LESSON 4529 Fri 19 Aug 2022

MISSION BENEVOLENT UNIVERSE

WE WERE BENEVOLENT AWAKENED ONES

WE ARE BENEVOLENT AWAKENED ONES

WE CONTINUE TO BE BENEVOLENT AWAKENED ONES

Always for

Freedom, Democracy, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity

Dr Ambedkar thundered “I will make this country Prabuddha Bharat “

All Aboriginal Awakened Societies Thunder “we will make entire Universe Benevolent Awakened One Universe!

May all sentient and non sentient beings be ever happy, well and secure!

May all live long at least for 150 years with NAD pills and following Benevolent Awakened One’s teachings!

May all have calm, quiet, alert, attentive and equanimity mind with a clear understanding that everything is changing!!!

Step -by-step guide to create a physical atmosphere of All  jhanas with

similes 

A Step-by-Step Guide to Growing Peppers

https://www.thelonerider.com/2019/aug/jhanas/jhanas.shtml

In Buddha’s quest for awakenment, he reached up to the 8th Jhana but still came short of liberation.

Jhana is an altered state of consciousness while in meditative absorption.

It is one of the 8 paths in the Eightfold Path way to awakenment - Right Concentration. It comes in 9 states although it’s not very clear where one state ends and
the next begins. While there is not even an official label for these
altered states, some conventions have been established. Some say only 8
Jhanas exist. The higher Jhanas are far more subtle, it’s even hard to
explain into words. Others contend that they simply have to be
experienced to be understood. It may take years of devoted practice
before the 1st state of Jhana is realized. You cannot summon Jhana. Just
do the proper meditation with no expectation, nor having Jhana as a
goal. Jhana may or may not happen.

Jhana vs. Vipassana
My meditation background is Vipassana (as taught by SN Goenka), and there was no mention of Jhana, even though Vipassana and the Jhanas stem from Buddha. Both are powerful meditation methods but distinct from the other. Jhana is geared toward single-pointed concentration - samatha…like
concentrating on an object, the breath, picture of a guru, etc. until
everything else disappears or becomes imperceptible, except for that
object. Vipassana, on the other hand, scans the entire body for any sensation
with a calm and equanimous mind. While the first 3 days of a Vipassana
course focuses on the breath, it is not yet Vipassana but Anapana Breathing Meditation. So we can say that a 10-day Vipassana meditation course includes the practice of samatha for the first 3 days.

Same Experience but Different Labels
Further
scrutiny reveals that even though the approach is different, the
meditative states achieved are the same. Vipassana simply doesn’t put
labels on the Jhanic states or uses a different name. Example, Vipassana
calls the state where the physical body is no longer present and what’s
left is a mass of vibrations, Bhanga-ñana. This is simply called the 5th Jhana: Infinity of Space - a state of consciousness where there is no perception of a form or body.

Disclosure: I’m discussing Bhanga and Infinity of Space as I understand them from my readings. I have not experienced them…yet.

Superpowers
It is said that as a meditator goes through the Jhanic phases, superpowers
inevitably develop. Yes, it is involuntary. I’ve met serious meditators
who developed these powers in the course of practising meditation. The
powers vary from person to person. You simply cannot know what powers
develop - they just happen. But because there is great risk of inflating
the ego and losing focus on the path when you openly exhibit or talk about these powers, it is considered taboo to even talk about them, let alone show it off.

What exactly are these powers? To the newbie, it could be seeing
elementals, ghosts or spirits - much to their chagrin. To the seasoned
meditators, it could be traveling to other unearthly places or leaving the physical body. To the very advanced ones, they could see their past lives or will to terminate their existence.

It is interesting to note that in Hindu Yoga, superpowers are developed when prana (life energy) goes through the central nadi (energy channel), the Sushumna, and travels up, touching-up the rest of the chakras (energy centers) all the way up to the highest chakra, the Sahasrara on the top of the head.

9 Jhanas

1st Jhana: Pleasant Sensations
With a single-pointed concentration of the mind on a subject (there are 40 established subjects for the choosing, one of which could be the breath), you could start feeling a pleasant physical sensation which could explode into a state of ecstasy (piti)
- this is not a calm and peaceful state. The sensation could start from
a specific body part like the hands or heart center. While observing the pleasant sensation without clinging to them and keeping the stillness of the mind, the physical rapture morphs into an emotional joy (sukha).
I have met meditators who cling to this pleasant sensation and meditate
for the purpose of arriving at this joy - like a junkie in search of
his ‘fix’. He has lost the balance of his mind. Thus it is important to
observe this joy without attachment. At this point, it is important to shift the observation
from the breath to the pleasant sensation - observing the meditation
subject has already served its purpose by bringing about the rapture.
While piti and sukha are in high gear, there is still thinking and analysis lurking in the background.

2nd Jhana: Stilling the Analytical Mind
While
immersed in rapture, the meditator stills his analytical mind. Thinking
and evaluation cease. There is now pure awareness, free of
conceptualization.

3rd Jhana: Contentment
As you let go of the peaceful joy, you transition into a quiet, placid state of contentment with an alert and vigilant mind.

