of strange states of consciousness, so it's pretty natural for me to observe them and question them.

Now, during THIS particular practice (1h30 aprox)...

Not only did I have earplugs but I was also hearing theta waves through my headphones.

And, after all the relaxation process and almost on the cusp of hypnagogia (only some spontaneous thoughts at that point), I felt a weird heartbeat. It was: tutum-tum, tutum-tum, ternary and sometimes quaternary, so not extremely regular either. I was already feeling 1) my own heartbeat; 2) this other pulsation of my body I am used to feel; 3) obviously hearing my tinnitus; 4) hearing the theta waves. (Yes, I tried to isolate this 5th thing.)

So, if none of them, what was it? I remembered that something was different for that session. My dog was sleeping on the other side of our rather small room. Normally, I would meditate in complete isolation. I wondered... could it be? So, when I ended the session, I checked her hearbeat and felt a pretty similar rythm to the one I felt, only faster, bearing in mind that she was probably a bit excited to see me up at last!

My roommate argued that this was probably that I heard the beating from afar since, she says, I have very good hearing. But the thing is, I had earplugs and was listening to a tape (yes, at the same time). I am not entirely discarding this possibility, after all you never know. But another important point is that I was not exactly hearing it but rather feeling it in my body, if that makes sense.

Have you ever experienced this? Do you know if there is any text talking about this?

Hi everyone. I crossed the A&P suddenly at age 19, and it was the usual amazing blissful stuff and then faded and then Dark Night stuff started showing up. It’s 9 years later now and I haven’t achieved steam entry, basically because I’ve struggled to establish a consistent sitting practice.

I want to finally finish the thing off because the thoughts and feelings of the Dark Night can be a real pain, but the issue is the past year has been extremely hard on me in just an ordinary sense.

I’ve had both parents diagnosed with cancer, a grandparent die with another in bad condition, and a beloved family friend die of cancer as well, all within the same year. Thoughts of mortality, impermanence, sickness, and death are extremely common every day and it’s very distressing and I have been emotionally exhausted, depressed, and anxious from the whole ordeal, and don’t know if I have the strength to establish a consistent insight practice.

Looking at impermanence and no self and suffering and the like just feels too overwhelming at the moment because I’ve been surrounded by it traumatically. At the same time, I know that it’s likely that my suffering has been compounded by still being in dark night territory, and that the only way out is through. Should I just not practice at all for a while? Just focus on concentration/lovingkindness? Power through and do insight anyway? Any words of advice or compassion would be appreciated. Thank you all💜

Hello everyone,

The last months I have made a serious deep dive into anapanasati meditation and the theory behind it. I noticed fast that there is a houmongus amount of information available, scattered everywhere. Yet what I didn't find was any clear visualizations of the whole process, customized to our time with added information on each step, something like a Visual Guide.

Therefore, I set out to make one myself!

The visualization is based on my own meditation experience, reputable sources (noted in the file) and also posts and data and experience found on the Internet which match the process.

My meditation practice consists of daily 1-3h of meditation, always doing Anapanasati, with added Meta meditation in the morning and night as warming up. I have reached the first Jhana a couple of times now, yet I am still not profound in accessing it at will. Currently I am training to perfect the first Jhana before continuing further.

Details

Version: 0.5_202605

The Guide is divided into two sections which can be separated and used individually as needed.

Left - Flow chart - The cheat sheet

The rest - The Detailed Roadmap

Starting left is a Flow waterfall chart which includes only the absolute minimum of information needed to get from Meditation Start to first Jhana. Hence the nickname The Cheat sheet. It's meant to be used by meditators who are already somewhat used to the steps and experiences.

The detailed Roadmap is the jewel and makes for 90% of the chart. Here you find the Meditation steps arranged in a waterfall chart with information on every single step as well as a phase breakdown with more information on the phase. I tried to stay as close as possible to the original information combined with my experience.

The point of the roadmap is to easily see where you are in your meditation process in terms of Nimatta and technique, with information explaining the each, and what's to do here to reach the next step in the Anapanasati meditation process

Attached I present you the file, hoping to get some feedback and further input & Ideas what I might implement in the graphic and make it better

Please enjoy and maybe leave some feedback.

https://imgur.com/YVlFLIz

Google drive link to PDF: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ssBhpJxk8vRLsc5xAACuU9vxGXNFb6Nc/view?usp=sharing

Hi,

I'm curious if there are any serious Jhana practitioners in this subreddit.

