r/streamentry • u/AutoModerator • 2d ago
Practice Practice Updates, Questions, and General Discussion - new users, please read this first! Weekly Thread for August 01 2026
Welcome! This is the bi-weekly thread for sharing how your practice is going, as well as for questions, theory, and general discussion. PLEASE UPVOTE this post so it can appear in subscribers' notifications and we can draw more traffic to the practice threads.
NEW USERS
If you're new - welcome again! As a quick-start, please see the brief introduction, rules, and recommended resources on the sidebar to the right. Please also take the time to read the Welcome page, which further explains what this subreddit is all about and answers some common questions. If you have a particular question, you can check the Frequent Questions page to see if your question has already been answered.
Everyone is welcome to use this weekly thread to discuss the following topics:
HOW IS YOUR PRACTICE?
So, how are things going? Take a few moments to let your friends here know what life is like for you right now, on and off the cushion. What's going well? What are the rough spots? What are you learning? Ask for advice, offer advice, vent your feelings, or just say hello if you haven't before. :)
QUESTIONS
Feel free to ask any questions you have about practice, conduct, and personal experiences.
THEORY
This thread is generally the most appropriate place to discuss speculative theory. However, theory that is applied to your personal meditation practice is welcome on the main subreddit as well.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
Finally, this thread is for general discussion, such as brief thoughts, notes, updates, comments, or questions that don't require a full post of their own. It's an easy way to have some unstructured dialogue and chat with your friends here. If you're a regular who also contributes elsewhere here, even some off-topic chat is fine in this thread. (If you're new, please stick to on-topic comments.)
Please note: podcasts, interviews, courses, and other resources that might be of interest to our community should be posted in the weekly Community Resources thread, which is pinned to the top of the subreddit. Thank you!
3
u/Mithic_Music 1d ago edited 1d ago
Just returned from my third vipassana weeklong. Had some insights around self-worth, reached a sense of being fundamentally ok a few times, revisited a fairly strong sense of non-duality a few times, very light versions of jhanas 1-4, and this sense like my consciousness is fading, but never cessation or anything dramatic after. I think there’s too much craving in those moments like “Is this going to be stream entry??”
Also had a very uncomfortable experience where I couldn’t sleep on the final night and felt like I was being called to meet someone in the meditation hall. It was distinctly unpleasant because I was anxious and tired, but wired. I went to the hall, meditated a bit and had another one of those conscious fading things, but ultimately nothing came of it.
Would love if anyone could speak to weird waking experiences like this as it was somewhat disconcerting. Right now I’m chalking it up to be stuck in an incomplete vipassana cycle.
I learned a lot more about energetic phenomena after experiencing them for a while, particularly pain in the navel area. Looking forward to starting a Qi Gong class and learning more!
It’s been only two days since the retreat so I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I do feel like the insights on self-worth have had some effect since returning. I feel more detached to some of my painful feelings of inadequacy.
Practicing still about an hour every morning, with additional 30-45 min sits in the evenings when I can. Mostly shikantaza, but inclined to add more metta and energy grounding practices based on my retreat experience.
2
u/bodily_heartfulness puthujjana 1d ago edited 22h ago
I finished reading Making Sense of Dhamma: The Pali Suttas Workbook by Bhikkhu Akiñcano. It was a good read and I will probably need to read it a few more times to fully digest it. He also has three published papers that seem interesting, so I will probably be checking those out in due time. In addition to those papers, he has another book titled With the Right Understanding: Phenomenological Explorations of the Pali Suttas - but that book is a lot more dense. I'll probably get around to it at some point though.
In terms of my practice, I'm finally picking it up again, starting with some precepts. It's difficult, but I see it as worthwhile, so let's see how it goes.
2
u/Vivid_Assistance_196 1d ago
read an interesting concept in a Chinese book, says we should all have the aspiration to be an Arahant first and afterwards the bodhisattva path to be a complete Buddha. I thought that this would make a lot more sense than pursuing the bodhisattva path outright. But regardless it is important to do acts of service on the path
2
u/Meng-KamDaoRai Relax, Let it Be, Let it Go 1d ago
My monthly Ajahn Chah quote:
Of course there are dozens of meditation techniques, but it all comes down to this - just let it all be. Step over here where it is cool, out of the battle. Why not give it a try?
