Content uploaded by Charles Laughlin
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Charles Laughlin on Oct 03, 2020
Content may be subject to copyright.
International Journal of
Transpersonal Studies
/,4-%
224% VOL. 36, Iss. 1 (2017) 13)#,%
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry: !e
Signi"cance of Buddhist Contemplative
Development for Transpersonal Studies
Charles D. Laughlin
Carleton University, O%awa, Canada
/,,/63()2!.$!$$)3)/.!,6/1+2!3 (<0$)')3!,#/--/.2#))2%$4)*3231!.20%12/.!,234$)%2
!13/&3(% 4$$()2334$)%2/--/.2(),/2/0(8/--/.2!.$3(% 1!.20%12/.!,
28#(/,/'8/--/.2
:)26/1+)2,)#%.2%$4.$%1! 1%!3)5%/--/.2<1)"43)/./.#/--%1#)!,/%1)5!3)5% /1+2)#%.2%
:)213)#,%)2"1/4'(33/8/4&/1&1%%!.$/0%.!##%22"83(%/41.!,2!.$%62,%<%12!3)')3!,/--/.23(!2"%%.!##%03%$&/1).#,42)/.
)..3%1.!3)/.!,/41.!,/&1!.20%12/.!,34$)%2"8!.!43(/1)9%$!$-).)231!3/1/&)')3!,/--/.2/1-/1%).&/1-!3)/.0,%!2%#/.3!#3
$)')3!,#/--/.2#))2%$4
%#/--%.$%$)3!3)/.
!4'(,).%.2/18$/32./2%,&!.$231%!-%.318:%2)'.);#!.#%/&4$$()23#/.3%-0,!3)5%$%5%,/0-%.3&/1
31!.20%12/.!,234$)%2 International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 36 (<0$7$/)/1'(<02$/)/1'
)*32
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 17
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 36(1), 2017, pp. 17–38
Far better than sovereignty over the earth, or far better than going to the abodes of the devas,
or far better than ruling supreme over the entire universe, is the attainment of Sotāpatti Fruition.
The Buddha, Dhammapada, vers e 178
A monk once went to Gensha, and wanted to learn where the entrance to the path of truth was.
Gensha asked him, “Do you hear the murmuring of that brook?” “Yes, I hear it,” answered the
monk. “There is the entrance,” the Master instructed him.
C. G. Jung, Psychology and Religion, ¶878
Charles D. Laughlin
Carleton University
Ottawa, Canada
Ethnographers often work among what I call
polyphasic cultures2—that is, among peoples who
consider experiences had in alternative states of
consciousness to be both real and signicant. Hence,
an experientially grounded ethnography will inevitably
have to incorporate the more transpersonal domains
of experience, and the realizations and psychological
transformations that stem from such experiences.
However, despite such realizations often nding their
way into cultural expressions as narratives, mythopoeic
symbolism, ritual enactments and art, the signicance
is often missed due to the lack of requisite transpersonal
experience on the part of the eldworker or lab
researcher. As my colleagues and I have argued many
times elsewhere, the study of transpersonal experiences
requires transpersonal methods (Laughlin, 1989, 1994a,
2011; Laughlin, McManus, & d’Aquili, 1990). Simply
put, if I want to know, I have to do what is necessary
to know. As Ken Wilber (2005) suggested in his book,
A Sociable God, one begins the process of inquiry with
the injunction, “If you want to know this, do this”
(p. 156). When one does “this” (i.e., meditate, dance,
take the magic herb, carry out the ritual) then certain
experiences arise as a consequence, and then perhaps a
conversation ensues with one’s host or guide, one learns
what those experiences mean both for oneself and for
one’s host culture.
In this paper I want to share how transpersonal
experiences arising for me along a path of spiritual
inquiry may, in retrospect, be understood as part of
a single maturational process. I will describe several
experiences I have had over the course of nearly 50 years
as a meditator, and roughly 35 years as a Buddhist insight
meditation practitioner, seven years of which were spent as
a Tibetan Tantric Buddhist monk. I want to sketch these
experiences in order to show how one follows the other
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry:
e Signicance of Buddhist Contemplative Development
for Transpersonal Studies1
Based on the author’s nearly 50 years of meditation, it is observed that as a given alternative state is
accessed and used over the span of years, experiences and capacities within that state are not merely
static but may themselves shift as a practitioner develops neuropsychologically. An ethnographer
using a substance within the context of a cultural practice may gain helpful direct insights into
that cultural practice, but the researcher may fail to realize that the state attained by a novice may
be substantively dierent from that gained by an elder or shaman with years of experience in the
practice. e author’s meditation led to insight that visual and other phenomenal experiences are
constructed out of sensory particles, or sensory dots. is practice later led to a state in which pure
awareness was aware only of itself, and to an experiential realization of the Buddhist teaching of no-self.
Keywords: polyphasic culture, Buddhism, phenomenology, stream-entry, sensory dots, no-self
https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2017.36.1.17
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
18 Laughlin
in a retrospectively obvious and causally ecacious way. I
will take the reader from my realization of the pixilated
nature of sensory experience, through the realization
of the impermanence of the self to the experience of
what eravada Buddhists call “stream-entry,” the rst
conscious experience of Nirvana. I oer this description,
not to replace the necessity of directly experiencing these
way-points (after all, “if you want to know this, do this”),
but rather: (1) to sensitize transpersonal anthropologists
and other researchers to the developmental dimension
of transpersonal experiences, and (2) to underscore
the empirical evidence for states of consciousness that
transcend sensory experience. e terminology I will use
will be from both eravada Buddhism and Husserlian
phenomenology. Although the goals of Buddhist and
Husserlian phenomenology are dierent, I am mixing
their terminology here because: (1) both held sway in
my own development, and I have used both frameworks
in making sense of my experiences, (2) both eravada
Buddhist methods and Husserlian methods constitute
transcendental phenomenologies (Hanna, 1993a, 1995;
Larrabee, 1981),3 (3) both methods are productive of
good science (Chavan, 2007), and (4) in some cases
the Husserlian interpretations and terminology are
less loaded with ideological baggage than are Buddhist
accounts.
