Fetters and Paths, Oh My!

Here is my current take (which is subject to change). It is my take and my take alone and gels with my practice and general direction of this flow of mind/body. In no way am i saying this is an absolute.

I have been investigating the notion of 'fetter', asavas (outflows and inflows) and how to go about uprooting them in my daily life for awhile now. I have been inspired by a few things. In the Vimuttimagga, it says that there are two phases to the path although the Vimuttimaga uses the word 'plane' in English. The first phase is that of seeing. The second phase is the phase of volition.

The first phase is getting to stream entry. You see what was previously not seen and then cannot unsee it from then on. Here it would be seeing that there is no self to find in the 5 aggregates at least long enough to do damage to the corresponding fetter of identity view.

The 2nd phase is called the phase of volition. This phase is about attending to what has already been seen in a certain way such as attending to the aggregates as they are attended to in the khemaka sutta for example. This phase is post-stream entry to arahat. I find this distinction in methodology very interesting and corresponds to what I find myself doing in my own practice.


Here is the very short passage from the Vimuttimagga under the 5 Methods section:

PLANE
There are two kinds of planes: plane of seeing and plane of volition. Here, the Path of Stream-entrance is the plane of seeing. The other three Paths and the four Fruits of the recluse are the plane of volition. Not having seen before, one sees now. This is the plane of seeing. One sees thus and attends to it. This is called the plane of volition. And again, there are two planes: the plane of the learner and the plane of the learning- ender. Here, the four Paths and the three Fruits of the recluse are of the plane of the learner. Arahatship is learning-ender's plane.

My path ever since I started all this meditation business in 2000 up until July-ish of 2010 when the centrepoint dropped from experience, was all about the plane of seeing. From then onwards, it was about attending to what I had now seen in a certain way. Since then it has been a path of volition.

In my current experience there are inflows and outflows. I consider the inflows as the mental and bodily reactions triggered after there is contact between the 6 sense spheres and their corresponding 'objects' e.g. a sound with the ear, visual objects with the eyes, smells with the nose, touch with the body, something tasted with the tongue and ideas/thoughts/images with the 'mind' sense door.

These 'objects' are conceived by us. We first assign a sound 'shape' and 'name' then there is contact of said object with the ear sense door. We first assign visual fodder visual 'shape' and name', then there is contact with said object and the eye sense door. We first assign smells 'shape' and 'name' and then there is contact with the nose sense door. We first assign tastes 'shape' and 'name' then there is contact with said object and the tongue sense door. We first assign ideas/images/thoughts 'shape' and 'name', then there is contact with the 'mind' sense door.

By 'shape' I mean actually assigning initially unnamed, unborn aspect of the field of experience a 'shape' or 'form' or 'outline' or 'significance' that has mental weight, that can then be given evaluation and conceptualised as some 'thing' (name). Only when there is some 'object' or 'thing such as a 'sound' or 'visual object' or 'smell' etc can there be contact with a sense door that then triggers vedana, craving and clinging.

The outflows are the mental, physical and verbal actions that are consequently triggered by the inflows due to lack of awareness of inflows. If one observes from the level of vedana in the chain of dependent origination(DO), just before craving and clinging arise, one can train to cut the outflows right there. I think the Goenka technique and approach is good for this.

If one moves a little further up the chain to the link of nama/rupa, just before there is 'contact', one can really see some interesting cause and effect relationships going on as well. In my experience, the mind habitually creates, gives shape and names to sounds, visual phenomena, bodily touch, smells, tastes and mind phenomena. That is when there is contact and then vedana arises. A sound or sensation does not exist till the mind habitually assigns it the significance of a 'sound' or 'sensation' with mental weight, name and shape, which now can be evaluated as good, bad or neutral and reacted towards as so.

There is a difference in experience when there is experience of the field of experience that has no 'objects' assigned to cut it up. Sounds, visual fodder, thoughts etc all still are experienced so to speak but not as 'objects'. They are simply shapless and nameless aspects of the field of experience. This part I find hard to describe.

Observe with specific neutrality long enough at the process of assigning significance and thus creating 'objects' for the mind to evaluate and react towards and their cessation comes about. With the cessation of naming and giving shape to 'objects', the cessation of contact and vedana occurs and then all that follows.