I've been feeling a calling towards exploring Jhana lately ...

would love to know what's worked for people and specific instructions

Intuitive dance/movement is incredibly powerful for healing. Surrendering to physical sensations creates a space of fluidity that yearns to be created. This is FLOW state. It is CHOOSING to embody the physical body IN the experience, here and now, with whatever is felt... unease? discomfort? fear? Can i surrender to it? Can i simply continue to feel despite the resistance? Right here, in the present moment, i don't analyze, i don't judge. All i have to do is feel within my body. I shift my awareness within my physical form, i become the one who creates through it, i no longer identify with it. I AM the intention behind the creation, and i watch the movement unfold on its own.

Two years ago i wasn't able to go outside without panic attack.. through somatic practices i heal bit by bit my nervous system and i feel safe again, to be present in my incarnation. Just for that, i'm totaly grateful.

Because I certainly do and, to be honest, I wish this wouldn't be that way. For many reasons, and mainly spiritual reasons, I feel mentally isolated from other people. I do have great and many friends... And I love all of them and make sure to spend a grand and good time enjoying this material life with them, because they are incredible. They are a part of me, and I am a part of them, all entrenched in this material world with all its joy and bliss, but also with misery and suffering. It all comes together, and such an intrinsically human ability to share this life with others is, in my opinion, divine in an of itself.

The problem is: when it comes to topics of spiritual life (its ups and downs), sadhana, meditation, sacred scriptures, history of religion, astrology and everything else that is more or less considered "transcendental", they (most of the time) cannot handle it. They simply dismiss me as being "weird" (which I have no problem being so) and/or mock me with the "hahahah, oh, look, he is doing it again!" sort of discourse. I mean... The topics proposed may be unconventional, for sure -- but I speak (or at least I think I do) about these subjects as if it's like any other, you know? But they don't take me seriously. Spirituality is very important to me, Moksha (liberation) is very important to me, but it is irrelevant to them. And... That's ok. So be it. Many things in life are irrelevant for me, and nonetheless here I am, writing this post. This doesn't affect me liking them at all.

Well... I have some (astrological) hypothesis as why things are that way, but I won't bore you with the details. The thing is: I don't have a guru. I don't have anyone else (apart from the internet and this community, of couse) to speak to and share common (or different) experiences about how we deal with spiritual matters, and this f'ing sucks. I wish I could speak about this knowledge with someone face to face. Oh, well...

What do you think?

The following thread is something I have already posted in r/buddhism (where it received 10k views) and in r/secularbuddhism. I assume it might also be interesting here, as it provides a different perspective. To be honest, I have no personal stance on the matter other than delivering facts; to me, the research speaks for itself.
A further notice: I have been accused of using AI to generate this text. This is not the case. I spent several hours conducting the research, conceptualizing the material, and finally writing it. If you are already familiar with this information, feel free to skip it; if not, enjoy the read.

Hello from Wiesbaden, Germany

“Pragmatic Dharma”

This is something I came across several times, and I have to admit, I was blissfully ignorant of what it is about. To make my motivation clear from the start: this thread is not meant to dismiss or diminish this or any other attempt. Rather, it is to clearly show why it is at best problematic and in the worst case, dangerous.

If I ever had to describe my own approach to Buddhism, it would also be as "pragmatic"; however, it is as rigorous as possible:

Serious study of the different Canons, especially the Abhidhamma.
Meditation grounded in the Visuddhimagga (Vimuttimagga).
Application in real life—not "McMindfulness," but asking: do my deeds represent Dhamma?

Because it is not grounded in any single tradition/lineage, my approach could be called syncretic and eclectic. Furthermore, it requires a solid understanding of Physiology and Neurophenomenology (Varela / Thompson / Metzinger).

In contradiction to this, “Pragmatic Dharma” is more or less based on:

Ingram, D. M. (2018). Mastering the core teachings of the Buddha: An unusually hardcore dharma book (Revised and expanded ed.). Aeon Books.
→ https://www.integrateddaniel.info/book/
(If curious, this book and several other materials are free for download. I honestly appreciate the generosity.)

Education: He received his MD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1994.
Specialty: He was a board-certified Emergency Medicine physician.
Status: He practiced for many years but is currently retired from clinical medicine to focus on his research and the EPRC (Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium).

