varieties of the dark night

Tonight I had the idea a few times that my path is highly conditioned by difficulty, and has a kind of severe disposition in some ways - about dealing with suffering that is very thick, in general as well as in specific sensations. A lot of the time there is a melancholy and vague, unpleasant sensations that just aren't enough in and of themselves, and there is a down-and-dirty attitude towards practice and dealing with them.

I got wondering a little bit, though, about how that may not be the case for some. But at the same time, wondering if discomfort/uncomfortable stuff is necessarily a part of a path, whatever its particular character is. What's the deal here as far as you guys have seen?

Well, some teachers, like Culadasa, claim you don't need to go through the dark night at all. I've heard Shinzen Young say the same thing. The problem with the dark night (and I am a veteran of that stuff) is that a bad one can be appropriated by the ego, which then proceeds to feel "special" over the miseries of said dark night. Been there, done that. In general, the more jhana practice a person can get, the more "lubricated" the path. I couldn't bring myself to spend time on samatha, so I braved the dukkhas.

Now, James, what are you doing up at this horrible hour? And come to think of it, what am I doing up?! It's time to get some sleep!

I would say discomfort and uncomfortable stuff, absolutely, because the process is a process of stripping away (illusions, certainties, security, etc) - but this doesn't necessarily have to be a 'dark night' of the kind described in the Visuddhimagga and adopted/interpreted by PD.