Vajra Fist

I wouldn't say that meditation per se would enable one to live longer. I know of many excellent human beings and advanced meditators who have died young from various cancers or diseases. Rob Burbea in particular is sorely missed. Similarly with taiji, excellent teachers like Ronnie Robinson and Joanna Zorya have passed from various illnesses. Heck, even Lou Reed was a dedicated practitioner of the internal arts. I would say that taiji though shortens your odds somewhat, by providing an excellent low impact exercise in older age, as well as many other physical, mental and emotional benefits that statistically have been found to contribute to longevity. But when your karmically-allotted time on earth is up, its your time to go. You do your best to live well, and cleanly, but any of us could die in a freak accident - medical or man-made, at any time. It's best not to worry about it. Over a long-enough time line, the survival rate of everyone drops to zero. The best we can do is practice wholeheartedly with what time we have left.

It's never what you think it is

I thought the same too! But it seems the area of focus is two fingers width above the navel, rather than below (a little below the solar plexus). That doesn't seem to correspond to the dantien, nor the chakra system. It seems very unusual in that respect

Thanks, it's next on my reading list. Did she compare the historical practices to what is taught in the Dhammakaya group? Is this linked in any way with the historical Ari Buddhism?

Actually, I may have been too quick to dismiss. This is a fascinating article, about the esoteric tradition within theravada, similar to vajrayana. https://tricycle.org/trikedaily/esoteric-theravada/?utm_content=buffere8d70&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer&fbclid=IwAR3vvEodpJSq7blxk9dKmEH5jZMqz4Clmk5vLeIaIMkKtYdRNNwztdl3BCQ Apparently a lot of the practices from the Dhammakaya movement stem from this tradition. Fascinating stuff https://youtu.be/M1KcXP6T6ag

Interesting analogy. According to many teachers, stream entry normally accompanies a sort of 'system crash', where the brain sort of reboots. Regarding the question of how energy works in relation to awakening - I honestly have no idea. I remember speaking to a long-time taiji teacher and advanced meditator who said that the practice of releasing physical tension in the body has a corresponding mental effect of reducing the hindrances, allowing absorption to be more readily attained. Interestingly, some teachers will say that the end goal of processes like neidan is not the same state as that reached through a lifetime of meditation. So it may not be entirely appropriate to compare one model to another.

Good question. On the traditional four path model, the general direction of travel appears to be toward a progressive lessening of the 'I'. I think the farthest we can go on that scale in this life, is the point where personality material really stops exerting any sort of influence on behaviour, and the source of action is the unfiltered action of the unconditioned mind. In that sense, having strong opinions, and an 'I'm right' attitude, would seem to me to go in the opposite direction to that. Edit - I'm acutely aware of how this opinion negates itself, namely that these opinions I experience are subject to change or disappearing entirely. They not the territory itself.

Let's see. He charges an extortionate amount for in person courses. For instance, looking on the Isha site, a three day retreat with him in June costs INR 7,93,000 ($9,400). And yet the employees of the Isha retreat centre are reportedly all volunteers. He has no spiritual training, but somehow has become enlightened - a feat that every other advanced spiritual practitioner in history with similar attainment has arrived at only after a lifetime of practice. This is because he claims he is a divine avatar. "I am 50% Shiva, who entered into me and has enlightened me on yoga and such. I don’t see a need for learning Vedas/Bhagavad Gita”. His talks are not at all profound, they're rehashed pop spiritualism, although he talks as though he's dropping pearls of wisdom. For instance: "Too many people are hungry not because there is dearth of food. It is because there is dearth of love and care in human hearts." "Love is your quality. Love is not what you do. Love is what you are." The trouble with Sadhguru is that he has become a cultural export, so will always be defended on the basis of nationalism.

Thanks for the information. I'm assuming by enlightenment you mean cessation and the final, rarified state of an arahat. Could you let me know which tradition he practiced within, how many years of training he underwent and with which teachers?

The Buddha did not enter nibbana until his death. The point is that what he taught was largely from an existing tradition. The foundational practice of samatha for instance, predates the Buddha by around two thousand years. If you are really comparing Jaggi Vasudev (sadhguru) to the Buddha, then at least please tell me where he learned the practice of having someone repeatedly whispering into your headphones the phrase: 'you are not the body, not even the mind'.

The Buddha Gautama had two main teachers, Arada Kalama and Udraka Ramaputra, both of whom verified his attainments and asked him to teach.

Teachers are necessary when you get serious about the path. * they are available to work with you one on one, and in those personal discussions can point directly to your own nature when you're lost * they genuinely care about you, and in that sense rarely charge at all, least of all excessively, and mostly through donation * they have been verified to teach by a lineage master, rather than by what they claim about their own attainments. * they fall more into the category of 'spiritual friend', as the buddha described it, rather than 'incarnation of god' If all those are true about sadhguru then I wish you well.

I think there's probably already too many people who worship 'sadhguru'.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhammakaya_meditation Honestly, it sounds all a bit complicated and new age.

Thanks for sharing. Did you have the opportunity to touch hands with him or any of his students?

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This person is not here to contribute to discussion, only to scout for students. The way they operate is to raise themselves up by putting others down.

My teacher often points to this story told by Carl Jung.

Eh I mean, having the ability to laugh at yourself should be a prerequisite for walking on this path. I meant no offense. Unfortunately there's no such thing as the Dan Sutra in English. Dan is also short for Daniel.

https://youtu.be/NwW3ytid4DA

That's a fantastic analogy! Very similar to how I gather koan training works too. The koan is held deep in the hara and becomes the object of one-pointed attention for days or weeks or even longer. Then, a sudden shattering of samadhi, and glimpse into one's nature.

Continuing the theme of alchemy in Japanese Zen, here's an interesting quote from Hakuin, who is basically the father of modern Rinzai.

I would say that historically this served a purpose. It preserves the integrity of a tradition. If all paths are considered equal, there is the tendency to mix and match. You see this now with absurdities like 'YoQi'. The result is arguably you end up with something that leads nowhere. They might all lead to the same place, or near enough the same, but how they get there is different. But at the same time, it's important not to get too attached to the form. In the Buddha's parable of the raft, he asked monks what he should do with a raft after crossing a river. Should he leave it by the shore, or carry it across the land. The monks said he should - of course - leave it by the shore. But I would build on that analogy by saying that you shouldn't make alterations to the raft in the process of crossing over the river, otherwise you'll sink. Therefore fostering the sense of your raft is superior is a useful mentality for teachers to cultivate in their students. But once you've got to the other shore, you can see that all the rafts effectively serve the same purpose, although they might look different in form.

It's easy to get attached to states in meditation - to crave them, and attach a measure of pride to them. But jhanas aren't the end goal of practice. They are also impermanent. Edit - just watched that section of the interview. I agree wholeheartedly, and this was one of the reasons why I moved on from Bhante Vimalaramsi's stuff (which I think she is directly criticising here) is because of what I saw as the overemphasis on goals in practice. But whether the experience I was having was of the arupa jhanas or merely access concentration, my point stands that to say it is 'mine' and compare it with that experienced by others, is a recipe for further suffering

I hear this quite often from internal alchemy practitioners: 'My jhana is better than your jhana.'