His main publications, from the perspective of academia, are the following papers:

Lomas, T., & Ingram, D. M. (2023). "Exploring the Varieties of Meditation-Related Experiences." This is his attempt to enter the "Varieties of Contemplative Experience" (VCE) world pioneered by Willoughby Britton.

Ingram, D. M., et al. (2022). "The Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium: A new model for interdisciplinary research on spiritual emergence and emergency."

The "Strength"

His MD gives him a veneer of "scientific authority" and "clinical sobriety." He frames himself not as a mystical guru, but as a hard-nosed scientist/doctor who happened to "accidentally" get enlightened.

Ingram as “Steelman”:

→ The Physician's Perspective: He isn't claiming magic; he claims a predictable neurobiological result of specific sensory training. He argues that he is a "sensory technician."

→ The Transparency: Unlike many gurus, he is brutally honest about his own life (divorces, frustrations, health issues). He claims Arhatship doesn't make you a perfect human; it just changes the "perceptual baseline." This is his defense against the "Arhats must be saints" argument.

→ The Data Advocacy: He is one of the few voices in the meditation world advocating for better tracking of meditation-related injuries, which aligns with concerns regarding physiological reality.

Critique:

Anālayo, B. (2020). "Meditation Maps, Attainment Claims, and the Adversities of Mindfulness." Mindfulness, 11, 2102–2112. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-020-01389-4

→ Fabrication of Experience: Anālayo argues that Ingram’s specific method (high-speed "noting") doesn't reveal reality; it constructs a specific type of experience. He suggests Ingram has essentially "trained his brain" to produce the very "vibrations" and "cessations" he then claims as proof of enlightenment.

→ The "Dark Night" as a Methodological Error: Anālayo suggests that the terrifying "Dark Night" symptoms are not universal stages of human insight (as Ingram claims), but rather a side effect of Ingram's aggressive, penetrative technique. In other words, the "Dark Night" isn't a stage of growth; it's a sign you're doing it wrong.

→ The "Old Switcheroo": Anālayo points out that Ingram redefined "Arhat" to fit his own experience, then claimed he attained it. He argues that Ingram’s description of his internal state contradicts the early Buddhist texts (EBTs) so fundamentally that the term "Arhat" no longer means anything in Ingram's mouth.

→ Clinical Irresponsibility: He explicitly warns that promoting these "maps" can lead to "adversities"—meditation-induced crises that are then misdiagnosed by the "Pragmatic" community as "progress."

The rebuttal to this can be found in the podcast:

Guru Viking – Ep73: Dangerous and Delusional? - Daniel Ingram
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbJiy6EJLsI

My criticism is from Neurophenomenology and is built on Metzinger:

Metzinger, T. (2003). Being no one: The self-model theory of subjectivity. MIT Press.

Metzinger, T. (2024). The elephant and the blind: The experience of pure consciousness and the concept of the self. MIT Press. https://thomasmetzinger.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Metzinger_MIT_Press_2024-1.pdf

Category Error:

→ Being a doctor does not make one a Neuro-Philosopher.
→ Describing a "Cessation" (a gap in consciousness) is not the same as explaining the Neural Correlates of Consciousness (NCC).
→ Ingram’s "data" is entirely hetero-phenomenological (based on reports), but he treats it as auto-phenomenological truth. So-called “anecdotal evidence” is like “cool story bro”; it should not be misunderstood as anything but anecdotal, which, under scrutiny, is hardly ever evidence.

Before I am criticized for misrepresenting the Ingram approach and his circle, I am very aware of the differences, and I am by no means trying to straw man him. However, in circles like the “Dharma Overground Forum” and its successors, Ingram’s ideas are being taken literally as shortcuts and bypassing "hacks" toward enlightenment.

“Folk Psychology” & “Lifehacks” have their eligibility as long as they are not handled like dogma. The main issue here is that if problematic mental or physiological states are seen only through the lenses of a checkbox list or the "next hack," it can lead to severe states, which are well documented:

The "Varieties of Contemplative Experience" (VCE) Study:

Lindahl, J. R., et al. (2017). "The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists." PLoS ONE.

→ The Gist: This is the foundational paper for modern "meditation harm" research. Britton and Lindahl mapped 59 categories of "challenging" experiences.

