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I think this stuff is actually pretty typical for folks who progress to a certain stage. I experienced it as well, if that makes you feel any better. The Buddh

I think this stuff is actually pretty typical for folks who progress to a certain stage. I experienced it as well, if that makes you feel any better. The Buddhists definitely know about this, but a lot of their writing is pretty impenetrable and interlaced with weird metaphysics. Here's some modern, secular words on the subject (from the admittedly controversial author Daniel Ingram): https://www.mctb.org/mctb2/table-of-contents/part-iv-insight/30-the-progress-of-insight/5-dissolution-entrance-to-the-dark-night/ https://www.mctb.org/mctb2/table-of-contents/part-iv-insight... Here's a more traditional buddhist description of the same thing: https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/mahasi/progress.html#ch6.8 https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/mahasi/progress.... I think a very small fraction of people actually meditate enough to get to that point. Meditating 90 minutes a day (plus the constant mindfulness practice) is pretty extreme by most people's standards (at least in US secular culture).

bowsamic 4y ago
> The Buddhists definitely know about this, but a lot of their writing is pretty impenetrable and interlaced with weird metaphysics. Here's some modern, secular words on the subject: This and linking MCTB (of all things) are the exact dangerous taking out of context I’m warning against. Daniel Ingram is a terrible resource, he should not be recommended
- bstrom 4y ago
  I would be interested in hearing more about why Ingram is considered a terrible resource, if you care to share.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    One reason is that he broke a major taboo in publicly declaring himself an Arhat Then he has this book that is supposed to distil all of the powerful insight practises into a secular path, but everyone I’ve spoken to in his pragmatic dharma community is extremely toxic. It’s literally like the 4chan of Buddhism, huge amounts of racism, lots of depressed teens, very online, lots of people who think they are enlightened (one of which suddenly “rated my capacity for awakening” as zero, and when I said I didn’t care flew into a rage) It’s exactly what you expect to happen when you take Buddhism, try and condense it down into a path for having the strongest and most intense experience, and market it to terminally online young adult men Ingram was also heavily involved in this “fire kasina” stuff where you just stare at a flame for days until you start seeing things and go kind of crazy, which is a controversial practise in Buddhism Finally he’s just not a qualified Buddhist teacher
    - titanomachy 4y ago
      I agree that a lot of people in that community (and online in general) seem to be chasing after some kind of peak experiences and there's a lot of weird spiritual dick-measuring. For what it's worth, Ingram himself recommends Kornfield's "A Path with Heart" as one of his favorite books, which is largely about how the goal is to be a better person and that's not the same thing as developing incredible concentration abilities and having intense experiences.
      - bowsamic 4y ago
        Ingrams path produces such people because his path is broken. Look at the results. He had a novel idea for how to “optimise Buddhism” and it had bad results I don’t really think it matters what Ingrams favourite books are if his methodology has been so destructive
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- titanomachy 4y ago
  You seem pretty experienced in this stuff. I agree with a lot of what you're saying in this thread: meditation can be dangerous and should be taken more seriously. Treating it as on par with a psychedelic therapy sounds about right. Here's where I think we differ: a lot of people in secular western culture are intensely put off by all the religious stuff that comes with Buddhism. The metaphysics and reincarnation stuff is, in my view, a reflection of the culture that Siddhartha Gautama grew up in and taught in, rather than a necessary part of eliminating suffering. I think that retelling these lessons in a way that's accessible to modern audiences is important. Some people simply will not accept something taught in the form of ancient mysticism. Should those people be denied insight just because they didn't grow up in India during the Iron Age? I get that Ingram is polarizing. I'll add a link to Mahasi Sayadaw as well, but I just don't think he explains things in a way that's as clear to someone with my cultural background.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    The Buddha never taught that those aspects are optional and every tradition has preserved them from India to China to Japan, until now! Why are we special that we can forgo all of the religious trappings? We aren’t Of course the teachings must be made to appeal to westerners. This does not mean totally gutting them People who won’t accept anything spiritual or religious don’t need this practise. In Buddhism we don’t try to convert, for some people it is simply not their time