Learning To Meditate
I
was origina lly taught to meditate by one of my professors,
the late Dr. LeRoy Johnson, while doing graduate
work in anthropology at the University of Oregon in
1967. LeRoy showed me how to sit in half-lotus position
and focus attention on the rising and falling of my belly.
I quickly learned that with increasing concentration
to the exclusion of distractions (other objects, verbal
chatter, etc.) came a deeper and deeper calm leading to
single-minded bliss-states I would later learn were typical
of absorption states (samādhi, jhāna; see Gunaratana,
1988; Snyder & Rasmussen, 2009), and that the practice
was in fact samatha—cultivation of single-mindedness
leading eventually to a special state of complete calm and
one-pointed concentration that Buddhists call upacara
samādhi, or “access concentration,” so named because
the mind is free to choose to concentrate upon an object
or remain indierent to the object, and thus may choose
to enter absorption states or not.
But I am getting ahead of my story. At the time I
learned to easily enter samādhi using belly concentration,
I knew nothing about Buddhism or insight meditation,
and simply meditated to relax and enter bliss-states as
a palliative to the rigors of graduate school. I became
adept at what I later understood was, from the Buddhist
point of view, frozen-ice samādhi—frozen, because the
state of mind is utterly devoid of any burning questions
that would lead to any insight into the nature of mind.
Inevitably, I grew bored with bliss-highs and dropped
meditation work for the following decade or so.
When I took up meditation again, it was because
I was having experiences that triggered avid questions
about consciousness. A years-long process of unfolding
dream-work that I have described in detail elsewhere
(Laughlin, 2011, pp. 409–421), accompanied by taking
up hatha yoga practice, lead eventually to spontaneous
transpersonal experiences and serious questions about
mind that had been absent from my earlier so-called
frozen ice attitude. I sought and found guidance from
Buddhist teachers4 in Canada under whose tutelage I
learned the causally entangled relationship between
tranquil single-mindedness (samatha) and mindfulness
(or vipassana; see Goleman, 1984; Solé-Leris, 1986;
anissaro, 1997; Johansson, 1969. pp. 88–102S). It
was during lengthy meditation retreats, ostensibly under
the inuence of Buddhist methods and guidance, that
I learned to establish what Edmund Husserl (1989)
liked to call the phenomenological attitude—that is, the
suspension of everyday conditioned interpretations of,
reactions to, and beliefs about the world and the self (i.e.,
the natural and personal attitudes) and the cultivation of
a series of epochés
5 that allows the contemplative to study
aspects of consciousness through direct introspection
(Husserl, 1931; Kockelma ns, 1967; Mil ler, 1984; Schmitt,
1959). is shift in consciousness is not a momentary
choice, but involves a fundamental reorganization
of perception with life-long consequences. Arthur
Deikman (1982) has argued that mature contemplation
involves a process of deautomatization, “an undoing of
the automatic processes that control perception and
cognition” (p. 139)—a freeing-up, as it were, of natural
attitude conditioning requisite to the development of
the phenomenological attitude.
Any discernable attribute of consciousness
may be bracketed, deautomatized, and studied using
mindfulness methods. For instance, one may choose
to isolate the color red and study the gradation of hues
cognized as red, or the feelings evoked by reddish
hues. Or, one may choose to bracket the relationship
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 19
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
between visual patterns on a page and the meaning they
evoke as words. Wine tastings under a sommelier are
essentially phenomenological exercises leading to a more
sophisticated understanding of the avorful nuances of
wine. e potentially bracketable qualities and processes
of experience are virtually endless. However, some foci
are more auspicious than others, depending upon the
goal or ideology associated with the meditation being
practiced. In Buddhist psychology, focusing upon the
impermanence of phenomena is more important and
developmentally productive than focusing upon discrete
qualia. In Husserlian terms, this whole process of self-
inquiry is called phenomenological reduction (Held,
2003, p. 21), the intent of which is to learn to parse raw
sensory presentation (the things themselves) from knee-
jerk interpretation.
As any seasoned meditator will attest, all sorts of
strange sensory experiences arise during the maturation
of contemplation. Many of these experiences are what
Buddhist psychology calls signs (nimitta), some of which
are what may be called countersigns (patibhaganimitta)
for the particular meditation object upon which one is
focused (see Buddhaghosa, 1991; Laughlin, McManus,
& Webber, 1985; Snyder & Rasmussen, 2009, pp. 57–
63). Regardless of the object of concentration (breath,
heartbeat, water, ame, sensations arising from the soles
of the feet, kasin.a practice6, so forth), eventually most
meditators will experience imagery that is associated
with that object. For instance, many who meditate
upon the breath moving in and out of the nostrils see
bubbles of one sort or another (“sh eggs,” “bubble
wrap,” so forth). Meditation on other objects may
result in intricate lacy patterns, smoke, various light
phenomena, and so forth. ese are the countersigns
of the object of consciousness. ey are causally and
unconsciously associated with the object, but are not
logically predictable from the object. Objects are
associated with numerous countersigns, and these
countersigns tend to indicate stages in the development
of the meditation. Every Zen koan has its countersign(s)
and by reporting these to the teacher will determine
where the meditator is along the path of contemplative
maturation. Frequently, the arising of countersigns are
interpreted by meditators as transpersonal experiences.
Viewed in this way, the range of transpersonal
experiences had by a serious practitioner over time may
be considered as way stations along a maturing spiritual
path.
