2014:

https://www.dharmaoverground.org/discussion/-/message_boards/message/5542824

Bill F. wrote:

Hello,

        I am curious about those who feel they have reached 4th path as defined in MCTB and gone on to see further developmental shifts. Specifically, what method/s were most useful or what resources were most useful? What did those shifts entail?
       For example, for myself I can say that somatic practices and paying attention to the way that thoughts/feelings bounce off the body creating a sense of dissaosiciation has brought about dramatic changes in the way that reality is recieved and processed so that even post mctb 4th path there has been a signifigant reduction in the tension associated with the process of dissaosicating through thinking/feeling. This had all been described in my journal at kfd which may be lost to the wind for the second time now, not entirely sure.
      I believe my own process is not uniquely better but was just suited to my own particular history/personality, so I am just interested in what others have found most useful: continued noting? Dzogchen? Concentration? Metta? AF inspired practice? Something else entirely? Thank you.

Bill

Daniel replied:

Well, it has been 11 years, which is a pretty long time-span to try to describe, starting after medical school, spanning residency and 8 years of post-residency work, which has involved all sorts of changes. It is hard to really sum up.

First point: the implications of this space are the primary thing, obviously, that being now the reality, not that it wasn't always the reality, but this it's different when the thing knows it is the thing all the way through. So, anything about the field trying to somehow optimize itself really is the practice, such that "practice" really seems to be everything, and that happens on its own.

However, I take it that this was not your question, and you mean formal practices, techniques, and the like.

I really doubt that it is going to be something that one person could answer and have that answer mean a whole lot to anyone else, as at that point (as as every other point, but it is not known the same way), conditioning and circumstances will determine what happens, and those are obviously extremely individually variable.

That said, my formal practice has been all over the place, everything from samatha to magick to Brahma Viharas to AF-inspired stuff to very Dzogchen-inspired stuff to lots of things that are really hard to describe, as I don't see a lot of people talking about that territory, such as what to do with the waves of subtle unrightness that can slowly move through the body (did have a brief conversation with Chuck Kasmire about that years ago), and things like energy work, cognitive restructuring, and things that are very vipassana: noticing very fine points of subtle parts of feelings and the like, as well as dream-work, things that are very zazen (practice-enlightenment, which, from a certain point of view encompasses all of this), and on and on...

More specifically, and to paraphrase Chi Nul, just because the Sun is shining brightly, that doesn't mean all the snow will melt at once, and the implications of the field integrating this understanding into all sorts of brain regions, patterns, feelings, old habits, constructs, and things has been totally fascinating. That has been the most remarkable thing, as the fundamental insight runs into parts of the brain that might not have been used for years, feelings that might not have been felt since decades ago, ways of thinking about the world that are clearly out-dated and yet didn't get reworked until some very specific situation brought them to light in some way, and all of that, now being perceived in this totally different way, can transform itself into something better

That basically goes along with my very brief blurb on integration in MCTB, which says basically: get the insight, and reality will integrate itself.

Overall, it has been fascinating to explore old things in a new light, as well as get into new things in that same new light, and so the key really is the new light.
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