    - titanomachy 4y ago
      I think there is a difference between accepting spiritual and religious practices. The illusion of self can be observed directly. Perhaps it's even an inevitable conclusion of sufficiently intense introspection. I'd consider observing this to be a spiritual practice. The metaphysics of realms of reincarnation, hungry ghosts, etc. is religious thought (and it was the dominant worldview when Siddhartha was born). These are not ideas that I can discover independently through introspection; if I believe them it's because someone told me to. We might be talking past each other, though: if you're saying that the benefits of meditation are inherently inextricable from a Vedic worldview, I don't agree. But if you are just saying we haven't yet figured out which parts of the religion are actually necessary, then I agree. I personally learned meditation in a fairly Buddhist context, and naturally there are parts that resonate with me and parts that don't.
Enginerrrd 4y ago
Yeah, it came as a real shock to me at first. I had made many mistakes in my early meditation career. But I learned a lot more and suddenly started progressing. This was wonderful at first. I started to feel and experience some pretty mind-blowing things on the cushion at first and then extending well off the cushion into the rest of my life. Then... I remember random memories started to kind of pop into my awareness. I started to see a bright light shining through my eyes/head while I was on the cushion. This was accompanied by these almost divine feelings of bliss and content, which sometimes extended for hours after my sit. This was very cool at first. Then... this weird head pressure and uncomfortable feeling between my eyes started showing up. My single pointed focus was impossible to maintain because the intense feeling of pressure between my eyes or on the crown of my head would grow more and more distracting as I tried to regain the single pointed focus I had been enjoying. Then... shortly after that, the pressure turned into full tension headaches that lasted all day on bad days. Then... I was working in my office at home one day and my vision suddenly became blurry. Then, I started to feel nauseous. I went to throw up, I could feel the usual feelings of vomiting coming up from my abdomen, then up my throat, then... when it reached my mouth/face, instead of vomit this wave of intense sadness reached my face and it contorted into an expression of anguish. For the next like 30 minutes, wave after wave of this sadness, in every nuanced flavor I'd ever experienced started coming up, taking over my face, then passing. Then the rage. So much anger and rage and betrayel and hurt came and did the same thing. Wave after wave. I had NO idea WTF was happening to me, but I'd always been an absolute pinnacle of mental stability so this was very unusual. I didn't know what else to do but to let it pass. After that, for months, the head pressure / headaches would reappear and then they'd be relieved by me crying. Feeling the intense feelings and going away. But... I really wasn't expecting any of that. I just wanted to be able to focus better and think more clearly. I didn't sign up for THIS. So I just let it go and fade. I didn't really want to accidentally screw my brain up. So, unfortunately, I haven't started a daily practice again since. It all did feel pretty cathartic though. I've dabbled here and there with meditating again. When I do it with any real regularity though, the head pressure tends to come back.
- titanomachy 4y ago
  Wow, thanks for sharing. I have no advice to offer but maybe an experienced teacher could help. I've experienced intense emotional swings like you describe but not the pain or pressure. The emotional swings at least were something I was able to get through, eventually. They were strong for a while but stopped with continued practice. I'm definitely still more sensitive than I was before. I feel both positive and negative feelings more intensely, but hold onto them less.