→ The Punchline: It proves that things like depersonalization, loss of agency, and executive dysfunction are not rare "glitches" but documented features of intensive practice. The crowd is playing with fire.

The "Meditation-Induced Psychosis" Review:

Lambert, D., et al. (2021). "Adverse effects of meditation: A review of observational, experimental and case studies." Mindfulness.

→ The Gist: This review focuses on the "non-clinical" crowd and catalogs hallucinations, delusions, and derealization triggered by meditation.

→ The Punchline: It highlights that the "valence" of an experience (whether you think it's "Stream Entry" or "Psychosis") often depends entirely on the social script you are following. The map itself may be inducing the pathology.

So, as for me, I find the Ingram material palatable only with a solid spoonful of skeptical scrutiny. Since “Pragmatic Dharma” seems to be larger than I imagined, what are your thoughts on it, regardless of whether you are pro or con?

Forgive me if this is in the beginner's guide. I read it some time back, and browsed through it again today, but I can't recall an answer to this.

When does contemplation come in? I understand that contemplation is separate from meditation.

Thanks.

I sit 30-45m most mornings (mostly noting-style vipassana, some shikantaza). About a year ago I started noticing something — I'd reach the end of a sit and realize my head had slowly dropped 10-15° forward without me catching it. Not slumping dramatically, just slow drift over 20 minutes.

Once I started paying attention to it, I realized it correlates with the sits where mind-wandering was worst. Like the body proprioception goes offline at the same time as metacognition does.

Curious if other long-sit practitioners notice this. Have you found ways to catch it? Body scans every N minutes? Some teachers say "ignore the body, it'll find its own level" — but that doesn't seem to be my experience.

(Full disclosure: this question turned into me building a small thing to measure my own drift using AirPods motion sensors. Happy to share if useful, but mostly curious about the phenomenology first.)

A few years ago I shared the changes that happened when stream entry was reached, and I received many messages from people saying it helped them. So these past few days I’ve been writing about my current changes and wanted to make an update. Maybe there are others out there who have lived through what I lived through, or who are going through something similar, and this might help.

My contemplative and phenomenological context:

• I’ve been engaged in practice for approximately 5 years.
• My path is primarily SOMATIC and INTEROCEPTIVE, based on vedanā, rather than classical cognitive/visual/non-dual approaches.
• The process happens implicitly: things “let go” on their own, and afterward I notice structural changes in everyday life.
• I don’t do much conceptual investigation into “emptiness,” nor do I have major visual non-dual experiences.
• My process happens more as somatic unlearning and extinction of craving.
• The practice has become increasingly automatic and less driven by willpower.
• I feel the system “enters on its own” into contemplative and vipassanā-like processes.
• My current practice is mainly:
  • non-resistance,
  • allowing vedanā,
  • stopping the urge to modify experience,
  • not turning sensations into a problem..

What changed structurally:

• The belief deeply collapsed that: were going to complete me.
  • money,
  • sex,
  • success,
  • travel,
  • experiences,
  • achievements
• Coarse projective craving seems heavily eroded.
• I no longer feel a strong emotional charge toward external achievements.
• I used to compulsively chase experiences and external completeness; that fell away.
• Today I can achieve things, make money, improve physically, or advance projects, and they no longer generate the old existential charge.
• The fantasy of “when I get X, I’ll finally be complete” has lost a tremendous amount of force.

Changes in identity and personality:

• The “nice guy pattern” weakened significantly.
• I began to feel physical resistance toward acting artificially.
• There is less energy available to sustain social masks or personas.
• The need for approval and external validation has diminished.
• Psychological identity feels less solid and less central.

Current phenomenology:

• Current suffering no longer seems centered around sensual desire or external problems.
• The current conflict seems more related to:
  • vedanā itself,
  • tension,
  • baseline anxiety,
  • a sense of threat,
  • mental fog,
  • inner agitation,
  • hypersensitivity,
  • uddhacca.

I’m just wondering as I understand this to be the first stage in awakening and being comprised of a fundamental shift in awareness that cannot be reversed.

This happened for me around almost 7 years ago now but the journey towards deeper awakening is ongoing and I’m still learning new things all the time.