Observe long enough and the seemingly automatic urges to create and shape the field of experience into 'things' to then react towards becomes clearer and the cessation of those urges can occur. When that occurs, there are no more 'things' created. There is nothing born of mind to be experienced. There is nothing that arises and passes as the mind has ceased assigning aspects of the field of experiecne name and shape. A 'thing' that has 'name' and 'shape' is a formation and subject to pass away, subject to die. So, perhaps the end of conceiving of 'things' that die is what is referred to as the 'deathless'. Still the field of experience but now not cut up, segregated into 'parts'/'things'/objects to then react towards with craving and clinging. There is still experience so to speak. Hmm, hard to describe. Anyhow, my point is:

I only began to truly see this stuff in action in my own experience post-technical 4th path (the dropping of the centrepoint and a stickyfree experience of the inflows). Now I am able to attend to the chain of DO in a way that leads to what this mind/body organism seems conditioned to move towards, the uprooting of the fetters that remain.

This part of my path is the plane of learning still, and also the plane of volition. The 2nd phase of my path according to the Vimuttimagga. Technical 4th path seemed to be to be all about the plane of 'seeing'. Seeing that there was just this one field of experience, no foreground nor background, no agency, no self to find. Just a mass of sensations where no sensations were more or less sacred than other sensations. This was all about the plane of seeing for me.

After that it has been all about attending to, the plane of volition. For example, attending to the creation of nama/rupa and thus contact and all that follows with specific neutrality so as to stop feeding its continuance, which simply seems to be ignorance of its occurance.

Doing this again and again does something to the brain. It interrupts the formation of those 'objects' of mind. And it is not like one loses an important ability when this happens. The field of experience continues as the field of experience and things just occur. Fingers type by themselves, actions occur, life gets lived, but there is less and less inclination to give rise to name and shape and thus all that arises post nama/rupa link ceases to be (although I am by no means free of it). What it is doing is interrupting what comes after nama/rupa in the chain of DO. And as far as I can tell, the next two fetters of sensual desire and ill will, so wrapped up in the created 'objects' of mind, lose their fuel, momentum and causal links.

All the fetters need an 'object' of mind to jump from. If one ceases to create the 'object' with 'shape' and 'name', then there is no more corresponding fetter. Here, shape could be for example a 'human body' given that 'shape' and the 'name' (evaluation) of 'woman' or 'man', 'sexy' and 'desireable'. Fom their arises contact with sense doors, pleasant vedana and subsequent craving and clinging. If the mind ceases to create shape and name, then there is no fetter of sensual desire to jump from those objects. At the same time there will be no 'objects' for hatred and illwill to jump from. As one begins to attend to DO in thus way, these two fetters get weaker and weaker.

As long as one is not aware of the urge to create the world of objects to then react towards, then those objects will continue to take shape and name and thus contact with the sense doors continues, and thus vedana arises and thus craving and clinging follows. So until there is no more moments of ignorance of this conceiving , then the other five fetters have fuel, name and shape to arise.

belief in a self (Pali: sakkāya-diṭṭhi)
doubt or uncertainty, especially about the teachings (vicikicchā)
attachment to rites and rituals (sīlabbata-parāmāso)
sensual desire (kāmacchando)
ill will (vyāpādo or byāpādo)
lust for material existence, lust for material rebirth (rūparāgo)
lust for immaterial existence, lust for rebirth in a formless realm (arūparāgo)
conceit (māna)
restlessness (uddhacca)
ignorance (avijjā)

this is my current take which could change.

Edited x 5 times

interesting nikolai. that rings true in my experience even if it's not my model or tradition. never seen it said that way before.

Thanks for that Nikolai!

That's very close to what I have been triangulating lately. A phase of insight and awakening, a phase of refinement within the realm/context of that awakening, and another event where the bottom completely drops out.

The latter stage is like Bernadette Roberts and Ken McLeod seem to have hit -- where notions of personal god or dharma teaching are even seen as contrived. Right now Ken McLeod feels comfortable answering questions, but can't bring himself to teach anything, despite his catalog of knowledge of tibetian practices. Bernadette said things like the personal god disappears. In the linear version of the daoist path, the sage becomes dragon like after incubating, not quite a sage any more, unable to be described by any particular reference point.