bowsamic 4y ago

> The Buddhists definitely know about this, but a lot of their writing is pretty impenetrable and interlaced with weird metaphysics. Here's some modern, secular words on the subject: This and linking MCTB (of all things) are the exact dangerous taking out of context I’m warning against. Daniel Ingram is a terrible resource, he should not be recommended

bstrom 4y ago
I would be interested in hearing more about why Ingram is considered a terrible resource, if you care to share.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  One reason is that he broke a major taboo in publicly declaring himself an Arhat Then he has this book that is supposed to distil all of the powerful insight practises into a secular path, but everyone I’ve spoken to in his pragmatic dharma community is extremely toxic. It’s literally like the 4chan of Buddhism, huge amounts of racism, lots of depressed teens, very online, lots of people who think they are enlightened (one of which suddenly “rated my capacity for awakening” as zero, and when I said I didn’t care flew into a rage) It’s exactly what you expect to happen when you take Buddhism, try and condense it down into a path for having the strongest and most intense experience, and market it to terminally online young adult men Ingram was also heavily involved in this “fire kasina” stuff where you just stare at a flame for days until you start seeing things and go kind of crazy, which is a controversial practise in Buddhism Finally he’s just not a qualified Buddhist teacher
  - titanomachy 4y ago
    I agree that a lot of people in that community (and online in general) seem to be chasing after some kind of peak experiences and there's a lot of weird spiritual dick-measuring. For what it's worth, Ingram himself recommends Kornfield's "A Path with Heart" as one of his favorite books, which is largely about how the goal is to be a better person and that's not the same thing as developing incredible concentration abilities and having intense experiences.
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Ingrams path produces such people because his path is broken. Look at the results. He had a novel idea for how to “optimise Buddhism” and it had bad results I don’t really think it matters what Ingrams favourite books are if his methodology has been so destructive
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
titanomachy 4y ago
You seem pretty experienced in this stuff. I agree with a lot of what you're saying in this thread: meditation can be dangerous and should be taken more seriously. Treating it as on par with a psychedelic therapy sounds about right. Here's where I think we differ: a lot of people in secular western culture are intensely put off by all the religious stuff that comes with Buddhism. The metaphysics and reincarnation stuff is, in my view, a reflection of the culture that Siddhartha Gautama grew up in and taught in, rather than a necessary part of eliminating suffering. I think that retelling these lessons in a way that's accessible to modern audiences is important. Some people simply will not accept something taught in the form of ancient mysticism. Should those people be denied insight just because they didn't grow up in India during the Iron Age? I get that Ingram is polarizing. I'll add a link to Mahasi Sayadaw as well, but I just don't think he explains things in a way that's as clear to someone with my cultural background.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  The Buddha never taught that those aspects are optional and every tradition has preserved them from India to China to Japan, until now! Why are we special that we can forgo all of the religious trappings? We aren’t Of course the teachings must be made to appeal to westerners. This does not mean totally gutting them People who won’t accept anything spiritual or religious don’t need this practise. In Buddhism we don’t try to convert, for some people it is simply not their time
  - titanomachy 4y ago
    I think there is a difference between accepting spiritual and religious practices. The illusion of self can be observed directly. Perhaps it's even an inevitable conclusion of sufficiently intense introspection. I'd consider observing this to be a spiritual practice. The metaphysics of realms of reincarnation, hungry ghosts, etc. is religious thought (and it was the dominant worldview when Siddhartha was born). These are not ideas that I can discover independently through introspection; if I believe them it's because someone told me to. We might be talking past each other, though: if you're saying that the benefits of meditation are inherently inextricable from a Vedic worldview, I don't agree. But if you are just saying we haven't yet figured out which parts of the religion are actually necessary, then I agree. I personally learned meditation in a fairly Buddhist context, and naturally there are parts that resonate with me and parts that don't.

Enginerrrd 4y ago

Yeah, it came as a real shock to me at first. I had made many mistakes in my early meditation career. But I learned a lot more and suddenly started progressing. This was wonderful at first. I started to feel and experience some pretty mind-blowing things on the cushion at first and then extending well off the cushion into the rest of my life. Then... I remember random memories started to kind of pop into my awareness. I started to see a bright light shining through my eyes/head while I was on the cushion. This was accompanied by these almost divine feelings of bliss and content, which sometimes extended for hours after my sit. This was very cool at first. Then... this weird head pressure and uncomfortable feeling between my eyes started showing up. My single pointed focus was impossible to maintain because the intense feeling of pressure between my eyes or on the crown of my head would grow more and more distracting as I tried to regain the single pointed focus I had been enjoying. Then... shortly after that, the pressure turned into full tension headaches that lasted all day on bad days. Then... I was working in my office at home one day and my vision suddenly became blurry. Then, I started to feel nauseous. I went to throw up, I could feel the usual feelings of vomiting coming up from my abdomen, then up my throat, then... when it reached my mouth/face, instead of vomit this wave of intense sadness reached my face and it contorted into an expression of anguish. For the next like 30 minutes, wave after wave of this sadness, in every nuanced flavor I'd ever experienced started coming up, taking over my face, then passing. Then the rage. So much anger and rage and betrayel and hurt came and did the same thing. Wave after wave. I had NO idea WTF was happening to me, but I'd always been an absolute pinnacle of mental stability so this was very unusual. I didn't know what else to do but to let it pass. After that, for months, the head pressure / headaches would reappear and then they'd be relieved by me crying. Feeling the intense feelings and going away. But... I really wasn't expecting any of that. I just wanted to be able to focus better and think more clearly. I didn't sign up for THIS. So I just let it go and fade. I didn't really want to accidentally screw my brain up. So, unfortunately, I haven't started a daily practice again since. It all did feel pretty cathartic though. I've dabbled here and there with meditating again. When I do it with any real regularity though, the head pressure tends to come back.

titanomachy 4y ago
Wow, thanks for sharing. I have no advice to offer but maybe an experienced teacher could help. I've experienced intense emotional swings like you describe but not the pain or pressure. The emotional swings at least were something I was able to get through, eventually. They were strong for a while but stopped with continued practice. I'm definitely still more sensitive than I was before. I feel both positive and negative feelings more intensely, but hold onto them less.