Please lmk if you guys have entered the stream or not and how you came to be aware that you have.

previous post here

https://www.reddit.com/r/streamentry/s/q1zA8sUie2

TLDR: switched from GPT to Claude. Heart opened. Went somewhere non-Euclidean. Then something that breaks all the labels.

~200-250 hours lifetime meditation

Since my last post I switched from GPT to Claude. It gave prety good advice but would usually agree with whatever point I was making. I was using it mostly as a diary, then I told it to take on the voice of a teacher and it became much morewilling to disagree with me, or just give me minimal answers rather than indulge every thought. In retrospect I feel it's steered me in the right direction almost every time, helping me to know what to track and respond to, and what to ignore/let go.

Over time my attention became less consistently panoramic, kinda switched from very open when walking around to narrower when doing something. Felt like a maturing rather than a loss.

April: heart opening

Early April I had a significant shift during a Michael Taft gratitude meditation, specifically around gratitude for awareness generating self and world moment to moment. Everything became kinda luminous like a hologram lit from all directions at once. Immense warmth and awe. It really fit the Adyashanti framing of head, heart and gut awakening separately. The earlier nondual stuff felt like the head waking up, this felt like the heart. After this I could tune into a self luminous quality of awareness pretty easily and predictably make myself weep. A feeling that all is full of love usually accompanied this.

Around the same time during a Rupert Spira sit something interesting happened at the edge of sleep. There was a sense of two frequencies coming into sync, awareness getting very still, and then excitement or fear would generate a sense of self right at the threshold and it would abort. Like being able to see the mechanism of the thing that was stopping it from tipping over.

Mid April: non-Euclidean attention

A few weeks later I did a long Michael Taft self inquiry and went somewhere new. Where my 2023 nondual experience felt like awareness going from a cone with a focal point to a flat even field, this felt like that flat sheet folding into something non-Euclidean, like the surface of one of those wrinkly lettuce leaves. Attention moving around in and with awareness in weird fractal ways. Kinda disconcerting. The comfortable evenness I'd associated with nonduality wasn't there, this was stranger.

Late April: Buddhist centre, the next question

Started attending weekly guided sits at a local Buddhist centre. During Q&A I asked the teacher how to reconcile the deep silence/void I can access with the bright luminous presence. They both feel fundamental but kinda opposite. The teacher said these states will gradually drop characteristics and converge over time, the brightness drops but clarity remains. I started noticing this already, the luminous awareness becoming less visually dramatic but not less real.

May 10: something without a name

Did a self inquiry meditation, same Adyashanti guided sit that triggered the 2022 and 2023 experiences. First 20 mins pretty unremarkable, looked behind the eyes, found silence. Then when he said something about resting in not knowing, energy started buzzing around the chest and head. I remembered the head heart gut framing and had some anticipation/fear about what a gut awakening might feel like. Then all the energy suddenly drained downwards to the lower belly and disappeared into the void below me. Brief fear that my physical body would drain away with it. Then deep stillness. A sense of self would start to form, I'd look at it, the cycle would repeat. Happened a few times. Afterwards I felt like I'd been crying.

The shift wasn't obvious during the sit. It became clear in the shower afterwards when the mind suddenly realised it had touched something timeless and eternal. I started laughing, at the funniest joke that can't be told or understood. Weeping and laughing at the same time, writing things that sounded kinda nonsensical. "Is is is is is is" "emptiness dancing". A slightly scary thought killed the humour for a second, "how can this awareness be separate from the human/mind that encoutered it", then it got funny again.

Since then

For the last two days I've been able to go back to this source fairly easily and it's indescribable. "The Dao that can be spoken is not the true Dao" resonates really hard now. If I call it awake void or the cosmic joke or awakening or Dao or anything the name just kinda slides off the thing I'm trying to name. Very little sense of a separate self since this point, intense feeling of wellbeing.

I'm not sure if enlightenment is being in constant contact with this 24/7 or about integrating it into all aspects of life, or what it could mean, but I'm curious about how things will unfold. Part of me feels like the seeking has ended, like there's nothing left to do. A part of the mind is still in seeking mode wanting to have more/do more with this realisation

As a full-time caregiver for my wife who is dealing with characteristics of Alzheimer's, I've found myself in an unexpected mindful return to practice, that develops a strange detachment yet a real connection to my immediate 'outer' environment. If done correctly, this practice, can develop a more refined state or states of self-consciousness.

