Nikolai's Practice notes, Phase .2.

Phase .1. kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/36...lai's+Practice+Notes

This is my new practice notes thread. New phase, new thread: I love you all!

I look forward to it...

So a new thread, new phase. Hmmmm, I haven't got much to say about what one should and should not do on this wondrous path we are all on, so I will just talk about what is happening in my daily sittings without holding back. I'll leave the hard hitting Dharma for others to do so well and I'll just drop in with a Here! Here!

So, what have I been doing? My sits have been just sitting. By that I mean just sitting. No intention, no willing the mind to do something. There is no need. It just wants to "sit".

And what happens when I sit. Well, the mind is just still, so still and around it, the chaos and pandemonium of all the phenomena arising and passing away. I've used the analogy of a chorus of voices yelling to be heard all at once but no-one there to answer them. that is what it feels like, especially during an obvious dark night, which now are kind of different to the dark nights from before. They are mostly physical with fragmented thoughts of a negative nature, but fragmented, in a sense they seem to arise as embryos and pass away as embryos. They seem not to hatch out and grow if I am just sitting and staring from this ever present calm. In fact this is how it seems when I am just walking around being normal.

I am getting a lot of heaviness in my stomach region for some reason. I might have to blame the dhal I made , hehe, but it feels very much chakra related as it is a very heavy energetic rumbling there. It will occasionally make it's way up the body to the third eye. When it hits the crown, it is a flow of pleasantness there. And as I continue to just "sit", the calm , calm mind that watches, becomes lighter and I get the wellspring of joy bubbling to the surface at the chest...then a fruition that seems overly physical and strong , meaning the before and after feel so very within the brain. A tensing of something physical there felt so very clearly. And it feels so smooth. I find I can will the mind to hold it somewhat...and it "feels" like the lights go out for more than a second but I am not sure. I feel a blast of subtle bliss waves spread throughout the body. So calming and like a blanket of warm.

Sitting like this in the morning for over 40 minutes. Then suddenly a thought arises...."The jhanic arc?"....I sense a curiosity to see how the jhanas now feel. The mind is directed to the Witness state....so easy now....and the 1st jhana pops up immediately...and the ride takes me up to the 13th jhana and back down...they seem stronger, more pleasant than previously. There is no hindernce in the mind....things, thoughts arise that may have previously had the mind get all "sticky" and affect the experience, but now those thoughts or feelings arise and hold no authority over the mind, no status to push the mind around. They arise and pass away like cigarette smoke, so amazing how this occurs. But it allows the mind to experience each jhana as it truly is without manipulation, without getting sidetracked. Amazing! I come back down the arc, feeling like the mind is just extremely powerful and this leads to the thought of what one could do with such a powerfully concentrated mind.....haha, the harry potter/child within raises it's head and the thought..."Siddhis?"....

"Now is a great time to do something about this curiosity, no?" And past lives comes up as a thought...I am curious now....I rise up to the 13th jhana and resolve to remember my "last life"...hehe....nothing happens....I have another thought occur..."Why not do this the traditional way?"...Ok, I come out of jhana and resolve to remember my last life and for the mind to do what it must to go there, I rise to the 4th jhana and allow the mind to do what it wants. Now, I have never experienced a siddhi before so I have no idea if they exist or not.

What happened next could well be the mind just willing for something to happen as some of us know how, post-path, the mind gets extremely good at resolving to experience things. Images of a person or scene flash by so fast in the mind, I can't pick out exactly what it is. But I see flashes of people, faces indistinguishable faces....but for a fraction of a moment, so fast.....and in succession. I come out of the sit after an hour or so with my curiosity peaked. Maybe there was something going on there, maybe not. But worth exploring. The Harry Potter within is satisfied for the moment.

What else? ...walking around, just being with my fiancee, watching television, doing normal stuff, doing stuff I always wanted to do, taking salsa dance lessons...yeh! But always with the ever-present awareness that things are now different and oh, so much better. I feel a great storehouse of karma/habitual tendencies to get through though...so there is plenty of work or things to observe.

Love this place! Metta to all!

As I mentioned on the jhanic arc thread, I am amazed that you could talk through that video. So I need to ask, instead of whipping up and down the arc, can you now lock into a particular jhana and stay there indefinitely? Treat it like a more "classic" absorption state where you are...uh...absorbed?

"As I mentioned on the jhanic arc thread, I am amazed that you could talk through that video. So I need to ask, instead of whipping up and down the arc, can you now lock into a particular jhana and stay there indefinitely? Treat it like a more "classic" absorption state where you are...uh...absorbed?"

Hi Tom,

Yes, I can do that. At least from 1st path I have had the ability to dwell in a superficial state for each jhana as you witnessed in those videos. I can go deeper and get even more absorbed if I just will the mind to do so. But I don't often get the urge to do so, so I don't. When I played around recently with the desire to "witness a past life" (I don't know if one can yet or if past lives exist- all specualtive still), I resolved to do so but also resolved to let the mind do what it wanted in order to do so. Then I let go of the resolution, no intention arising, and the mind just went deep into 4th jhana, real deep, where the sounds, outer distractions disappeared and it was a very, very absorbed state. And that is where I had flashes of extremely brief images. That is probably what you are asking about, right?