If, instead of remaining focused on the original
object (breath, eidetic image, sensations at the bottom of
the feet in walking meditation, etc.), the meditator shifts
focus to the countersign, applying sucient intensity of
concentration may lead to absorption (jhāna) into the
sign—that is, the collapsing of the watching-watched
(subject-object) duality. Absorption is a natural function
of an interested brain. One normally experiences
absorption when watching a movie in a cinema, or while
engrossed in a good book. But the kind of absorption
I am describing here is into an image produced wholly
within the mind’s eye. Moreover, the concentration
may well be beyond the intensity one normally brings
to reading or watching a lm. In addition, the sign is
usually simple and not very dynamic. Again, the sign
is associated with the original object—it is a sign of the
object.
Absorption states are frequently numinous,
especially for beginning meditators. Among other
things, the jhānas are often accompanied by bliss (pīti) of
varying intensities, dynamics and locations in the body.
Meditators may describe themselves as feeling a frisson,
a “rush,” joyous, centered, exhilarated, pleasurable,
ecstatic, and so forth. e loci of bliss may be in the
so-called chakras (energy centers in the body), perhaps
also owing up or down the central channel. For the
duration of the absorption and for a period afterwards,
the meditator feels good, comfortable, tranquil and
energized (Laughlin, 1994b). Buddhist meditators
are taught to utilize these experiences to energize
their insight practice—like plugging-in to a psychic
battery—but not to make the mistake of considering
the absorption state as the goal of insight practice, no
matter how numinous the experience. When I was
early on practicing frozen-ice samadhi, I had become
essentially a pīti-junkie.
Apprehending Sensorial "Dots"
The pursuit and maturation of the phenomenological
attitude typically produces a state of mind marked
by astonishment and wonder—what Zen practitioners
call the beginners mind (Suzuki, 1970)—and by a
cognition relatively free of the constraints of received,
culturally conditioned frames of reference (the natural
attitude of everyday consciousness; see Fink, 1981). is
freedom allows the inner-directed study of the factors
of consciousness as objects of awareness, rather than
conditioned attention to phenomena naïvely presumed
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
20 Laughlin
in the natural attitude to be “out there” somewhere and
requiring response (see Funke, 1981). e contemplative
comes to realize that each and every state of mind is
componential and unitar y. In addition, the contemplative
can slow the process of neurocognitive entrainment
down to the very simple so as to discern the atomic levels
of experience: pixels, temporal epochs, impermanence of
objects, purity, parallel processes, componential nature
of the empirical ego, or me (and cognized ego, or I), and
visible and invisible causation.
is is a very crucial point, for even if one
has access to the very nest neuroscience available, if
the phenomenological data remain naïve (pre-epoché,
pre-reduction, natural attitude laden), it is very likely
the neurophenomenology will be naïve as well—and
very likely erroneous. For example, it is apparent to
most mature contemplatives known to the author that
at some point in their meditative careers they came to
realize that sensory data are pixelated, particulated,
or granular to perception (Laughlin, 1992; Laughlin,
McManus, & d’Aquili, 1990). In other words, there
comes a time when many contemplatives reach a specic
epoché within which they are able to perceive that their
entire sensorium (multimodal sensory eld) is made up
of points (dots, granules, particles, bindus, yods, and so
forth). After the epoché, the sensorium is experienced as
a eld of ickering, pulsating pixels that is perceptually
and cognitively distinguishable into sensory modes,
and within sensory modes into forms and events. e
fundamental act of perception is the abstraction and
reinforcement of invariant features within the order of
an unfolding and dissolving eld of dots (see Gibson,
1979). In my experience, apprehending the pixelated
nature of the senses is easiest to realize visually, but
eventually sounds, tastes, touches are all made up of
sensory particles. Once one realizes this epoché, one may
easily apprehend the granular texture of the sensorium
at will. Furthermore, when concentration upon sensory
molecular pixels reaches a sucient intensity, awareness
of gross sensory objects is lost, including the ego (see
below).
Whether or not a theorist has attained this dot
epoché is evident by how they experience and think
about their own consciousness, and what understanding
of consciousness they project upon others. For instance,
David Chalmers (1996), the Australian philosopher of
mind, has famously dened what he called the hard
problem of consciousness. By that he meant, after all
the mental functions are explained by reference to their
underlying neurophysiology, the fact of experience
remains a puzzle.
Why is it that when our cognitive systems engage in
visual and auditory information-processing, we have
visual or auditory experience: the quality of deep
blue, the sensation of middle C? . . . . It is widely
agreed that experience arises from a physical basis,
but we have no good explanation of why and how it
so arises. Why should physical processing give rise
to a rich inner life at all? (Chalmers, 1995, p. 201)
Nowhere in his presentation of the “hard problem” did
he evince the epoché noted above. He did not seem to
realize that his patch of “deep blue” is (1) pixelated, and
(2) a cognitive operation of his own brain. A patch of blue
is the brain’s symbolic representation of electromagnetic
energies striking the retinae and mediated by special
networks of cells. In other words, blue dots are the
brain’s way of representing a specic range of observable
electromagnetic frequencies to itself. When one realizes
that all sensory experience is a cognitive act on the part
of the brain, then the so-called hard problem vanishes,
or is at least rendered much easier.
