This is the story of my personal experience [so far] with Buddhism. This story is deeply integrated with how I understand rationality, science, reality, ethics and the human mind.

First Experiences

My first experience with Buddhism was in my high school's World Religions class. For homework, I had to visit a religious institution. I was getting bad grades, so I asked if I could get extra credit for visiting two and my teacher said yes. I picked an Amida Buddhist church and a Tibetan Buddhist meditation center.

I took off my shoes at the entrance to the Tibetan Buddhist meditation center. It was like nothing I had ever seen before in real life. There were no chairs. Cushions were on the floor instead. The walls were covered in murals. There were no instructions. People just sat down and meditated. After that there was some walking meditation. [...]

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Outline:

(00:17) First Experiences

(01:54) Initial Search

(06:45) The 8 Jhanas

(08:35) Vipassana

(09:58) Zen

(17:36) Meditation

(20:52) Stream Entry

(22:44) Insight Cycles

(24:05) Second Insight Cycle

The original text contained 2 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:

Source:

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.