Interesting and puzzling thread. To Kenneth's original statement ("As long as you draw breath, there is dukkha. It's not because you are doing it wrong.") my response is: Sure, and? The last part ("To misunderstand this is to misunderstand Buddhism.") doesn't concern me much. An outcome of my practice is that I don't care much about practice, and less about Buddhism or what the old guys in India meant. The pragmatic part of pragmatic dharma meant I never had to care much about that; the framing of contemplative *practice* as a technology for awakening absolves me from having to figure out Truth, Nibbana, or anything else that might be capitalized. Looking at Kenneth's list of negative emotions, I experience all of them (except perhaps for hatred because that's a strong one and I'm a mellow person). I always have and practice has not changed that. In fact, one of the significant benefits of meditation was in becoming *more* aware of the vast ever changing spectrum of emotional experience. That includes anger, irritation, anxiety, annoyance, boredom, but also joy, gratitude, humor, happiness. I love the Bill Hamilton quote, "suffering less, noticing it more".
While Thervada Buddhism is not more sacred to me than any other isms, I recognize and appreciate that the framework I've practiced within, thanks primarily to Kenneth and Daniel Ingram, was heavily based on the Mahasi tradition along with other influences and many unique contributions from the Kenneth and Daniel. I'm especially grateful for the progress of insight as a structure that takes you through the entire spectrum of experience including challenging parts. At this point though, I hardly think about it. I'm not interested in eliminating emotion, defining enlightenment, figuring out what the Buddha meant, thinking of my self as an awakened guy on some big journey. What have I become?
I'm still interested in experience, though. Joy, excitement, embarrassment, remembering, gratitude, smiling, amusement, loneliness, sadness, coolness, pressure, listening, gratitude, happiness, heaviness...