4th Jhana: Peacefulness
As the mind remains
equanimous without feeling anything positive or negative in the body or
mind, a deep sense of peace prevails. The joyful sensations are no
longer present.

5th Jhana: Infinity of Space
From hereon, the
altered states of Jhana are said to be “absorption without form”. The
perception of the body disappears. There is a transformation into the
heavenly realms where form is abstract. From feeling peaceful, you shift
your attention to your physical boundaries which seem to be getting
bigger and bigger until you feel everywhere.

6th Jhana: Infinity of Consciousness
When you
realize that the expansive space you occupy includes your consciousness,
you enter the 6th Jhana. As consciousness fills into infinity, you feel
one with the universe. The one-pointedness of the mind remains. This is
not yet enlightenment, even though it feels like it.

7th Jhana: No-thingness
With infinite consciousness,
you realize there is nothing within this infinity that is permanent.
Everything in it complies with the natural law of impermanence and is in
a constant state of flux.

8th Jhana: Neither perception nor non-perception
This
realm is very hard to grasp as it is so fine and subtle. It is at the
highest pinnacle of concentration that the only way to describe it is to
experience it. You let go of the nothingness of the 7th Jhana and into a
natural and calm place where you have little recognition of what’s
happening even though you still have the awareness in you. You thread
the world of perception and non-perception. Again, despite the
permeating peace and calm, this is not enlightenment.

9th Jhana: Vipassana
According to SN Goenka,
the Buddha found the 9th Jhana, and that is Vipassana - the development
of insight that will take the meditator to the ultimate goal beyond the
misery of sensory experience.

I find it interesting that other meditation teachers claim that Vipassana is a stepping stone in getting established in the practice of meditation. Stepping stone?
When Buddha reached the 8th Jhana from the most learned teachers during
his time, he was still short of enlightenment. There was no teacher
alive who could liberate him. Thus he went deep within the physical
structure of his body and gained wisdom which helped him develop
Vipassana which opened up the gateway to enlightenment. So I have to
strongly disagree that Vipassana is a beginner stepping stone.

This “stepping stone” claim was also uttered by a self-proclaimed
“Vipassana teacher” in one of his sessions. When I asked him to clarify
exactly what he meant by it, he recanted. I sat through his 1-hour
“Vipassana class” and it was anything but Vipassana. Think about it.
Authentic Vipassana in the Goenka tradition, in its most condensed form, takes 10 days. How could anyone claim to teach Vipassana in one hour?

Another Tibetan Yantra Yoga teacher I met in Dharamsala claimed the same
thing - that Vipassana is a good start in meditation but that there are
far more advanced forms of meditation. I’m not sure if he has ever done
Vipassana (in the Goenka tradition) as he is steeped in his
Tibetan Buddhism tradition. I’m familiar with Tibetan yoga retreats
conducted in a cave or remote mountain highlands which lasts 3 years, 3
months, 3 weeks and 3 days. Yes, I will agree it’s more intense, longer
and more consuming. But I disagree that Vipassana is just a good start
for the more advanced meditation modalities.

I will say that you can start a meditation practice with Vipassana, but
you can go deeper and deeper into Vipassana until you reach liberation. I
don’t think anyone can max-out Vipassana to prompt him to “move on” to
other types of meditation. My analogy is Photoshop. This program
is so user-friendly that a 5 year old can play with it. But Photoshop
has so much complexity to it that even a 30-year veteran power-user
cannot claim that he has exhausted Photoshop.

I’m not saying that Vipassana is the be-all and end-all of
meditation. There are many out there. If Vipassana doesn’t work for
you, try something else until you find one that works. Simple as that.
Just don’t make a claim or imply that Vipassana is a beginner stepping
stone in a meditation practice - that is simply wrong and misleading.

I digressed, but there are other interpretations of the 9th Jhana. Some posit it as:

Cessation
At this point, even consciousness stops. The
heartbeat slows down to a faint beating and breathing is almost nil.
It’s like a deep state of sleep. This is as close as it gets to
liberation.

Caution
Jhanic states are not
something to pursue. The more it is pursued, the more it becomes
elusive. It is best to stay focused on the goal and not be distracted by
the sensations that happen along the journey. Talking about reaching
Jhanic states is discouraged and frowned upon, but honestly, if that
happens to me, I cannot resist the temptation of writing about it.

Ending Thoughts
There was a time in my early meditation days that my focus was experiencing bhanga-nana. It was a high
I wanted to have. Of course, nothing happened. Now, it doesn’t even
appeal to me. If I can just find time to meditate and still my mind for a
few moments, I’m already happy. To this date, I can easily still my
mind in meditation, but I can’t seem to go deeper as in dissolving my
solidity and becoming a spec of consciousness. But again, I no longer
aim for it. While meditating, being at peace with myself and the planet I
live in is reward enough.

This pursuit of Jhanic states is simply intellectual adventurism for me…or a ‘nice to have’
at best. Perhaps it is best seen that way so it becomes part of a
journey but not the destination. Jhana can best be viewed as a blueprint
to enlightenment. Buddha confirms this when he said, “Jhana is the path to enlightenment”. Experience of Jhana is a validation that you’re on the right path - but you’re not there yet.