I think the only piece that could use more description is the "what is" a fetter. I think you describe it well, it's a tendency or habitual way of interpreting. They need to be seen still within "the middle way", however. They are not intrinsically bad or evil or wrong. It's the unconsciousness of them that makes them fettering. This point is somewhat hard to understand when we begin practice, because we are so used to thinking "this OR that", or thinking that a "self" becomes awakened. The middle way needs to be invoked otherwise the statement "I am awakened" will always seem to be a contradiction. Likewise, the very awakened people I know seem to have some version of the fetters appearing in their experience. So this stage of refinement can seem to be bogus and impossible, but that's only true if we have a very dualistic/dogmatic interpretation of fetter.

It is interesting to see the spiral nature of this. For sure there is a similar kind of release of the fetters along the initial path of awakening, the refinement phases covers similar ground but higher and deeper, so to speak. There aren't many data points that describe what happens after the bottom drops out. I suspect it's the holy fool, the going into the market, the rock by the side of the road that we don't even think about.

EDIT: this model seems to cut across traditions and is a reason why I have trouble calling myself a Buddhist with a capital B. I don't think there is anything particularly Buddhist about this, but rather what happens when a human exposes themselves to the consequence of the disparity between any mental model and reality. Everything falls apart, yet experience still arises undamaged. One problem with the discussion of the fetter model is it, too, isn't talked about in terms of a middle way. Too much angst has been spewed about whether it is really really true, but again it is a model that is both true and a complete fabrication. The fetters are the most important things and completely unreliable descriptions of something that don't really exist.

I didn't know that about Ken McLoed's teaching, Shargrol (though I vaguely recall some statement where he was taking a break from teaching, but not under what circumstances). From what I've seen on Bernadette's website, she teaches only at occasional small private retreats, and avoids all other interaction.

One thing that occurred to me the other day - in an amusing way - was that perhaps the way people talk about awakening is a useful part of the whole game. In the sense that there are phases where people have a lot of questions and doubts and need a lot of guidance, and phases where people feel a desire to do a lot of teaching, write books, go on the dharma talk circuit, start a class, etc, and other phases where people tend to be more insular, retreating from the world more, feeling disinclined to talk about everything. The "talk a lot/teach/write" phase serves the function of helping "spread the virus" or evangelizing, which is a necessary function, a natural part of the "organism's life cycle" so to speak. So that being in one phase or another is not better or worse, but just typical of that territory and part of how things "need" to be.

It does seem if you start mapping in detail two significant problems occur: the more detailed it is, the more individual (to the map creator) it is, and the less it embraces the general shared process across individuals and traditions; and second people start measuring themselves against the details and getting hung up on where they are in an unhelpful way.

On which topic, do you feel that 1st, 2nd and 3rd path are useful markers for the Seeing Phase? (I'm not sure they are useful; I know people who have "woken up" (in the 4th pathy sort of sense) with or without knowing about any kind of paths or subdivisions of that process. Is it just as problematic or non-problematic as dividing the Volition Phase into segments? Why use markers in one phase and not the other, for instance? (Besides that they (eta: 1st, 2nd, 3rd) are pre-existing vocabulary in the pragmatic dharma model).

Just wanted to say a big thank you to Nick. This makes a lot of sense my experience so far as well. This also lines up with what Adyashanti calls his 1st awakening (where the seeker goes away - which sounds a whole lot like technical 4th path) and his second awakening (full realization.)

My input: from what I have previously understood about the fetter model, many people who take it literally never believe they've gotten 3rd path b/c it's virtually impossible to uproot desire and aversion, although it is possible to minimize them. Let's just forget anything beyond that. So calling myself technical model 4th path has been helpful. Unlike many people, I still like labels. It helps keep me from spinning off into confusion and thought proliferation.

I like Nick's way of explaining the relationship between "fetters" and technical paths. It helps keep things in realistic perspective.

I am somewhat shy about identifying myself to people outside of my little posse here. Yesterday I was on an all-day Buddhist Geeks hangout, and somewhere in the later sessions, when I was with just three other people, I decided to ask people what traditions they were working with and where they were at in their practice. It just seemed at that point easier to communicate with them if I had some knowledge of about their POV. I then used my nomenclature to make sure no one thought I was trying to do anything so radical as claim enlightenment in the more traditional sense.