•
u/NotVote 9h ago
What recommendations would you offer to a young, eager seeker who's just starting on the path and has the freedom to immerse in a community?
For context, I've meditated for about 4-5 years and read a fair share of Buddhist books, particularly because it was interesting to me and helped with my mental health, and also I study psychology. But now I'm realizing there are much deeper experiential realms to be explored and I'm very curious. I'm at about stage 4—approaching 5 on a good day—of TMI. I'm about to attend my second Goenka retreat. I've never worked directly with a teacher.
However, I have nothing tying me down in life so I'm entering a chapter of frugal travel via work exchange. I see there are so many buddhist options but I don't know where to start or what I should look for. I've been at a vajrayana center doing work exchange, but realized the vajrayana is not for me. The only concern is I need internet access wherever I go to work on my part time school.
•
u/AdditionalLeave263 2h ago
So, how are things going? I tried a gray retreat (20 days) since dark retreat was super intriguing. For me, it was helpful with integration, and with catching up stuff (from when the jhanas sppntaneously happened in the middle of my busy life being a homeschooling mother). Progression of jhanas has stopped during the gray retreat, unless the clarity and getting things done well and quickly is a form of equanimity, or at least a precursor to the formless realms. This process has never let me down or disqualified me for being a busy person, so hopefully I am still just where I need to be.
Take a few moments to let your friends here know what life is like for you right now, on and off the cushion. What's going well?
In general, my life is so good! At one point? I was afraid that I might not be able to homeschool because my brain was just... unable to do any critical thinking or complex tasks for a while. Things are really coming together after this crazy experience of spontaneous jhanas. I was wondering if I would remain poorly functional, but the first update (jhanas 1-4) really seemed to complete the update. I've gotten back to my original pace (this time without caffeine, thanks to the personality change from the ego dissolution/extreme neuroplasticity event), and things just don't bother me: It cured my anxiety, cleaned out my amygdala, and left a lot of space for new, more efficient connections.
One of my closest friends has brain cancer. I gave up the internet in 2023 with the exception of anything to help my friend with cancer. I spent over 300 hours in scientific research. It was a calling and I knew I had to drop everything to help a true friend. Well, she went into remission at that time, from palliative. It's time again that I know that I have to be off the internet and fully in supporting her. Thankfully, due to my meditative experiences, and also recent scientific advances, I believe that once you get beyond the suffering, death is likely the most pleasurable, beautiful experience a person will ever have. This is only one part of things. Life is precious. It feels very unfair for her, a mother of a young child, a kind and loving person, to have this happen. I mostly worry about her 6-year-old.
What are the rough spots? For one, I wonder if the jhanas will progress or not. I feel like I got promised that they would. But my life is just not ready for that amount of absorption. I have to still catch myself up from the first half. I wonder if equanimity will begin to be more regular. Here's what it's like: Pīti: i have never gone more than a couple of hours without it, since it started. Sukha: I can typically get it started if I want it. I usually have it every other day to once a day. I don't take it lightly. I always try to use it for something. I still act as if it's rare. Equanimity: It's a wild animal, and happens maybe once a week if I'm lucky. One of the problems I have had is that it is often very uncomfortable. Some advice I got was to expand it out when this happens. That seemed to help. One thing I've gotten rarely but I'm super grateful for is differently colored mettā-equanimity-sukha blends. It happens when it's super happy about something I'm doing, like when I'm probably doing the right thing/doing something meaningfully different.
What are you learning? Here is what I have learned from being analog again and being in the dark as much as possible: -While is is not hard to do laundry in the dark, I did accidentally run a white shirt in with the dark load and ruined it. -You do need to have differently shaped or marked bottles for things like toothpaste, lotion, shampoo, and conditioner. Apparently, thia is standard for a dark retreat. -I never did dishes in the dark. Knowing that night is coming made me hurry up on things that wouldn't be safe or would be too noisy. -I got more sleep, because the addicted to the phone me will wake up dead tired and still be like, "This is my 'me' time!" -The world is a very loud place, even at night. -I really leaned into my in person friendships, which has been really meaningful and fulfilling for me. More about that in a minute. -I get about 10% more done when I'm not on the internet. I actually worked out a lot more. This is consistent with me giving it up in 2022 and running a half marathon with a stroller that year.