No-Self
Realizing that sensory experience is pixelated, and that
pixels and elds of pixels arise and pass away each
and every moment of consciousness leads quite naturally
to understanding that all things constructed from these
sensorial dots are likewise impermanent, including all
thoughts, images, feelings, somatic sensations, perceptual
qualia, and so forth. is is one route to realizing that
everything one is conditioned to associate with the
ego—the personal or participating self, that which seems
to be me—is also impermanent. us it is not surprising
that disciplined contemplation will eventually lead to
the fall of the illusion of the permanent ego. is indeed
happened in my case. Sometime around 1980 I was
meditating in a hotel room on the Rue des Ecoles near
the College de France in Paris when I suddenly realized
(an instantaneous intuitive insight) that all sensory
modes are pixelated. Prior to that I had assumed that
only visual sensations were made up of dots. e “Rue
des Ecoles realization” (as I have called it ever since) led
directly to the realization of no-self soon thereafter.
ere is no better example of the tra nsformational
capacity of self-reection than the realization of no-self
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 21
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
(or not-self; see anissaro, 1999); that is, the realization
that there is no such thing as an empirical ego, no
permanent soul-entity, no little homunculus sitting inside
the brain watching the sensorial movie. One realizes that
the belief in a permanent ego is an artifact of cultural
conditioning that is easily dispelled by phenomenological
self-reection—by disciplined introspection leading to
direct experiences that bring one’s received self-model
into question. Because the realization of no-self is
derived empirically—that is, introspectively—it is safe
to say that any cultural tradition that encourages self-
reection as a path to self-knowledge and wisdom will
lead inevitably to apprehending that nothing that arises
in consciousness is permanent. is realization is not a
matter of taste, not a matter of opinion or ideological
commitment, not a matter of cultural custom, but
rather is one of empirical seeing of the self as it really is, a
transcendental and dynamic self-system.
Anatta
e best known tra dition of self-reection leading
to the realization of no-self, and the elevation of that
realization to a cornerstone of an ethno-phenomenology,
is the Buddhist doctrine of anatta (also known as no-self
or selessness; see Austin, 1998; Carlisle, 2006; Collins,
1982; Federman, 2011; Flanagan, 2011, pp. 93–98;
Harvey, 1995; Metzinger, 2009; Morris, 1994; Smith,
2010; anissaro, 1999). In eravada Buddhism, the
realization of anatta occurs automatically as a fruit of
insight meditation (vipassana). In a famous treatise
on insight meditation, the great Burmese meditation
master, Mahāsi Sayādaw (1994), noted that the belief
in a permanent ego falls away during stage four of a
19-stage maturation process leading to the realization
of Nibbāna (Nirvana) and its fruits. What Mahāsi’s
discourse obviously implies is that personal identication
with an enculturated self-model is common to all people
everywhere, even in Buddhist societies. is is a point
that ethnographer Melford Spiro (1993) made about his
Burmese Buddhist hosts. Aware of the central teaching
of anatta, he wished to see how that teaching inuenced
peoples’ self-understanding. Spiro noted that:
After a few months into my eld work . . . it became
apparent that I would have to change my research
plans because I discovered that the Burmese villagers
with whom I lived and worked do not internalize
the doctrine of anatta. Instead, they strongly believe
in the very ego or soul that this doctrine denies.
ey do so on two accounts, experiential and
pragmatic. First, because they themselves experience
a subjective sense of a self, the culturally normative
concept of an ego-less person does not correspond to
their personal experience. Second, and perhaps more
important, they nd the doctrine of seless person
not congenial to their soteriological [expectation of
salvation] aspirations. (Spiro, 1993, p. 119)
Spiro’s ndings among the Burmese mirror my own
among Tibetan Buddhist monks. Individuals rising to
the realization of no-self are exceptional in any society;
even those who’s local epistemology or ethnopsychology
describe the emptiness of the transcendental self.
Tibetan Buddhist monks may learn texts by heart that
extol the virtues of realizing no-self (the anatman), but
few actually practice the advanced insight meditations
leading to this realization. Indeed, if the realization of
no-self were all that easy, disciplined methods leading to
that realization would be irrelevant.
No-Self in the West
Practitioners of certain Western phenome-
nological and spiritual traditions have reached the same
realization based upon meditations focusing upon the
impermanent contents of the empirical ego. e great
phenomenologist, Edmund Husserl, concluded from his
own introspection that the ego is essentially empty of
content and is really no more than an enduring point
of view upon ever-changing content—a transcendental
ego as Husserl liked to say, tongue in cheek (see Husserl,
1989, pp. 103–104). e ego is an ineluctable focus
of intentionality, a perpetual orientation of attention,
perception, feeling, and cognition directed toward the
world of experience (Husserl, 1969, p. 23). A meditator
inevitably comes to this conclusion because she or he
nds that every content one focuses upon as “me”—as
“my” self—is impermanent; that is, all contents arise and
pass away within the sphere of consciousness; hence, the
old Su saw: you can’t step in the same river twice. All that
remains of “my” self is an enduring point of view always
present within the stream of consciousness, a point of
view that is devoid of permanent content, and yet is
identical to the unity of each moment of consciousness
(see Husserl, 1970, p. 545).
Meditation and the Neural-Self
What one is able to learn from the maturation
of awareness reported by advanced meditators ts well
with how the neurosciences describe how the brain
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
22 Laughlin
develops consciousness. Insight meditation of any kind
is essentially the disciplined turning of the spotlight
of consciousness upon the internal processes of the
transcendental self. It is clear now from research on
the neuropsychology of meditation that the process of
introspection is one that involves a reorganization of
the neural-self (Davidson, 1976; Damasio, 2003, 2010;
Deshmukh, 2006; Luders, Clark, & Toga, 2011; Luders
et al., 2012; Shapiro & Walsh, 1984; Varela, ompson,
& Rosch, 1991; Varela & Shear, 1999; Xu et al., 2014).
Moreover, this picture is consistent with Carl Jung’s
insistence that when one takes an active role in one’s own
individuation (maturation of the psyche), one ends up a
qualitatively dierent person than if one’s individuation
unfolds unconsciously (see e.g., Jung, 1967, paragraph
241).
