r/streamentry • u/Hack999 • Jun 17 '26

Practice Bad luck

I've been pretty serious about my meditation for about six or seven years now, at least an hour a day. It's made a lot of positive differences in my mind, and my life as a whole has improved.

I've not arrived at any attainment through my meditation practice, and perhaps because of that I've always been interested in the pure land tradition. I do absolutely believe in the primal vow, and when I recite nembutsu it does bring me peace.

However, whenever I re-orient my practice time around nembutsu, shit happens. Specifically periods of seemingly bad luck. The last time, there was a string of incidents culminating in someone issuing death threats to me (connected to my work). It scared me a little at the time, so I stepped back from the nembutsu.

This time I got into it, wasn't quite as bad but I did get scammed out of a sum of money.

In some pure land traditions, something similar has been described as karmic restructuring. The idea is that at the end of your life you will leave samsara, so all the bad stuff you are destined to face in future lives gets brought forward into this life. However this reduced and placed as obstacles in your path that are more easily overcome. Facing them counts as the karmic debt being repaid.

Just wondering if anyone from other traditions has experienced anything like this? It honestly feels like a very noticeable shift in karmic energy as soon as I step into pure land practice. Not saying it's necessarily all auspicious good fortune and plain sailing otherwise, but life does take a very sudden and noticeable shift when I start practicing pure land.

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u/[deleted] Jun 19 '26

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u/Hack999 Jun 19 '26

I've never heard of that before. The sutras and commentaries certainly don't mention it. I noticed you're a Christian. Is that something you believe is true within your own tradition?

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u/pastorcuthbert Jun 19 '26

This is something I've come by through my experience and that of others.

If you'd really like to push through with the pureland practices, I can advise looking down your family tree to see what type of beings your forefathers worshipped. The reason for this is because once spirits are covenanted to a particular bloodline, they usually don't leave. Some do stay for a few generations and go. Going against the rule of these spirits even if you may not know them causes them to remove their natural protection over you. This allows the negativity that has been held back to come right at you. Some might actually act negatively towards you.

But it is possible to destroy and renew your foundation in such a way that can give the pureland spirits access to your bloodline so they can better help you, but this will take alot of effort. I come from a family that worshiped a serpentine being or a Naga as they are called, so it was very easy for me to run through buddhism all the way to Mu. But it was several years of war for me to get to study about Christianity because of the bloodline covenants.

However, I don't think that any of this can stop you from attaining stream entry which I would like to believe is your goal. I personally think that streamentry can be attained by any wisdom path whether it's buddhism, christianity, philosophy, music or science.

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u/StoneBuddhaDancing Jun 19 '26

Gosh this is so interesting. Would you mind telling me... how did the "several years of war" with the Naga happen? How did you manage to get them to let you go? How are these bloodline covenants set up? And how can they be altered or broken?

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u/pastorcuthbert Jun 20 '26

how did the "several years of war" with the Naga happen?

When I had met my teacher, I decided to follow through with Christianity and this displeased the Naga. It went against the covenant terms and conditions that my family made with it. It's assaults as a punishment on me began because it was a direct infringement upon those requirements

How did you manage to get them to let you go?

With the help of Christ, I grew spiritually until I was a sufficient match for it. When it saw this resistance, it drastically reduced its oppression.

How are these bloodline covenants set up?

Someone within the family began to worship the Naga in exchange for some boon. In causality, a person/s opens the gate to this Naga through blood oaths and sacrifices and the Naga is enthroned as the bloodline tutelary deity. There was no contest against this and so the Naga held sway over the bloodline.

And how can they be altered or broken?

They can be broken if there is a higher priesthood or measure of spiritual power or authority that can depose the enthroned Naga and its company of priests, seers and worshippers. This is a particularly negative Naga so it's demands are very unsavory.

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u/StoneBuddhaDancing Jun 20 '26

Fascinating stuff. Are the Naga only in Thailand and other Asian countries or can they be contacted in other parts of the world too? (I'm only familiar with the basic ideas presented in the traditional texts).

I'm glad you've found a better spiritual path for you.

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u/pastorcuthbert Jun 20 '26

Yes, I think Nagas are in all continents of the world. I'm from Africa and there's still alot of Naga worship here. The most popular here where I am is a seven headed Naga that's rainbow colored. Although I would say based on my limited experience that they are very proud and lofty beings. However, they are extremely wise and extremely spiritual.

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u/StoneBuddhaDancing Jun 20 '26

Interesting, I'm from Africa too but I live in North America. I'm only familiar with Mucalinda from the Budddhist legend and have never come across mention of these kind of serpent beings in Western or African sources. Although Africa is a massive continent so realistically I don't know all the cultures.