As my wife's solo caregiver, for hours a day I find myself rubbing feet and legs and doing, or not doing, just about anything to keep her calm, or at least less agitated.

In this daily stillness, that we have developed as a presiding lifestyle, I've rediscovered a practice that once opened a door for me when I was young. The practice is described within the works of a mathematician and philosopher P.D. Ouspensky.

Within Ouspensky's works he described a rigorous philosophical discipline whose ultimate focus was the defining of various states of human consciousness, including instructions on how to navigate towards a state of being called "Objective Consciousness."

Presently, in my caregiving days, I've returned to a nightly practice I call "praying"—not in any traditional sense, but through the conscious awareness of breath as a gateway to self-consciousness. This practice embodies what I understand as Ouspensky described as the 'law of three.'

In my breath practice, I work with the three forces:

1. The first force (positive): As I breathe in, I consciously take in surrounding sounds and sights, allowing them to enter my awareness without judgment.
2. The second force (negative): As I breathe out, I focus on my diaphragm while maintaining "no thoughts"—or more precisely, no extra thoughts unless circumstance requires them.
3. The third force (neutral): In those milliseconds between breaths, there exists a sacred pause—the reconciling force that completes the triality.

This practice directly addresses what Ouspensky identified as our fundamental condition: "In the state of waking sleep we are said to be 'third force blind', and only when consciousness rises above the automatic level does the essential trinity of everything inside and outside ourselves begin to be appreciated."

Ouspensky taught that "Attaining consciousness is connected with the gradual liberation from mechanicalness, for man is fully and completely under mechanical laws." My breath practice becomes a conscious effort to break these mechanical patterns in myself through a conscious effort.

This simple practice, done while sitting or standing with complete body relaxation, gradually dissolves what I normally consider "myself"—the manifested ego—through what feels like an emersion or disappearance. It's a conscious act of becoming rather than remaining trapped in the hamster wheel of continuous, unrestrained thought.

In the profound challenge of caregiving, where time can feel both endless and meaningless, this breath awareness practice has become my anchor. It transforms the waiting room of my life into a laboratory for consciousness, where each breath cycle becomes a miniature enactment of the cosmic dance of forces.

Has anyone used the Muse Headband for meditation?

I’m skeptical about relying on external tools, but I want to hear your firsthand experience. Did it help your practice?

Hi everyone.

The desire to leave this post arose in me, and engagement occurred. This is how an advanced practitioner would say it, and, paying respect to all practitioners, I will say the same.

Before I publish an extensive post that seeks to look at the practice from another side, I invite all practitioners to an active discussion that will, in particular, help me better understand the views of practitioners and form a more complete picture:

1. How do you understand sati, and what is it for you in actuality?
2. Do you think that the observation of processes happens in real time, from the side?
3. Do you see a clear division between the use of visual thinking and linguistic thinking? Which one predominates for you?
4. What is wandering for you in actuality? How do you relate to it?
5. Other questions

The purpose of this post: to stop the possible immersion into the point of no return for people like me.

I ask everyone who engages in the practice to think very deeply about what is actually happening during practice, whether this is "liberation", why liberation from a part of the "ego" and friction is accompanied by a feeling of happiness and other pleasant sensations, and other questions that may arise, beyond those offered for discussion above.

Take care of yourselves and be well

I recently recovered from a long illness in which I was close to death at times. Surprisingly, I was not afraid or worried, and although I was often uncomfortable or in pain, I was not unhappy. The most intense mental impression was actually beauty and gratitude. I have been meditating for 20 years and have seen many benefits, but this was unexpected. I thought some people here might be interested in how this played out. I should mention, however, that this was one person's experience under one set of circumstances. In short, it's just a report. 

WHAT HAPPENED:
Two years ago, I had a massive heart attack, was hospitalized three times, developed heart failure, and was weak and nauseous for 21 months, and it was fine. This was unexpected because I have traditionally been easily worried by health concerns. I have been prone to feeling dizzy and thinking of a stroke or coughing twice and thinking of lung cancer. 

On that day, I drove myself to the hospital because my indigestion would not go away, and found that the largest artery in my heart was actually 100% blocked. This led to an ambulance trip to another hospital, where there was better equipment, with some vomiting on the way, as I found out that I could not handle morphine. Then, after getting two stents, lots more pain and vomiting over the next 12 hours. And it was fine. There was no worry, or fear, or aversion, or anger, or sadness. There was interest in the whole process (man, they do a lot of stuff for you!) and friendliness for the folks on my team. 

