This is a Pariyatti Presents... event recorded May 25th, 2025 with Paul R. Fleischman, interviewed by Kory Goldberg, titled 'How the Brain and the Body Make Vipassana Possible'. This is part two of 'The Power of Small Changes' interview series.

Paul R. Fleischman

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Kory Goldberg's & Michelle Décary's 'Along the Path': store.pariyatti.org/along-the-path-3.

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This is a Pariyatti Presents... event recorded May 4th, 2025 with Paul R. Fleischman, interviewed by Kory Goldberg, titled 'The Psychological and Social Wellsprings of Vipassana'. This is part one of 'The Power of Small Changes' interview series.

Paul R. Fleischman

Watch the video or download the audio.

Download Audio (48MB)

Video copyright, 2025 Pariyatti

View the archive of all Pariyatti Presents... Events.

More by Dr. Paul R. Fleischman at store.pariyatti.org/paul_fleischman.

Kory Goldberg's & Michelle Décary's 'Along the Path': store.pariyatti.org/along-the-path-3.

View more books and audio resources available at the online Pariyatti bookstore.

Epilogue: Manjushri’s Burden from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

I SET THE CHAIN SAW down on the stump of the tree which I had just felled and sat down on the log to drink from my canteen. It was the very same orange water bag I had purchased to take with me to India two years ago. I looked up through the bare November trees at the sun edging toward the apex of its low autumn arc. Then I looked at the piles of cordwood I’d accumulated along the road during the past months. There would certainly be enough for the stoves before the first snowfall. Satisfied, I picked up my saw and headed back to the house. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 14 - Time Past and Time Present from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

DELHI HOT LIKE A KILN. I wandered through empty streets at midday making final connections. London like a plunge into ice water, only hours later. I stood shivering in the transit lounge, my thin wool shawl wrapped tight around my shoulders, my socks incongruous in Indian sandals, even more incongruous in white pajama clothes, amidst fur and leather coats, heavy sweaters and fat, flushed, liquor-stained faces. I was emaciated by comparison. Crash landing in Boston, hours late. Time sense destroyed. I slept last in Calcutta. A strange wakefulness haunted my body. Alert to ponderous events all around me, I followed my breath as a customs official began pawing through my bag. Suddenly he stopped and handed it back to me with an apologetic smile. I felt a rising thickness in my throat to get beyond that door. She would be waiting. At first she wasn’t sure she could, but after letters back and forth, she’d finally agreed. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 13 - The Essence is Anicca from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

THE TWO-BLADED FAN above my head cut ponderously through the thick, hot air. It was late April and the annual three-month heat wave was in full bloom in Madras. My own body temperature had gone amok with some indeterminate fever, and I’d spent the past three days in this hotel room waiting quietly for my illness to pass. It was a comfortable enough place to be sick, with its clean, white walls and stone floors, and outside, a balcony that overlooked gardened courtyards where huge trees reached up to the third tier of rooms. The dark and faintly musky atmosphere was almost Mediterranean. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 12 - The Great Blind Sea Turtle from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

ON MY RETURN TO the monastery from my brief journey out into the world, I had been warmly greeted by the head monk, Nyayaka Maha Thera, and by my two friends Bhikkhus Sunno and Ratanapala, who were convinced that I had returned for good. It was quite a homecoming. I asked Sunno if he might like to take a walk out to my hut one afternoon and have some tea so we could talk. He was quite pleased by the invitation and promised to visit me soon. The days went by, though, and he didn’t come. One day after lunch, I sent the young boy who served me food back into the meditation quarters to fetch Sunno. I didn’t think it proper for me simply to wander in there unexpectedly. Sunno appeared with a big smile, and after apologizing for not being able to make it to my kuti, invited me to his quarters. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 11 - The Path of Power from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

THE LIGHT OF GOD. Ishvara, the Lord. Divine Luminescence. Seen with the mind’s eye only through a mind that can see. I stared with eyelids drawn immobile at an empty black background. The shimmering disk of cool brilliance was not an object but an event, which eyes cannot see. My attention stayed with my breath as it had for days, the tiny touch of my life against thin skin. The awareness on that single point was almost unbroken. That stillness of mind created the light, the light that cannot be seen, only known, until I felt the light, breathed light as a tingly, glowing star. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 10 - The Great Elder from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

AFTER TWO WEEKS OF isolation in the forest, I left the monastery for a short time, mostly to find out about the possibility of returning to Burma. It had been rumored that tourist visas to that country were going to be extended longer than seven days. If so, I could return there soon, and possibly stay for as long as a month. The rumors proved false, however, and I was left with a very open end to my trip. There was no particular rush to get back to Burma now, since that would probably be the last stop on my way home. And I certainly wasn’t ready to return home. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 9 - A Taste of Stillness from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

ON THE MORNING OF the tenth day I interrupted my return to the hut following my breakfast to catch my breath on a high flat rock that afforded a view of the entire valley beneath the monastery. The dawn haze had burned off, revealing the neighboring valley, whose sharply edged checkerboard fields stood out in contrast to the surrounding jungle. Perhaps I romanticized by calling this place “jungle” when, in fact, farmland was everywhere. But there is so much unclaimed land in Ceylon that nowhere in the countryside are you so far from the uncultivated forests that you’d not have second thoughts about wandering off in broad daylight, much less in the dark. No cobras here, though, the monks told me. The mongooses made sure of that. One of them was staring at me from a rock higher up the path. His elongated, rodentlike body was covered with prickly fur that made him look as though he’d been dunked in motor oil. His snoutish face was kind of cute, though, and I’d often seen the monks feeding these animals in the courtyard, as a good turn, no doubt, for the animal’s appetite for poisonous snakes. ...

by Eric Lerner

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Ch. 8 - Unmeasured Time from Journey of Insight Meditation by Eric Lerner

THE ENTIRE ISLAND OF Ceylon has only eight million inhabitants, and as I stood idly waiting for a bus or walked through the streets of Colombo, the capital city, I no longer felt the constant psychic assault that I had been aware of in India. The most obvious difference, however, was that Ceylon was a Buddhist country. Even the most casual conversation easily turned to a common appreciation of the Dharma. There are probably no more Ceylonese who actually practice the heart of Buddha’s teachings than there are real practitioners of any religion anywhere, but everyone I met at least understood the value of his teachings and was willing to support those who really did wish to pursue them. ...

by Eric Lerner

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