REVISITING THE IDEA OF VIPASSANA
ON SECOND THOUGHT...


A number of years ago (before I ran out of space on LMA site 1 - I have since run out of space on LMA 2 and am using LMA 3, though they all appear to you to be on one site), while investigating "meditation" I wrote the piece:  The Vipassana Way And The Vipassana Meditation. 

But now PL (a thirtyish proactive seeker of wisdom with a page on this site about his mastery trip: Truly Seeking Life Mastery And Wisdom - The Story And Progression Of PL) has written me about his experience of the (no fee) 10 day course meditation retreat (dhamma.org).  As he writes in a 4/23/17 email, 'I learned more in those 10 days about how to maximise life than from the best 1000 books on self help."  Click the link in that email to see his other comments!

I've taken the liberty to annotate and add comments to the freely shared nightly discourses provided during the retreat.  They have a great deal of wisdom in them. Read and study The Vipassana Discourses - Day 1 Thru 11 - Annotated With Added Comments.

If you are indeed seeking self mastery, that means you are "going all the way" and not doing a few dilettantish dipping your toe in the water explorations or instant result seeking.   Vipassana fits the path to self mastery.  It is not easy, but the ten days is complete and deep enough to get started.  PL has continued the 2 hours a day of sitting and does one hour a day of CDs and DVDs of instruction, so he is clearly seeking mastery. 

For someone who is seeking greater purity of thought and focus as part of self mastery, I think there is no doubt that this is a good move. 

If you are considering doing it, you could read the Art Of Living book, as it will lay much of vipassana out to see what it is about.  Or you could read, with almost the same verbatim discourses The Vipassana Discourses - Day 1 Thru 11 - Annotated With Added Comments

This is a course that will help you shed the nonsensical excess of what we have learned from our culture and from our caregivers or peers....and reconstruct.  We have added so much that we have in essence added numerous sources of "suffering", from anxiety, self-doubt all the way over to despair about life (or, as Thoreau puts it, "a life of quiet desperation... "  We are governed by what we think are the appetites that are inborn...but we invented much of that, as an aberrational version of reality, based on "made ups" that we created over time to "explain" what we didn't actually take the time nor thought to actually ascertain (make certain it is true!) upfront. 

In this course, you will cut off the "mental reactions" that occur from "sensations" and in so doing gain liberation from suffering.


IT'S FREE

Other than the 10 days of time given to the course, there is no fee.  You may only donate after the first 9 days and they do not in any way pressure you to do so. 


IT IS AN INTERVENTION

This is a serious matter and this is a serious intervention to fully confront the unnecessary suffering that we have allowed to stay in our lives.....


WILL IT SKIP SOMETHING?

Vipassana cuts off the reaction and misreading of the sensations early in the chain of suffering.

However, while it is true that we need to be able to see a thought illusion as being an illusion, we might not be able to get to this with all such thoughts.  Indeed, some thoughts are not explicitly seen or worked out, even though we hope they might randomly come up to the surface in meditating if one does enough of it. The danger, I think, is that one might skip over parts of the causal chain that are necessary to correct. 
I hope that those who do Vipassana also, perhaps, supplement it with the pieces on this site, as they deal with the whole chain (but do not conflict with the part where Vipassana comes in).

Such processing still leaves intact the mechanism that would cause us to run like hell when we see a tiger, but not to add more to it. 

The process will help one see the nonsense in undesired situation with no real danger, so that the false fear response will not be incurred.

One of my most respected resources is Richie Davidson, the neuroscientist who is also investigating meditation and such with the Dalai Lama.  He did, many years ago, a meditation retreat with the founder of Vipassana in a remote, remote village.  Richie meditates 45 minutes each day, as he recognize the benefits of such a practice.  I suspect, after someone has gone through the initial more intense parts of the training for Vipassana, that 45 minutes could be the time one continues to do the practice daily. 

Davidson, among others, wrote The Emotional Life Of Your Brain.  He has also identified one of the Buddhist Monks as the Happiest Man In The World.


TESTIMONIALS, COMMENTS FROM PARTICIPANTS

"The idea is that when you just observe the physical manifestations of the Sankharas with equanimity, and they arise and pass away, the Sankharas get eradicated, along with their effects on you. "  This person wrote: Vipassana 10-Day Meditation Retreat Review.
"Vipassana is not a cure-all, nor a magical solution to life’s problems. It doesn’t solve anything when you come out on the other side of the ten days. Instead, Vipassana is a tool. It’s a training technique that gives you another way to shape your mind — and yourself — into a person better able to face the world."   Vipassana Meditation: Was It Worth It?

Put in your internet search engine testimonials vipassana and read people's experiences.