New York Times article about Daniel Ingram, Stream Entry, and the Path - Discussion
Fitter Stoke:
"This is great--it's so much better that the meditator doesn't get stream entry. I like that he fails, and that the teacher is disappointed [...] Does this mean I am enlightened?"
That one is my favorite. Describes the Western dharma experience perfectly.
Doesn't it just? I swear at one place here in the UK the teacher would likely faint at the temerity of even suggesting stream entry as a serious goal!
Bagpuss The Gnome:
Fitter Stoke:
"This is great--it's so much better that the meditator doesn't get stream entry. I like that he fails, and that the teacher is disappointed [...] Does this mean I am enlightened?"
That one is my favorite. Describes the Western dharma experience perfectly.
Doesn't it just? I swear at one place here in the UK the teacher would likely faint at the temerity of even suggesting stream entry as a serious goal!
If the comment had said, "I like that he fails, and that the teacher is happy," it would have been a perfect fit.
I used to sit with a group of people at someone's house nearby. They were all very nice, and the couple who owned the place was gracious enough to allow people, some of them strangers, to use their home as a practice space for a full day of silent meditation. And so I would try to remind myself of this, over and over, when the spirit of defeatism was especially thick, which it often was.
Everyone was really sickly looking: pale to the point of being translucent. And at the end, when it was time to share the results of the day's practice, there were nothing but reports of being tired, being sad, being defeated, and being "okay" with all of that.
I'm not proud of this, but when it was my turn to share, I would just lie and say, "Nothing really to report. It was great to share today with you all. Namaste," even if I had just accessed whatever jhanas and gotten a fruition so strong it nearly picked me up off the cushion.
The guy running it once said, "We've all been doing this for years now, and we know we're not going to see anything new" - and he said it as something positive. I'm almost certain no one in the room was above the A&P.
The culture is really about celebrating being frail, celebrating sucking, celebrating failure. I saw the same thing at a major retreat center (a center which I'm sure all these people have been to many times). If you come out and say, "I did these practices like this, these were the results, I got into these states, and I've passed through these stages," you're going to be ostracized. Anything other than, "I failed, and that's super," is going to be treated as suspect.
For some reason I was under the impression that things were not this bad in the UK.
Fitter:
Most of the people writing those comments - as well as most of the hyperpsychologized dharma tourists at the retreat centers - aren't going to get interested in the stuff we're doing, will continue to buy Buddha figurines, will continue to titter when someone mentions "enlightenment" or "stream-entry", and will continue with their "namastes". It won't make any difference.
Had I been drinking coffee, Id now be wiping it off the screen heh!
Fitter:
What's exciting is the thought of an entirely new generation getting turned on to serious meditative and contemplative technologies, putting those to use in a serious way, and adding their results to the ongoing experiment we've got going on.
Agreed. Though I'd like to see more people publishing results from other techniques as well as noting.
Fitter:
At the moment, the majority of people doing that are pretty adventurous and don't mind being on the fringes of things (and may even enjoy that aspect of it). But might the kind of stuff we're doing here one day be as mainstream as something like MBSR or "mindfulness"? Maybe. I doubt most people would have expected to see this practice mentioned anywhere in the NYT, ever. So who knows what's possible?
The mindulness/MBSR route really is the kind of thing it will take. Plain language, easily taught, supported etc. Minus the dogma. Unfortunately it will take more than a loose committee of enlightened folks to agree terminology. It will take one brilliant spark. Shinzen Young is about the closest we currently have to that I think, but even he's not going to take it all the way I reckon. Maybe it can't be taken all the way like "mindfulness". After all, it's a bit more complex and the qualifications for teaching it a little harder to attain. (if you could do an 8wk course and get enlightened I'd have done it! heh).
Daniel might be able to do it. But we'd have to magic him a bucket load of extra time and income
Ron Crouch left a good reply:
And then there's this:
Namaste!
EDIT: Here's another great one:
The Buddha spent many years before his enlightenment visiting art museums and writing concert reviews.
The comments show how unfamiliar people are with this path being described. Some comments are referring to satori, others to loving-kindness, others to devotional service and so on. They are all like the blind man and the elephant, each describing this article in terms of the particular part of the dharma elephant they know. That is the state of the modern Buddhism though - it's not surprising.
Forget what you know about the Buddhism for a minute and take this path on its own merits. What is being described in the article is the variant of Buddhism called "insight" or "vipassana" practice. It isn't Zen, Tibetan or Metta practice, it is the predominant style of meditation taught in Southeast Asia. The vipassana path is indeed made up of states and stages. So working to attain them is not spiritual materialism - it is good solid practice, and any Sayadaw or Ajahn would laude Jeff for his hard work (though the ending was disappointing - don't give up Jeff!).
