follow-up to a discussion at Kenneth's NYC class

First off, I want to thank Kenneth for donating his time and effort to see those of us in NYC who are looking for some face-to-face, pragmatic dharma instructions. I think I speak for everyone involved when I say that we all find it immensely helpful in our own practice.

I have some questions that I hope Kenneth will answer, but I'll provide the context for them for readers who weren't there.

I asked Kenneth how the seventh stage of enlightenment differs from technical 4th path, and my understanding of his answer was that, at 4th path, a yogi recognizes that no phenomena are "him / her," but proprioceptive phenomena (concerning the feeling of where in space the body is) simultaneously continue to present as-if one's body is "him / her." So at 4th path, one recognizes that the appearance of phenomena-as-self is just an appearance and not a description of how things actually are, but unlike other phenomena which stop presenting as self as one attains various paths, this one remains. And naturally enough, at the seventh stage of enlightenment, proprioceptive phenomena no longer present as self.

This is my experience of states that I think are associated with stages 6-8.

Stage 6-associated: When I ask myself "where are my emotional experiences 'located'?", eventually there is a state shift where the phenomena I called "emotional experiences" localize as various pleasant / unpleasant / neutral sensations in my body, plus various kinds of vedana-free cognitive chatter concerning them. In this state there is a sense of being "grounded in the body," which is not a separate phenomenon itself, but is just how things appear when emotions and various other faux-mental objects are seen as body states. (con't below)

My attention no longer returns by default to my head or eye region, but seems to inhabit my body in a more diffuse way (i.e. bounces between whatever I'm attending to and my body-as-a-whole instead of just my head region). If I look at my hands or legs, they look somehow different, which as far as I can tell has something to do with a change in the way the visual experience of them vibrates (in particular, less emphasis on the passing-away / passed away phase of the vibration); they seem more solid than usual.

Stage 7-associated: If I stay in the stage 6-associated state and continue to focus on my body, there is another state shift where my body, as well as all my other sensory experiences, appear extremely solid (the passing away / passed away vibration phase is almost totally suppressed). Body phenomena simply appear as they are without any sort of reactive opinion about them from me, and the sense of "groundedness" both strengthens and weakers in different ways--strengthens in the sense of body phenomena seeming much more solid than in the stage 6-associated state while faux-mind states continue to be seen as body states, and weakers in the sense that the body is just there and no longer appears to be inhabited or not inhabited by me. The senses are *extremely* sharp.

For a long time I thought that this stage 7-associated state was a kind of enhanced "being present," which caused me to ask Kenneth a bunch of times in class about whether being present comes in degrees. I realize that this question was motivated by a misunderstanding of being present, as being present is simply being with whatever is occuring, and not specifically the appearance of whatever is occuring as ultra-precisely-sharp and uber-solid-seeming or attention being absolutely unwavering with respect to sensory input. It only made sense to me after I reflected on Kenneth's explanation of what stage 7 was like... (con't below)

...and tried to understand that in terms of my own relationship with proprioceptive phenomena, and the various ways that relationship could change during my attempts to ground emotions in the body and stay present.

Stage 8-associated: Simply not generating a narrative. This is independent of the two previous states, and probably independent of any path attainment or vipassana attainment altogether. It does seem that being in the stage 7-associated state makes this happen by default, and being in the stage 6-associated state makes this more likely to happen.

SOOOOOOOOOOOOO...here's the question.

It appears that the stage 7-associated state is only accessible from having immediately been in the stage 6-associated state (as if the former is built on the foundation of the latter). It seems like the stage 8-associated state can co-exist or not co-exist with either of these two other states, as well as any other state (so this stage 8-associated thing is more like a quality of other states rather than a state itself).

One thing I like to do is try to cultivate ALL THREE of these things at the same time, since the stage 7-associated state is built on the stage 6-associated state, and the stage 8-associated thing goes with them pretty well. And it's really good, especially when I get a bunch of momentum going and can keep it up for a long time. But unfortunately what has been happening is that eventually I lose the momentum for various reasons (e.g. I go to sleep and forget about it when I wake up, **** happens in everyday life that eats away at my ability to simply be with what's happening, etc.) and it all unravels. So I wonder if I'm doing something ineffective by cultivating them all together, when (according to Kenneth) the various stages build on each other in a linear way. Would be it more effective to simply, absolutely focus on the stage 6-associated state? (con't)

Is focusing on keeping up the stage 6, 7, and 8-associated states all at once doing too many things out of order for my brain to be able to figure out how to adapt? Any ideas? I sort of worry that this territory is not well charted. There are a lot of platitudes about vipassana that we can repeat, such as "just note whatever arises, don't worry about what kinds of things arise" because we *know* from collective experience that this works for people. I can repeat platitudes like that to myself, such as "just be with things as they are, to the highest degree that you can, even if out-of-order in relation to the 8-stage model" but I have no idea whether that is actually true or not, or just soothing because it's analogous to the effective platitudes about vipassana, because I obviously haven't gone through this territory before and I don't have access to any collective knowledge from people who have. So it would be great if Kenneth, who's done it, would tell me what he thinks about all this.

I also want to ask--the thing I'm identifying as a stage 7-associated state is my best guess as to what it is in relation to the 8-stage model, insofar as I understand that model from talking to Kenneth. If I'm confused about this I'd like to hear about it. Kenneth, while you were at the 5th stage of enlightenment, were you able to get into a state that you now recognize is related to the 7th stage of enlightenment, *while* you were working on attaining the 6th stage and cultivating the bodily grounding of emotions, but *before* you had attained either of them permanently?

Thanks so much!

Hi EndInSight,

Great questions and commentary!

"Is focusing on keeping up the stage 6, 7, and 8-associated states all at once doing too many things out of order for my brain to be able to figure out how to adapt?" -EndInSight

Not necessarily. It might be a very efficient vehicle. For example, if you were to ask "who am I?" while simultaneously grounding in the body, you would be killing a lot of birds with one stone. The self-enquiry naturally brings the proprioceptive sense (7th stage) into sharp focus, and you are already working at the sixth stage (mind states) by grounding emotions in the body. If you also notice whether a narrative (8th stage) is occurring, you have quite a comprehensive package. A related question would be whether any given yogi is ready to do this practice. The answer is that if this makes sense to you, you are ready.

"Kenneth, while you were at the 5th stage of enlightenment, were you able to get into a state that you now recognize is related to the 7th stage of enlightenment, *while* you were working on attaining the 6th stage and cultivating the bodily grounding of emotions, but *before* you had attained either of them permanently?" -EndInSight

I wasn't able to identify the 6th stage as the place I needed to work until after I had completed the 5th. And I wasn't able to clearly feel the pain of the proprioceptive subsystem of selfing (7th stage) until I had completed the 6th. Finally, I wasn't able to clearly see the need for working at the 8th stage until I had completed the 7th.

But that may just be because nobody pointed it out to me in advance...

For you, I wouldn't rule anything out. My students consistently make much more efficient progress than I would ever have thought possible had I not seen it with my own eyes.

Thanks for your feedback.

Do you recognize my descriptions of the suppression of part of the phases of vibrations when you look at your own current experience (or reflect on past experiences related to cultivating these states), or is that completely idiosyncratic?