A self-aware neural-self is dierent both
experientially and structurally than a non-aware
self or empirical ego. Indeed, neuropsychologically
speaking, awareness of self is mediated dierently than
awareness of the Other (Decety & Sommerville, 2003).
e introspective mind-state is mediated by a discrete
organization in the brain (Heatherton et al., 2006), and
as that system of networks develops through repetitive
application of self-awareness, the introspective faculty
grows, strengthens, and reorganizes (Goldberg, Harel,
& Malach, 2006; Gusnard, Akbudak, Shulman, &
Raichle, 2001; Murphy & Donovan, 1999). As more
is learned about how the brain mediates its own self-
reection , there is a concomitant and growing realization
among researchers of the value of introspective,
phenomenological, and meditative research in science
(Tart, 2001; Wallace, 2007, 2009).
Parenthetically, clinical psychologists have
studied an interesting syndrome that seems relevant
to the neural underpinnings of no-self—so called
depersonalization syndrome (Sierra, 2009). e condition
has its roots in early childhood, and onset after middle-
age is rare. It appears to be a consequence of childhood
anxiety (Lee, Kwok, Hunter, Richards, & David, 2012),
and there is no generally recognized treatment for the
disorder. Normal children and young adults may also
experience recurrent episodes of depersonalization.
Moreover, researchers have experimentally induced
the state in normal subjects using the drug umazenil,
a GABA A receptor antagonist (Cerqueira, Hallak,
Crippa, & Nardi, 2012). Depersonalization is a disorder
experienced as a detachment of awareness from emotions
(sometimes referred to as a numbing of emotions) and
the sensorium (sensory experience being, as it were, at
a distance and unreal; sense of disembodiment). Brain
imaging studies have shown that there is no damage to
sensorium or limbic structures leading to the suggestion
that depersonalization is a state of dissociation of
the awareness structures of the brain from those
mediating the senses and feelings. In studies in which
normal subjects were given repeated electrical shocks,
the subjects reported distinct depersonalization—a
phenomenological remove from sensorial experience—
and this was accompanied by a dramatic attening of
sympathetic nervous system reactivity (Oswald, 1959).
e best guess at present, based upon neural imaging
studies, is t hat depersonalization is mediated by prefrontal
cortical structures mediating awareness that disassociate
themselves from emotional and sensory inputs—that is,
they inhibit lower areas such as the insula and amygdala.
It is also signicant that the degree of severity of specic
symptoms like de-realism, threatened self, panic attacks
and the like will vary across cultures, and is especially
related to individualist vs. collectivist constructions of
the self (Sierra & David, 2007). It is entirely possible
that the mechanisms responsible for depersonalization
are active in the realization of no-self, as well as other
meditation-related transpersonal experiences, although
the motivation would be entirely dierent. As Castillo
(1991) has noted for the practice of Hindu yoga:
Yogis experience themselves as dual entities.
at is, they have two coconscious selves—a self
participating in the world, and an uninvolved
observing self—both aware of each other. To yogis
this is experienced as "true renunciation"—that is,
the renunciation of the participating self through
identication with the observing self. is subjective
experience serves to illustrate the power of culture in
the constitution of experience and behavior. (p. 1)
It is also signicant that as reorganization of the
neural-self progresses, direct experience may produce
dissonance relative to culturally received categories and
local models of self a nd consciousness. Indeed, as Murphy
and roop (2010) have shown, received categories
may become fuzzy in the extreme in order to remain
adaptive to changing experience and neuropsychological
maturation (see also Kosko, 1993; Laughlin, 1993; Rosch,
1978). For example, in many cultures it is dicult and
perhaps even irrelevant to make crisp distinctions among
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 23
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
alternative states of consciousness. For instance, Barbara
Herr (1981, p. 334) has described the fuzzy boundaries
Fijians draw between what in Western psychology are
called dream, hallucination, and vision. Bill Merrill
(1992) has described similar fuzziness of such categories
among the Ramámiru people of Mexico.
A crisp distinction between dreaming and
meditation becomes moot as well in the experience of
advanced meditators in Western society. For instance,
RM, a close friend of mine and one of the most advanced
meditators I have known, shared this dream sequence
with me:
I am looking down a long ramp. It is bright daylight,
a blue white light. Attractive females appear before
me beckoning me down the slope. I know these
women, but not by name. ey call me on, then
as I get close they fade and another appears. e
pace is slow and deliberate, no hurry. e sequence
eventually fades to light.
A few nights later, I had another dream in which
I enter a large space, like a gym, no ornaments or
distractions. Ahead, I see an older man playing
basketball with a few young boys, and I walk up
to them. e older master notices me approaching
and asks “are you interested?” I don’t need to answer
verbally, it is understood, I am interested. He leads
me to a side room. I sit, and he holds up a platter
of small objects. I am to choose one. e master
moves the platter to my forehead, and I am led to
choose a small black bowl. e third eye is now fully
open with light streaming. e master’s voice says
“you have chosen death.” Everything dissolves into
light and I am aware now of moving from a lucid
dream state into fully conscious meditation with
full concentration and at one with the universe,
samadhi. e meditation now had its focus, or koan,
the question had been answered. Calm, peaceful,
abiding. To be reborn or to redene ourselves, we
need to experience the death of the self. We need to
leave behind the constructs that impede our ability
to see the true nature of mind.
e “true nature of mind” to which RM alluded is in
part the inherent impermanence of any and all content
in the stream of consciousness, including anything that
might correspond to a xed, enduring soul, ego, self,
or identity. is does not mean that all of the feelings,
perceptions, self-concepts, habits, and so forth that
used to dene the “me” somehow magically vanish.
e sequelae of realizing no-self really involve a years-
long process of disengagement from and identication
with those mental factors. What falls away is the belief
that there exists a single seamless person, a permanent
“me,” that is at the center of all this mental and
physical conditioning. What does remain is Husserl’s
transcendental ego (see above), the inevitable pure
subjectivity in each moment of consciousness.