Chris Marti wrote: I'm not prone to creating maps, frankly. I suspect Kenneth's 8 stages were an attempt to map the post technical fourth path territory (stages five to eight). I wasn't paying that much attention to them until I had a conversation face to face with him in Lake Tahoe about three years ago. He was more articulate by then and I was more prone to pay attention to him and not tune him out. That was my first face to face meeting with him after the KFD-DFRC Schism

I notice that the videos of Kenneth describing all of his stages are no longer accessible. So I guess this discussion is, as are so many things, a work in progress. For awhile I was hunting for them in a desperate attempt for someone to tell me where to go and what to do when I got there. Nick's description is easier to work with. I am at this point more relaxed about everything. I should be good and go post on my thread now.

I would have to say that for me Kenneth's later stages model is fairly accurate of some things that happen after 4th path. Not necessarily in that order and I think the descriptions could use a lot of help. Especially 8th stage.

I also have a sneaking suspicion (im pretty sure of this in my own experience) that one can train the mind to recognise the absence of 'objects' (nama/rupa) right at the moment/s when the mind/body comes to after a cessation moment. For me there is a short period of rebooting. I found/find it very insightful to explore what exactly arises. It has helped me arrive at where i find myself (my description above) in practice.

What is rebooting? And what is presumably absent right before whatever gets rebooted? This is why i find the cessations to be a goldmine for important insight.

I should mention that everytime i practice in the way i described above, it automatically results in multiple cessations after some time, which made me look closer at the cessation's entrance and exit experience. The entrance experience seems to be triggered by the letting go of nama/rupa and thus the co-arising 'objects' which i see as mind created, concieved from the previously unsegregated, unborn, nameless and shapeless field of experience (hint).

This sort of makes sense as that seems to be what happens when one is in high equanimity and is very equanimous with all the formations of mind i.e the 'objects' given shape and name. The view from high E (11th nana) is wide, panoramic, calm and all encompassing of all that movement of arsing and passing of the 'objects' being given shape and name and instantaneously hitting sense doors to instantaneously trigger feeling tone (which itself can become another 'object') and all the rest that generally follows. When there are moment/s of a mature equanimity/specific neutrality towards all these 'formations' of mind/body that is when it all fades/ loses momentum and then......."blip".

Pre and post 'blip' are a possible goldmine that can possibly be ignored i think. Perhaps also one can train towards how a cessation comes about and then learn to repeat at will as many as one wishes and any given moment (which is the case for myself). If one is in high E and wondering what to do (or not do) to get to SE, perhaps contemplating the cessation of all 'objects' from an equanimity/specific neutrality will trigger their fading and then ...."blip".

(Asking to myself) Is it true that only 'objects' have a cause and thus are the only 'things' that have cessation? If experience is 'objectless' then there is no no cause for, no arising and no passing of anything, right? ( as i often do with my posts on dharma forums im conversing outlioud to myself seeing if ideas and notions become clearer for myself so please weigh in with an opinion if you wish. I like to hold these notions lightly.)

Which then may make the stanza that sariputta heard but once to get SE seem plausible.

"Of all those things that from a cause arise,
Tathagata the cause thereof has told;
And how they cease to be, that too he tells,
This is the doctrine of the Great Recluse."[2]
www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/nyanaponika/wheel090.html#i

He supposedly experienced a monent of the deathless right then and there. A moment where all 'objects' ceased? No 'thing' to pass away?

I think that the following instruction or rather description by mahasi sayadaw is pointing to something important practice-wise aswell concerning the post-cessation period.

It has already been stated that phalasamapatti (fruition attainment) first begins to occur when arising from nirodhasamapatti. This phalasamapatti being free from raga (passion), etc., it is also called suññata(the Void). As it is free of ræga-nimitta (one of the attributes of sentient existence), it is also known as animitta. Moreover, as it is free from passionate desire such as raga, etc., it is also called appanihita. As such, phassa which is also included in this samapatti is also known as suññata, animitta and appanihita. As phassa (contact) takes place by dwelling upon Nibbana, which is known as suññata (the Void), animitta (the Unconditioned), and appanithta (freedom from longing or desire), with attentive consciousness of mind, it is called suññata, etc. The answer, therefore, is that the three kinds of phassa, viz: suññataphassa, animittaphassa and appanihitaphassa first begin to take place.