I've been experimenting with fruitions lately. They seem different to the past path fruitions. I've been calling them up for each characterisitic and for each path to see the differences. I will now try and explain them and would love for anyone else to comment on the differences.

The anicca door:

1st path: The fruition occurs at the crown. There is a very slight movement backwards or forwards of the head when this occurs. The eyes "seem" to tense slightly at the entrance and they get slightly tenser as the cessation moment approaches and a point directly below the crown within the brain feels like it is tensing too. The cessation moment occurs, and then the exit feels like the eyes and that spot within the brain below the crown release the flexing/tensing sensation. It feels like the bliss wave that follows is felt more at the heart spot. Or maybe the bliss wave seems to be activating it...Hmmm.

2nd Path: The difference between this fruition and the 1st path one is slight. It feels like the same process above but "smoother" and less obvious tensing occuring at the eyes and crown spot. Hmmm, hard to tell. The bliss wave seems to be more spread out than 1st path and I sense it covering more the whole front of the torso in and out.

3rd path: Ok, so it seems it's a similar process to above but there seems to be a longer period of the entrance tensing moment with the eyes and that pressure point below the crown tensing for a second longer than the previous fruitions Interesting, I am not sure if it is because I am having heaps of frutions one after the other trying to see the differences, so maybe this is influencing my descriptions...but the bliss wave feels more full bodied than 1st and 2nd path anicca fruitions.

Now: This fruition feels like the tensing is replaced by a surge of energy at the crown which feels like it is coming down through the crown from above. For some reason it feel "deeper" and "cleaner". There is a push downwards movement from the crown down to the spot below the crown, cessation moment then release and it feels like the bliss wave goes upwards and downwards through the body and up out the crown. It seems at the releasing of this "energetic push downwards" of the exit experience after the cessation moment, there is a more powerful bliss wave than the previous fruitions and feel like it is full bodied but also around the body if this makes sense...more encompassing. I'm actually finding it hard to spot the obvious differences so I may edit my descriptions at a later period.

The cessation moment for all these fruitions is an unknown event. I can't remember what happens there just the entrance and exit experience.

I'm gonna have a rest before I do the other two doors as I feel a little too blissed out......to be continued....

Thats what we call a high class problem Nick ; ) too much bliss I better go lie down. haha I will do the same experiement and post any finding whever I can motivate myself to care about fruitions again. haha I think I am more interested in learning to cultivate Niroda... that s--- put my out last night. Did you try the giving of metta before you went to bed? I think that is a real cool simple exercise...

Crap, I forgot! I will do that tonight! Nirodha is on my list of things to experiment with. Also, something possibly new...so I can call up a fruition whenever I want through any door of any path, and I, just out of curiosity, called up a fruition through all the doors at once.....had a really different experience which I will talk about eventually.....to be continued...

Your a tease Nick... give us the dirty details

Brilliant! Shinzen young talking about being enlightened:

Continued from above..

The anatta door

1st path: Ok, so for this door it feels like it's all happening at the 3rd eye spot. There is tensing of the eyes at the entrance of the cessation moment. And other tensing is happening behind the 3rd eye an inch or so behind instead of the crown. The tensing seems to be a "pulling inwards" of something physical there. The bliss wave seems to spread downwards from the 3rd eye and seems to activiate the heart area so I feel blissful vibrations mostly there.

2nd path: Hmmm it seems that it is the same process as 1st path but now the tensing seems to be a little more intense and stronger. And the tensing moment at the third eye seems to last slightly longer than the 1st path tensing. The bliss wave feels more wide spread down the body than 1st.

3rd path: There is a difference here in the way the entrance occurs compared to the 2nd. It feels like there is more of an energy surge felt around my eyes than in the 2nd which seems to be moving towards the 3rd eye spot. Hard to explain this difference. And the tensing feeling at the entrance feels again, slightly more drawn out than 2nd path. Again, the bliss wave seems more diffuse throughout the body, in and out.

Now: Wow, this one now feels so much more...hmm...more blissful for some reason. It's like the the whole body is feeling an energy surge towards the 3rd eye spot. And it feels more like an energy surge than tensing. However there is still a slight tensing but seemingly less than the other paths. And the bliss wave floods the whole body and feels much more blissful and "stronger". The cessation moment "seems" to linger longer but i am not sure....it just seems like it does, perhaps due to the more obvious full body bliss wave. The mind seems to reboot for a few more mind moments longer than the previous fruitions after cessation.

I'm up for another rest.. Oof!

Ok let's finish this fruition explanation before I forget about ever doing it again. I seem to be going through a very long insight cycle (longer than others so far) And I am experiencing an amazing amount of vibrational activity in the stomach and solar plexus more than I have ever experienced in my life. Seems like they've got some "unblocking" to do. Anyway, they seem to set off all sorts of negative thought patterns which arise and persist for the shortest time ever, several seconds max if i am just watching. I caught myself going along with one thought of being annoyed for about 10 seconds and when I realised what was going on, the thoughts just evaporated immediately. This is an amazing development. The "letting go" is so natural and automatic. Amazing! I still feel a chorus of fragmented thoughts seemingly trying to break through and stick at the moment, and a really, really strong gurgling energy at the stomach under the navel within. It really is heavy and unpleasant but the mind just watches it. So amazing without the "stickiness".