Stream-Entry
The penultimate experience in eravada Buddhist
vipassana meditation is sotāpatti (stream-entry)
or nirodha-samapattî (cessation). A meditator who has
attained stream-entry is called a sotāpanna, or stream-
winner. In Japanese Zen, this experience is called
satori or kenshō. Whatever term used, this experience is
considered to be the rst conscious absorption into and
realization of Nirvana (see Amaro & Pasanno, 2009;
Bodhi, 1999; Khema, 1994; anissaro, 2012a, 2012b).
e Samye-Ling Retreat
My own experience of stream-entry occurred in
1982 toward the end of a two month retreat at Kagyu
Samye Ling Tibetan Buddhist meditation center in
southern Scotland. At the beginning of the retreat I
was alternating two types of meditation, one being a
Tibetan Tantric meditation upon a deity known as
Khorlo Demchog, a standing, blue, erce, male gure
embracing the red female deity Dorje Pakmo in sexual
union while they da nce together in ames. I was not using
the complex instructions (sadhana) for the construction
of the image of the deities. I was simply working from
a photograph of the scene and internalizing it until I
was able to evoke the eidetic image at will and in detail
without the picture (another kind of kasn.a practice; see
above).
With this retreat my consciousness seemed to
have “learned set” (as Harry Harlow used to say) and
the visualization meditation developed far more rapidly
than during previous occasions. After a period of days,
the Demchog/Dorje Pakmo imagery took on a life of
its own and the meditation no longer required evoking
the eidetic image. e dancing couple would pop up
and move around my sensorium performing dierent
positions and movement that became meaningful to me
at an intuitive level. e imagery was never so strong
that I could hallucinate the imagery with my eyes open.
e imagery was more like a dream or vision.
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
24 Laughlin
Because I was heavily inuenced by C. G. Jung,
I had always assumed that male and female deities in
sexual union (yab-yum) were a symbolic representation
of the male and female aspects of my own unconscious.
eir movements, interactions, postures, and so forth
communicated to me what the relationship between my
male and female (the latter my anima, as Jung called
the cross-sex aspect of the male psyche; see Laughlin,
2001) processes were up to in the moment. e dancing
imagery became more and more autonomous, and I
became more and more comfortable with the meditation
taking its own course. Eventually, the imagery began to
simplify and the humanoid imagery transformed into
two spheres of light (bindus, in Buddhist terms; Tibetan:
thig le), one blue and the other rose, that danced (moved,
circled) around each other, sometimes separating,
sometimes merging, sometimes one bigger than the
other. Sometime later a much smaller third sphere would
appear between the blue and rose spheres, usually a
golden color. I interpreted the appearance of the third
sphere as representative of my self-awareness (or watcher),
identifying neither with the male nor the female aspect.
After a period of days, if I tried to construct the
eidetic image of Demphog/Dorje Pakmo, the spheres
would immediately pop up to take their place in the
sensorium. I was no longer able to hold a complex yab-yum
image of any kind without an immediate transformation
of the imagery to spontaneous bindu imagery—a
process I have learned to interpret as simplication
and purication of countersigns (patibhaganimitta; see
above). Interestingly, the bindus became permanent. To
this day, some thirty-plus years later, all I have to do is
close my eyes and concentrate on the inner screen of the
visual sensorium and the bindus appear, and their activity
reects the state of my consciousness at the moment. At
some point in this retreat I realized how the so called yin-
yang symbol may have originated in the direct experience
of ancient Chinese contemplatives.
e second type of meditation I used during
the Samye-Ling retreat was mindfulness of the breath
(ānāpānasmr
.ti), as taught in eravada Buddhism. I
would either focus my attention upon the breath entering
and leaving a nostril, or follow the breath down to the
pit of my stomach and then lodge my focus on one of
the chakras along the central channel as I imagined it
to be, just forward of my spine. I would often visualize
a tiny pea-sized blue bubble (bindu) with a Buddha
gure in it moving up or down the central channel, or
situated in a chakra.7 I used the breath concentration to
deepen the calm and increase the concentration that I
was using in the yab-yum work. Meanwhile, there were
other interesting experiences going on as well, especially
while dreaming (see Laughlin, 2011, Chap. 13 for more
details). ese were directly related to the core work of the
two alternating meditations I planned to do throughout
the retreat.
However, as the two previously distinct
meditations developed—or, perhaps more accurately,
as my consciousness developed during the course of
the meditations—they merged into a single exercise of
awareness that led eventually to stream-entry. Whether
beginning with the yab-yum, or the breathing meditation,
I quickly would reach the state of access concentration
(upacara samadhi; see above). In that state I had the
choice of meditating upon any aspect of consciousness to
the exclusion of all else. e instructions one receives in
Buddhist meditation training (so-called pith instructions)
is that regardless of what the original meditation, once
access concentration is reached and stabilized, the focus
of concentration should shift to the arising and passing of
phenomena. I followed this instruction assiduously, and
as the retreat proceeded, more and more time was spent
in this state and upon this focus. I had realized some time
before the retreat that if sucient concentration were
focused upon an object or other aspect of phenomena, an
absorption experience would likely arise. As I have said
above, in access concentration, the mature contemplative
can choose to enter or avoid absorption (the jhānas; see
above)—using absorption and its numinous qualities to
energize the main focus of meditation, whatever that
may be.
Stream-Entry
e constant, unremitting, and concentrated
focus of awareness upon arising and passing in access
concentration was usually upon the eld on sensorial
particles, and the residue of the two types of meditation
had simplied into a choice between concentrating on
the blue and rose spheres and what they were telling me
about the mind-state at the moment, or subtly shifting
focus to the arising and passing of the particles that made
up the sensorium in all modes (visual, auditory, tactile,
somaesthetic, feelings, so forth), including constituting
the spheres. I spent most of the time for days opting to
focus on the arising and passing of these sensory dots.