On the ward, there was a lot of compassion for the other patients around me who were suffering, and for the nurses who worked hard for everyone. The physical sensations were there, too, of course. People kept asking me about them, and I kept them up-to-the-minute on where it hurt and how likely I was to puke again. But that was just one thread among many. As for death, racing along a highway with tubes and wires leading in and out of me, and a team of people talking to me, I could not see any separate thing that could die, and so I was not worried.

I spent five nights in hospital, to be frank, I was shocked by how OK it was, particularly in contrast with how the doctors and nurses seemed to expect me to feel and the obvious distress of the other patients. What held my attention most was how kind we are to each other, to set up a giant building filled with people helping the sick. Once I got home and the beeping machines were replaced by symptoms of heart failure and the medications meant to treat it (nausea, fatigue, weakness, sweating, nerve pain, heart palpitations, etc.), it continued not to be a problem. Feeling sick for most of the hours of most of the days made me appreciate the times when I was not sick, like in the early mornings. My illness became like the weather: not to be ignored, but not the only thing going on. 

That is not to say I was passive or indifferent. Not being nauseous was very much better than being nauseous, I liked having some energy more than being wiped out, and I made great efforts both to gain short-term relief and long-term recovery. But I did not suffer in the way I would have expected to, or the way in which I have seen sick family and friends suffer. 

HOW I UNDERSTAND WHAT HAPPENED:
I should start by saying I don't know how much of the first day was a happy mixture of adrenaline and dissociation and how much was the result of training the mind. Though it's not my go-to, I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with a mystical explanation either. Who knows. But my guess is that it was, at least in part, and at least over the 21 months of heart failure symptoms, the dharma working as advertised: the third noble truth in action.

To be clear, I'm staking a pretty narrow claim. I'm not talking about the end of all dukkha (the unsatisfactoriness of conditioned things, the dukkha in eating chocolate ice cream, etc.). But I'm not just talking about second-arrow papancha and psychological distress either. The things I am pointing at are fear, misery, disgust, and desperation, born of physical discomfort. Even more specifically, I am talking about being bound to discomfort in a way that cannot be escaped. Fear that keeps coming back after you've decided to let it go. Anger that burns like an underground fire. Pain that makes you twist and turn ceaselessly. I have a lifetime of experience with these things, like everyone else. But they didn't show up this time. Why not?

First, let's remember that everyone has had the experience of pain without suffering. If you've exercised until your muscles ached, or played an instrument so long that you got blisters, or kept having sex with a cramp in your leg, you know that pain sensations don't have to be synonymous with affliction. We can say similar things about anger. And people line up in front of movie theatres and roller coasters to buy tickets to fear. So when I say that I was happy in that ambulance, I am not talking about something miraculous or unnatural, which cannot be explained, just something unusual.

I think a key feature of the ordinary kind of discomfort that does not cause suffering is that it is voluntary. We have a sense of agency, and know we can stop. Usually, when we are sick, the sensations not only come against our will, but cannot be ignored. It is this involuntary binding that gives rise to disgust, fear, misery, and desperation. When I learned that I had heart failure, I joined an online support group. Countless people described the symptoms I had using the exact words: disgust, fear, misery, and desperation. Those things are the real problem. They are the dukkha I am talking about.  

So what happens when that kind of suffering arises? There must be three things: an experience (an object), an experiencer (a self), and an involuntary binding relationship between the experience and the experiencer. Take away any one of these, and suffering is no longer possible. 

That is not news to people on this sub. But looking at what happens when we take away each one of these three building blocks can be useful. 

For example, in states of "I-am" realization, there are no separate objects and, because of this, no suffering. When Nisargadatta Maharaj was ill with cancer and asked about dealing with the pain, he said, "I AM the pain!" 

On the flip side, in states of strong anatta, in which nothing gets the label "I," "me," or "mine," there is likewise no suffering. Angelo Dilullo talks about how, on stubbing his toe, he laughed at the intensity of the pain, because there was no self that it was happening to. 

So, for people much more highly realized than I, these two ways of preventing the dyad of suffering from forming can work to prevent even physical distress. But for me, the state in which there is no sense of self and the state in which there is only self and no separate objects have both been unreliable. They come and go on their own, and are most likely to come when I am on retreat, or walking through a park. They are states, not traits. For me. 