The states and stages are not the creation of Dr. Ingram. They were first written about thousands of years ago in ancient meditation manuals (check out the Vimuttimagga and Visuddhimagga if you're geeky). They were explained in a more modern fashion by Mahasi Sayadaw in this century in his manual "The Progress of Insight."
Don't fall in the trap of thinking that the "Path" is a vague kind of personal growth one enjoys by meditating or is only the way it is presented in one corner of Buddhism. Look into vipassana yourself.
Forget what you know about the Buddhism for a minute and take this path on its own merits. What is being described in the article is the variant of Buddhism called "insight" or "vipassana" practice. It isn't Zen, Tibetan or Metta practice, it is the predominant style of meditation taught in Southeast Asia. The vipassana path is indeed made up of states and stages. So working to attain them is not spiritual materialism - it is good solid practice, and any Sayadaw or Ajahn would laude Jeff for his hard work (though the ending was disappointing - don't give up Jeff!).
The states and stages are not the creation of Dr. Ingram. They were first written about thousands of years ago in ancient meditation manuals (check out the Vimuttimagga and Visuddhimagga if you're geeky). They were explained in a more modern fashion by Mahasi Sayadaw in this century in his manual "The Progress of Insight."
Don't fall in the trap of thinking that the "Path" is a vague kind of personal growth one enjoys by meditating or is only the way it is presented in one corner of Buddhism. Look into vipassana yourself.
And then there's this:
Aha, I think the truth is your experience was a complete success–because you failed! The whole point is to fail [...] So I say well done! Be well and keep failing.
Namaste!
EDIT: Here's another great one:
Advice to the public, stay away from anyone who claims to be an advanced meditation teacher... "The Arahat?". There is a reason it's called the middle path. The Buddha himself was an aesthetic before rejecting that path and the many fantastical states of mind such practice brings.
The Buddha spent many years before his enlightenment visiting art museums and writing concert reviews.
Jane Laurel Carrington:
And don't forget to be grateful for whatever karma led us to take it up and work with it, instead of blowing it off, as so many others do. I am totally, totally with you here, Fitter Stoke. I consider MCTB to be the most influential book of my entire life, and I've built my life around reading books (I know, that's twisted, but there it is). And it's awfully hard to share it with anyone, because when you try they give you "that" look, like you're some sort of cultist. But that's okay; I've got you lovely people, and that's just plain wonderful.
It'll be a lot easier to share the book once it has Andy's new cover.
No crackling ninjas here!
Fitter Stoke:
Jane Laurel Carrington:
And don't forget to be grateful for whatever karma led us to take it up and work with it, instead of blowing it off, as so many others do. I am totally, totally with you here, Fitter Stoke. I consider MCTB to be the most influential book of my entire life, and I've built my life around reading books (I know, that's twisted, but there it is). And it's awfully hard to share it with anyone, because when you try they give you "that" look, like you're some sort of cultist. But that's okay; I've got you lovely people, and that's just plain wonderful.
It'll be a lot easier to share the book once it has Andy's new cover.
No crackling ninjas here!
Hilarious.
Although, for the newly revised, "friendly" version, it should be subtitled "An Unusually Centered and Balanced Dharma Book..." Included will be a CD of guided meditations by Dan Ingram on how to "let go" of your workplace stress, accompanied by background pan flute music.
Just in case anyone's confused, I am not Jane Rainbow. 
[Actually, I go by Laurel. No idea why I felt moved to use the full name here.]
[Actually, I go by Laurel. No idea why I felt moved to use the full name here.]
I swear at one place here in the UK the teacher would likely faint at the temerity of even suggesting stream entry as a serious goal!
Go on. Tell me what that "one place" is called - I have a few suspicions!
Andy W:
Because I apparently have nothing better to do on Christmas Eve...
NICE
How to get your consciousness to stop blinking midnight.
NICE
How to get your consciousness to stop blinking midnight.
Andy W:
.......A great book for the coffee table to offer hours of entertainment when friends come round....! 
Just kidding, no disrespect intended. Actually, this book opened my eyes to the fact that it can be done in this life - so my thanks to you too Daniel and all those around you who supported you doing it.
Just kidding, no disrespect intended. Actually, this book opened my eyes to the fact that it can be done in this life - so my thanks to you too Daniel and all those around you who supported you doing it.