Eventually a sudden realization arose (instantaneous
intuition) that there was actually no arising, and that
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 25
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
the entire sensorium was passing. From that moment
my meditation focused upon the passing of the eld
of sensorial particles. is shift in awareness, be it
ever so subtle, led within hours to stream-entry. One
moment I was concentrating on the passing of sensorial
dots, the next the entire sensorium fell away like a vast
cosmic “dump” and all that remained was diamond-
clear awareness with no sensory eld whatever. e
experience must have been momentary, but during its
duration there was no sense of time, no sense of space,
no arising or passing of phenomena, no thoughts, no
feelings, no movement, no desires or aversions, no
choice, no coming or going—total liberation from
the tyranny of phenomena over consciousness. e
experience is ineable simply because the only way to
describe it to others is by way of metaphors, which of
course are drawn from the experience of phenomena.
ere is no way to speak of Nirvana, save by the use of
words that connote sensory objects or concepts. Even
the word Nirvana itself is a metaphor, meaning to blow
out the ames of desire and aversion. For that duration
there was not a scintilla of phenomenal reality. ere is
just what I would call pure awareness with only itself
as object.
e moments following stream-entry were
lled with inexpressible joy, for with the memory of
the experience was simultaneous comprehension of its
signicance—that I had won through to the essence of
mind, that I had realized sotāpatti (Mahā si Sayādaw,
1994) Very soon after this realization, within minutes
as I recall, I understood completely why the masters
taught that three fetters automatically fall away as a
consequence of one’s rst experience of stream-entry
(see, e.g., anissaro, 2012b): (1) belief that I exist
as a permanent phenomenon (for me this had largely
fallen away earlier; see above), (2) doubt about the goal
of Buddhist meditation, and (3) belief that rituals or
other practices are the goal of the path to liberation.
As the Alagaddupama Sutta notes, “In the Dhamma
[the Buddha’s teachings] thus well-proclaimed by me—
clear, open, evident, stripped of rags—those monks
who have abandoned the three fetters, are all stream-
winners, steadfast, never again destined for states of
woe, headed for self-awakening” (anissaro, 2004).
From my experience of the moments just following
stream-entry, I had acquired apodictic knowledge of
what constitutes the goal of Buddhadharma, and that
any practice that does not aid in attaining stream-entry
is false and a hindrance to the path. I also understood
the truth of the words one of my teachers, Namgyal
Rinpoche, had said to me, “Complex meditations are
for dull minds.”
Consequences of Stream-Entry
ere have been for me numerous consequences
of the experience of stream-entry—usually summarized
as the fruits of stream-entry (Sanskrit: sotāpatti phala).
For one thing, I came to understand that realization
of sensorial dots is neither a necessary nor sucient
condition for stream-entry. All that i s absolutely required
is the ability to enter access concentration and tenacious
concentration upon the arising and passing, and then
the passing of phenomena. Others would seem to have
experienced stream-entry in something like the way I
did. For instance, Ekaku Hakuin (2010) wrote that:
“At around midnight on the seventh and nal night of
my practice, the boom of a bell from a distant temple
reached my ears: suddenly, my body and mind dropped
completely away. I rose clear of even the nest dust.
Overwhelmed with joy” (p. 23). In addition, Robert
Bellah (2008) related the experience of an eighteenth
century Zen monk and teacher, Ishida Baigan, who,
after meditating for years, had this experience:
Late one night, he lay down exhausted, and was
unaware of the break of day. He heard the cry of a
sparrow in the woods behind where he was lying.
en within his body it was like the serenity of a
great sea or a cloudless sky. He felt the cry of that
sparrow like a cormorant diving and entering the
water, in the serenity of a great sea. After that he
abandoned the conscious observation of his own
nature. (pp.201–202)
For another thing, meditation for me boiled down
to whatever work I have had to do to become centered
and tranquil enough to enter access concentration, and
then to focus upon the passing of phenomena. is
work has continued to mature in very subtle ways. Very
recently I came close to entering the stream for a second
time, an event that is called phalasamapatti, or attainment
of fruition (Mahāsi Sayādaw, 1994, p. 34). is occurs
when the knowledge of Nirvana, or the stream (the
cognitive fruits), has matured suciently that one may
re-enter the stream with greater awareness than the rst
time, and without aversive reactions that will hinder the
letting go into the stream (Mahāsi Sayādaw, 1994). is
happened for me in this way:
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
26 Laughlin
I became lucid in a dream in which I was meditating
(I believe I was in a temple of some kind) and
turned my attention to the passing away of dream
phenomena. So intense did the concentration
become that I was no longer dreaming, but was
in access concentration watching the eld of dots
that constituted hypnopompic imagery, and then
the eld of dots alone without form—the imagery
had fallen away. At a particular moment, I realized
I was headed back into stream—I recognized the
symptoms as the eld of dots began to “dump” so
that all that remained before the mind’s eye was
rapidly passing sensorial dots. My foreknowledge of
the experience of entering stream, which had been
absent when I experienced sotāpatti, got in the way
of letting go. At the last moment there was a small
but sucient aversive reaction to stop the process
leading to phalasamapatti.
Despite having hindered the process of letting go into
the stream, I experienced intense joy and after some
moments realized that, while my clinging to phenomenal
reality was still too strong to allow the experience a
second time, the bonds are weakening and I am getting
closer. I also realized that it is only that aversion, that
clinging to phenomena (or form; Mahāsi Sayādaw, 1994,
p. 34), that stands in the way of my being able to enter
the stream at will, and remaining there if I chose.