For better understanding, it may be stated that when arising from nirodhasamæpatti,contact takes place with suññata-nibbana, a condition devoid of kilesa-sankhara to which the mind has been directed as its sense-object. Contact is also made with animitta-nibbana which is devoid of or free from any sign of nimitta. Then comes mere awareness of contact with appanihita-nibbana, a condition free from vehement desire, which is the sense object that has been contemplated. www.dhammaweb.net/mahasi/book/Mahasi_Say...ulavedalla_Sutta.pdf

Post 'blip' is perhaps free from kilesa, vehement desire and more importantly 'signs'? Free of signs? Nimitta or sign perhaps being some 'thing' with name and shape? But then there is awareness of contact once again as the 'objects' re-arise but now without vehement desire for them? A lag before craving crops up again? Perhaps at least till the post cessation bliss becomes something to crave and cling to maybe?

Nick

Disclaimer, please take everything i write with a grain of salt and healthy skepticism and explore for yourself as that is how it should be.

This has been the biggest trigger for contemplation in a while for me. Thanks for being responsive. It triggers more investigation in myself. All good.

Ps. These days im less and less interested in stages of awakening and more interested in exploring what presents itself in and of itself. It all just seems like cause and effect anyhoo. Plus i sense a slight apprehension at fast progress as i sense that the fetters when completely absent may live up to the holy monk image (it would seem the diehard theravadan in me still takes name and shape) and im married and with a baby on the way, so im certainly in no hurry to become a fabled arahant. Im happy to explore whatever comes up, or doesnt come up. This seems to representative of the whole being in the stream and being taken by its current in a certain direction regardless. 7 lifetimes says the dogma. Hehe

Edited x 6 for extra info, clarity and spelling and incessant need to make things sound better.

Actually im holding off on calling what is absent directly post-blip. I need to explore it more. Having the intention to pay attention to what is absent post-blip may actually trigger 'things' to take shape. Perhaps having the intention overtime eventually triggers a memory response when there eventually is no 'wanting' to know what is absent thus there is just 'knowing' what is absent without the wanting to know. Tricky stuff. I thought i had a firm opinion about this. Guess not. Hehe.

Nick

Nikolai Stephen Halay wrote: ....... and with a baby on the way...

Congratulations!

This is a fantastic thread, thanks so much.

+1 Congrats Nick!

I love the symmetry of this, so I wanted to add on... Right now I'm working on initial awakening. The critical moment for investigation seems to be when clarity is already established and I ask a basic question like "what is experience/mind/awareness". The body seems to open and then react to re-close itself. The reaction seems to recreates a self, an object of awareness, and then restablishes/reorients experience in duality again (but is so fast that at this point I'm just repeating someone else's model, I can't say this for certain). This is my cutting edge right now. I found it wild that your cutting edge is pretty similar, albeit with a >cessation< as the critical starting moment.

This stuff is pretty cool. Great conversation!

Although in the long run in matters little to me these days about the distinctions I do remember that it DID matter to me and so it helps to talk it out and perhaps assign some concepts to satisfy the desire to 'know' what is what. This is how I conceptualised what my practice seemed to be pointing to.

There are traditionally 8 different types of ariya-puggala ('noble' ones) talked of in the suttas. I think the Abhidhamma distingishes them by mere moments (see quote below) but there is I think references to 8 actual types of ariyas in the suttas, which don't make sense to me to distinguish one type from another by mere moment/s. For example in the Pathama Atthapuggala Sutta: Eight Individuals quoted below, there are 8 individuals talked of as 'worthy of receiving gifts'. It would take a lightning fast gift-giver to give gifts to all 8 individual ariyas if the 'path' versus 'fruit gainer' versions were separated by mere moments only. It just seems silly to call two individuals as 'two individuals' that are 'worthy of gifts' but separated by mere moments.

www.palikanon.com/english/wtb/a/ariya_puggala.htm

According to the Abhidhamma, 'supermundane path', or simply 'path' (magga), is a designation of the moment of entering into one of the 4 stages of holiness - Nibbāna being the object - produced by intuitional insight (vipassanā) into the impermanence, misery and impersonality of existence, flashing forth and forever transforming one's life and nature. By 'fruition' (phala) is meant those moments of consciousness which follow immediately thereafter as the result of the path, and which in certain circumstances may repeat for innumerable times during the life-time.