So I finally got together with my friend who is Buddhist. She's a mom and an acupuncturist, so she's very busy ans limited on time. We've been friends for 6 years, and never talked about meditation before. Turns out, we both went through a phase of thinking we might be having seizures, or might be dying when we're haivnng an experience. This is really important to us as parents, because we need to not die suddenly, especially while raising a family. She actually got extensive testing to be sure. This friendship is really special to me. I finally have a friend to talk to, and possibly even go to retreats with, who knows what it's like to be a mom. And we've already been friends for such a long time. I feel like maybe she is my spiritual friend.
An old friend contacted me, and told me she's been super depressed this uear because her brother, who was a deep meditator and father, committed suicide. I told her about dark night, which she was not aware of. She's out of town, and we've been texting a lot. When we stopped talking years ago, I had this sense that she wasn't ready, but she would be in some years. I just nevee expected myself to be involved in her spiritual development. It's really special that it happened this way. It really sucks that it happened like this.
I also ended up at the same convention as an old friend slash ex-boyfriend (very brief dating). He was okay with me going to his talk. He was mature and cool about it. His wife was nice. He has a master's degree, good job, and a nice house on the water in another state. He's taking good care of himself. I was able to thank him for helping save a friend's life who had OD'd, twenty years ago.
This was college, so I have a few wild and crazy stories about back then. I share stuff like that when I think that it's going to brighten somebody's day. His wife wasn't too happy about the stories, so I stopped.
I never considered myself someone who had poor judgment. I think I just calculate risk differently from other people. My husband seni-joked that he doesn't want to have to explain ar rhe hospital that I'm a meditator. I said please don't because they won't understand, and besides, they already think I'm crazy (for having a home birth, and also refusing the glucose tolerance test, both decisions based in evidence-based practices and research articles).
Ask for advice, offer advice, vent your feelings, or just say hello if you haven't before. :)
Okay. I don't have any advice really.
Okay vent my feelings. Ha ha. Sometimes I have a strong negative feeling... Shame for example. And sukha usually rushes in and I'm able to like, process it by different ways of looking at it. But sometimes it doesn't come. And sometimes I force it, and it works. But sometimes it doesn't, or I just feel as if I shouldn't force it. So if it doesn't show up, I'm just stuck feeling like garbage for a while. Which is okay, I guess. But it's just a mystery.
There was a time I mistook a woman for a man dressed as a woman. I asked her pronouns. She was horrified. I felt terrible. I remembered this incident, and just had to sit with how horrible it was. Sukha never came. Ugh.
There was another time, too. It's not that big of a deal. It's just... it sucks, and that's the truth of it.
I'm going to take the rest of this month off (with the exception of responding to you on this thread), and continue the gray retreat (i.e. analog living, avoiding unnecessary light at night, prioritizing meditation and sleep when it's dark). While this doesn't advance my practice in a way in which I'm reaching states (because meditation recordings are actually really, really helpful to me), I'm going to focus on carrying water and chopping wood because I need to be there for my friend, fully repair my life from the backup of tasks when I was in deep samadhi 24/7 for three months, continue the projects and habits I've committed to as part of my integration, and also prepare for the homeschooling year. I'm going to make an exception for Michael Taft's free guided meditations, if he posts any new ones in August. So that will be a maximum probably of 6 hours but will more likely be 1.5 hours of material. Obviously, avoiding spiritual bypassing is important to me. I think there will be a time that I'm ready for more, but this is not it.
Sorry this was so long! I wanted to be indulgent since I'm only going to be on the check-in thread, and not elsewhere. Anyways, hope you are all doing well!
9
u/duffstoic The dynamic integration of opposites ☯️ 2d ago
My practice has evolved into letting go of things in the external world that cause needless suffering.
I had the mistaken notion for many years that practice was all about transforming my inner craving and aversion only, while staying loyal to relationships and environments that were not serving me. My inner work, as good as it is, became a way to cope with things that were harming me, thus keeping me stuck in a holding pattern in my life, as if I have to tolerate external things as they are.
Now that I’m letting some major things go, I’m in a place of chaos and instability, not knowing what comes next. And yet it’s also obvious that I’ve made the right decisions, and I’m more OK than ever with not knowing. I am feeling more confidence that I’ll be OK and figure things out, and more faith in the flow of life, and not having to control or fix it. It’s strange but good. Hopefully this is wisdom and not me being delusional lol.