Ok, let's finish the fruitions thingy before I forget...hehe! Strange indifferent mind..

The dukkha door

1st path: At the entrance: There is a slight pulling up sensation "just" below the crown. The eyes seem to tense and almost cross inwards . There is a tension just below the crown that is released and relaxed after the cessation moment at the exit.
The "pulling up" tensing sensation at the crown is what makes this one different from the rest.

2nd path: The entrance experience of "pulling up" at the crown, seems to be slightly drawn out compared to 1st path. The bliss wave spreads throughout the body.

3rd path: The tensing feels more like a an energy surge downwards at the same time as some sort of "physical" sensation of "pulling up".The bliss waves are much, much more spread out throughout the body and a bit more obvious than that previous fruitions. It feels like the energy surge travels downwards down the back of the head to the top of the spine, then the cessation moment, and then when the mind comes back online, that energy surge seems to have travelled all the way down the body "letting loose" a very nice wave of blissfully subtle vibrations.

Now: Ok, so it is very similar to the 3rd path dukkha fruition but now the downward "surge" of energy is stronger and wider in that it feels like it encompasses the whole top of the head as it travels down. It is hard to feel if there is the subtle tensing under the crown but it seems much more relaxed than in the previous fruitions. The eyes are still tensing somewhat like they tense and look inwards in the 8th jhana. The bliss wave is really full-bodied and much, much more "blissful" than the previous fruitions.

Again this might be cos i have just soaked myself in bliss waves after 20 odd fruitions in a row.....time for another rest.

But before I rest, out of curiosity, and because the thought just occurred, I decided to see what happened when i called up a fruition through all the three doors at once. So I just resolved for one to happen like this in 5 seconds....5 seconds later, I get this tremendous surge of energy that encompasses the whole head, the crown and third eye at once and a cessation moment in the middle of that big surge of energy which seems to flow down and up at the same time, but it is hard to tell what is happening there. My head trembled somewhat when this happened. Doing it again just now and it feels like energy is shooting up the spine at the entrance to the cessation and meeting up with the surge of energy which "seems" to be coming downwards from the crown or just building up in the middle of the brain moving outwards encompassing all the brain. My jaw moves or tenses slightly at the entrance experience. Then the cessation moment , then the release of all the tensing and energy and then an experience very similar to the after effects of nirodha samapati. The mind is blissed out and takes slightly longer to come back online.

Now back to being indifferent and quite blissed out.

Man, didn't you see Ghostbusters? NEVER CROSS THE STREAMS!

"Man, didn't you see Ghostbusters? NEVER CROSS THE STREAMS!"


Hehe..I feel a little "stoned" at the moment and that made me laugh out loud! Who ya gonna call?

I like these postings. Very interesting research being done here Nick... good on ya...

Thanks for laying out all this info on the fruitions. This is stuff you just can't find anywhere except this awesome site.

I should probably mention that experiences of fruitions is probably gonna vary considerably. Each yogi might experience it different to how i describe what I experience. For me, they are primarily physical experiences and I don't get any visualizations or much mental phenomena. Although at 1st path, the fruitions were always followed by a burst of pinky-red flashes seen through the eyelids and mind's eye. But that doesn't happen that often now, but still occurs more so with the pure abode jhanas.

Since I feel that the whole insight disease dilemma has been solved, I am filling my meditation time with either just sitting and observing whatever is going on in the body or exploring new stuff. Generally I do it in that order. The curiosity to explore occurs usually after I have been just sitting for 40 minutes doing nothing. I have had a lot of curiosity come up for the sidhhis/powers and I have been actively trying for astral projection but nothing yet, as well as remembering past lives but that hasn't given much except for flashes of indistinguishable images.

I have always been honest about what I have been doing, and I will still do so for the sake of recording it for the inspiration and benefit of anyone who reads it. Hopefully none of what I write is out of line and if Kenneth or anyone thinks so, please tell me and I'll stop no probs.

Well.... since you've brought it up I'd say don't forget to live your actual life, Nick. So yes, there are cool fruitions, cessations, jhanas and other neat stuff to explore. But that's all a sideshow that to my way of thinking shouldn't replace knowing what you really are and living an awakened life with your fellow human beings. When we wake up we wake up to something. What is that thing? What's the focal point of our life?

Hehe...I should also say I am on holidays for another two weeks with the apartment to myself and nothing to do but explore and sit. My fiancee gets home and I'm all hers. I'm sure as soon as the next semester starts, I'll forget all about this stuff, but for now I am Indiana Jones with a new wip and fedora and I feel like discovering the arc of the convenant, the holy grail and that weird amazonian idol thingy.
Hahah! Chris, yes, we wake up to the freedom to be ourselves without all the miserable suffering that perhaps made us suffer and others suffer too, and that makes for being much nicer than before with my fellow human beings. But I am home alone all day with just a pet hedgehog to keep me company. Let me have some fun, dad!