(I) Through the path of Stream-winning (sotāpatti-magga) one 'becomes' free (whereas in realizing the fruition, one 'is' free) from the first 3 fetters (samyojana) which bind beings to existence in the sensuous sphere, to wit:
(1) personality-belief (sakkāya-ditthi; s. ditthi),
(2) skeptical doubt (vicikicchā),i
(3) attachment to mere rules and rituals (sīlabbata-parāmāsa; s. upādāna).

To me, I took MCTB 1st path as the entrance in 'becoming free' from the first 3 fetters, and technical 4th path was a 'complete' freedom from those three fetters. Notice in the sutta reference below that there is "the one who has entered the stream" VS "the one who has entered upon the course for the realisation of the fruit of stream entry". 2 x different individuals. Makes sense to me to not seperate them by mere 'moments'.

Monks, there are these eight individuals who are worthy of gifts, worthy of hospitality, worthy of offerings, worthy of reverential salutation, the unsurpassed field of merit for the world. Which eight?

The one who has entered the stream, the one who has entered upon the course for the realization of the fruit of stream-entry, the once-returner, the one who has entered upon the course for the realization of the fruit of once-returning, the non-returner, the one who has entered upon the course for the realization of the fruit of non-returning, the arahant, the one who has entered upon the course for arahantship

Monks, these are the eight individuals who are worthy of gifts, worthy of hospitality, worthy of offerings, worthy of reverential salutation, the unsurpassed field of merit for the world.

To my thinking, technical 4th path was still only about the 'plane of seeing' and felt very connected to the initial 1st path realisation/cessation as simply an eventual result or the 'fruit' of it. There was much seeing that triggered MCTB 1st path, and there was a lot more seeing that moved me through to technical 4th path, which is simply about seeing still. Daniel has said that at what he calls 4th, there is no more to see via insight. Of course, one has seen all one can see.

The path nowadays seems a different beast from all that 'seeing' done up till technical 4th path. Thus now the path is a path of volition, and it is hard to deny that it is a path that is dealing directly with the remaining fetters. I mean why all the fuss about actual freedom transformations, and working with emotions, grounding emotions in the body, etc for many of the technical 4th pathers way back (including myself)? We'd seen as much as insight could allow to see, that there is no watcher, no self, no witness, no agency, and yet, there was all this stuff (fetters?) to deal with still.

This is was a way I conceptualised the disparities I thought I saw/felt. For me, practice-wise, it was very helpful to think of it like so, as I have had much theravadin conditioning to contend with and so it gelled well with this way of conceptualising the differences between technical 4th, and fetter free stages.

Nick

Edited x 2

@Tom - Though I don't use the same framework as Nikolai, his description makes a lot of sense to me, as in hindsight "4th path" seems to have been a transition from one kind of practice to another, the beginning of a new phase of things, a significant change, but by no means "all done" in the way it initially seemed. Everyone I know personally has gone through major development after 4th path, with exactly these sorts of issues: dealing with the intensity of emotional stuff, gradually loosening up entanglement with "karmic" stuff (habitual behaviors, beliefs, ways of engaging with the world and other people, etc.), and gradual changes in what "practice" means and how awakening is understood and how "self" is understood. For me, 4th path felt like "being reborn"... and then the journey began. Yes, there had been a journey before, but that journey wrapped up and it turned out there was a whole nother journey, so to speak.

So I'm finding his articulation of things quite interesting for the commonalities it has with my own experience, even though mine has been couched in a devotional theistic context.

Ona Kiser wrote: Everyone I know personally has gone through major development after 4th path, with exactly these sorts of issues: dealing with the intensity of emotional stuff, gradually loosening up entanglement with "karmic" stuff (habitual behaviors, beliefs, ways of engaging with the world and other people, etc.), and gradual changes in what "practice" means and how awakening is understood and how "self" is understood.

Very well said, Ona.

Okay, so are we saying then that technical 4th is actually stream entry? Sorry to be such a tool. Just trying to keep my head above water, as usual. I personally would be more inclined to say fetter model 2nd b/c desire and aversion are greatly reduced.