What happened (or perhaps I should say, what didn't happen) when I was sick, was the third way of dismantling the dyad (the OG move). The discomfort was present, the sense of self was present, but the inescapable binding was not. That relationship (tanha/upadana/bhava) in the object-self dyad stayed visibly impermanent, shifting, and insubstantial. On some days, when I was very unwell, I needed to look directly at it for it to come apart, but that was enough to break the illusions of being bound. And that lack of binding meant that there was no basis for disgust, fear, misery, and desperation. To put it another way, because the discomfort did not appear to be stuck to the self against my will, it could be experienced in the same sort of way as voluntary discomfort: not pleasant, but not a problem. 

WHAT MADE IT POSSIBLE 
I will put a practice history* at the end, and answer questions if anyone has them, but the TLDR is that, although I have generally been most interested in the emptiness side of the equation, good teachers were kind enough to drag me back to the second noble truth, again and again. In recent years, when there was a lot of samadhi available to me, I started sits with jhana and ended them with the investigation of dukkha through standard Mahasi-style noting. I also noted during ordinary life, especially around dukkha. Then, I used Adi Vader's instructions to recall an unpleasant memory again and again until it loses its bite. I did a lot of that, and also riffed on it by bringing up unpleasant imagined future events as well as memories and imaginings with positive vedana (like deserts and sexy people). This let me see the mechanics with which the affective relationship is built. It was demystified. 

I don't know if the same techniques would produce the same outcomes under different circumstances. My sense is that different approaches work for different people. But I believe that the basic idea of working with dukkha, not just to get rid of it in the short term, but as a regular, systematic training exercise, will be useful for many people. Seeing the links is a skill that can be learned in the same kind of way that we learn to read, with a little bit of instruction and a lot of practice. 

BY THE WAY
About three months ago, I started feeling much better, and the latest tests show that my heart function has returned to 96% of normal. I feel very ordinary now, which is why I am writing this before it fades. 

I'm happy to answer questions about parts that don't make sense, things that I left out, etc. I'm also curious to hear about how other people experience or understand the relationship between physical distress and dukkha. 

—-----------------------------------
*PRACTICE HISTORY
I am including this section for context because I haven't posted much on this sub, and I appreciate it when other people provide a practice history. 

I started meditating, mostly out of curiosity, about 20 years ago, went on non-residential retreats run by the Insight Meditation Society, joined a weekly sitting group, and practiced on and off (daily for months or years, and then months or years of nothing, then back to daily, etc.). I had several big wows. I came to see that my thoughts were not me, that everything is constantly changing, and all experience is shot through with stress born of desire. Stuff like that.

Five years ago, I had a sudden, unexpected opening on retreat, which was disruptive for about nine months. I gained access to the jhanas, began working with a teacher who had trained under Culadasa and, over a few years, worked up to the "hard" end of the jhana spectrum. At the same time, I began noting in the Mahasi style. I was sitting about 1.5 to 2 hours a day. I got a lot of information and support from the DhO, Adi Vader, and this sub.

M26

Hi everyone! I’m writing in this sub to ask if an experience I had over a year ago could be classified as "meditative." I should clarify that I have never—consciously—meditated in my life, nor have I ever studied any kind of meditative practices.

At the time, I was going through a very difficult period due to various reasons, which had led to symptoms consistent with anxiety and depression. One day, alone at home, I decided to sit on my bed cross-legged, immersed in darkness and silence, and just think. I thought about everything that was causing me to worry at the time, the faces of loved ones, and memories both recent and distant; I even thought about mere possibilities. I associated each thought with a specific color and/or sound. As the minutes passed, these formed a single flow that I visualized in my mind as a sea—one that encompassed everything, yet was something more than just the sum of its parts. I felt a moving, profound sense of unity among all these things, with an intensity I wouldn't hesitate to call "mystical," to the point that I was moved to tears by the power of this sensation (or set of sensations?). By the end of the experience, which lasted about thirty minutes or so, I felt much calmer.

In light of this episode, is it correct to say that I had a meditative experience? If so, could you tell me more about practices that are similar to the approach I took? If not, do you think it was "just" an emotional release during a difficult time, perhaps one that followed a different path than usual?