Within a week or so of leaving Samye-Ling for
the United States, some of the other consequences of
stream-entry began to present themselves, some of them
in the dream state. One particularly memorable dream
occurred while I was staying in Philadelphia:
I dreamed that I was standing hand in hand with
my child self under a ery arch that had morphed
from two enormous serpents that had arisen on each
side of us and touched their heads above us. I was
lucid and watching the scene from a position behind
the ery portal and my dream selves, so I could
see they were located on a vast plain upon which
stood the ruins of a city. I knew in the dream that
I was looking at the transformation of myself after
the realizations of the past [Samye-Ling] retreat. I
was beginning to awaken from the dream and was
in a hypnopompic state when a ery golden chariot
being drawn by huge golden horses appeared out
of an intense, almost blinding golden light, and a
deep, booming voice called out, "Read Ezekiel!"
is image could not have lasted more than a few
seconds, but I awoke knowing that I had not (and
indeed have never since) experienced a dream like
that. (Laughlin, 2011, p. 191–192)
I did not own a Bible and did not recall ever
reading the book of Ezekiel, although I might have
encountered the ery chariot motif in my childhood
Methodist bible classes. I obtained a copy of the Old
Testament later that same day and was astonished when
I read of God appearing before the prophet in the form
of a ery chariot pulled by Chayot (mystical angels), and
that much of the book was about the destruction of the
old Jerusalem and the construction of the City of God
upon its ashes. I also noted that the creatures pulling
the chariot in my dream were denitely horses, and not
the mythical angels of the Biblical imagery. is dream
happened over thirty years ago, and it is still as clear,
numinous and meaningful to me today as it was then.
For me, this was clearly an indication that the stream-
entry experience was resulting in transformations at a
very deep level of my psyche.
Discussion
Turning the subjectivity of transpersonal experiences
into publically available, scientically useful data
is sometimes not an easy thing to accomplish (Rock
& Laughlin, 2014). I once addressed this issue as the
“problem of the phenomenological typewriter;” namely,
presuming that ethnographers, by means of participant
observation, successfully attain the experiences intended
by mythic drama, ordeal, drug trip, ritual and other
methods of an alien culture's religion, how then do they
describe those experiences so that they become publicly
available data (Laughlin, 1989)? As an anthropologist,
my commitment has been rst and foremost to science—
to grounding experiential anthropology in a Jamesian
“radical empiricism,” if you will (James, 1912/1976;
Laughlin & McManus, 1995; Taylor, 1996). By that
I mean that no experience had by human beings from
whatever cultural background is too outré to be included
as data under scientic scrutiny.
Ineability and Poetics
e rarer the experience (a commonplace in
the study of mystical and transpersonal experiences),
the harder it is to render the information gleaned from
the experience into a scientically comparative form.
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 27
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
All too often the description of a rare experience is
set aside as somehow too anecdotal to be considered
scientic. is is especially true in the present case, for
any attempt to describe “path moment” (sotāpatti) in
natural language will perforce require that one resort
to similes and metaphors—even the terms “path” and
“moment,” “stream” and “enter”, are similes. Indeed,
with respect to the direct experience of sotāpatti, there is
no path, no stream, no entering, no time-consciousness,
no space (thus the term “empty” is also just a simile)—in
fact phenomenally speaking, there is no anything save
awareness .
Always keeping in mind that there is no such
thing as an experience that admits of one and only one
interpretation, one nonetheless develops a basis in
transpersonal experiences for understanding how
particular metaphors come to stand for what are largely
ineable states. Take for instance anthropologist, Carol
Laderman’s (1988, 1993) experience while researching
Malay shamanic healing. She found that Malays were
reluctant to talk about their experiences of the “Inner
Winds” that arise during ritual trance states. “ey
told me that the only way I could know would be to
experience it myself” (1988, p. 805). Eventually, her
teacher led her through a ritual that resulted in her
entering a trance state. “At the height of my trance, I
felt the Wind blowing inside my chest with the strength
of a hurricane” (1988, p. 806; emphasis added). When
she described this experience to her informants, they
responded with comments like, “Why do you think we
call them Winds?”
is issue has been tellingly addressed by
anthropological poetics (aka ethnopoetics; see Brady, 1991;
Diamond, 1986; Hymes, 2003; Tedlock, 1999), a eld
that studies the many ways language is molded to express
experiences across cultures—“...focusing in particular on
the oral communication of proverbs, laments, prayers,
praises, prophecies, curses, and riddles shaped by the
spoken, chanted, or singing voice” (Brady, 2008, p. 296).
Actually, all experiences are ineable in that more is left
out than can be expressed. Another way to say this is that
while experiences are information rich, cognition and
language are relatively information poor. e problem
in communication is for the speaker to send sucient
information—the right information—to trigger (or
“penetrate to”) a much larger eld of information in
the mind of the hearer (Laughlin, 1989). e challenge
is even greater with communicating transpersonal
experiences such as those I have described here. As most
societies are to some extent polyphasic, people who have
extraordinary experiences face the challenge of nding
a language to share the subjective, and express the
expressible. ey often have recourse to poetics, which
in all likelihood was the rst and oldest art form, for
it allowed the sharing of not only sensory aspects of
alternative states of consciousness, but also intuitive
knowledge. e Buddha himself reputedly used poetry to
communicate such knowledge. e Udana (included in
the Sutta Pitaka) is partly in verse, one of which expresses
a consequence of Awakening (Buddha, 1997, Ud 2):
When things become manifest
To the ardent meditating Brahmin ,
All his doubts then vanish since he has known
e utter destruction of conditions.
e Buddha’s verse does not express a rational
conclusion that because the conditions causing
phenomena have been de-structured, one therefore
logically concludes her doubts about the path were
unfounded. Rather, it is an expression of the fact that
with the rst stream-entry experience, doubt about the
path automatically drops away. It is an intuitive knowing
that may give rise to poetic expression via imagination,
metaphor and insight. Poetics is born of the challenge
of expressing and sharing the ineable. All societies have
their poetic forms for just this purpose. Yet in modern
technocratic societies, a schism has been erected between
poetic expression and science. is humanist-scientist
dichotomy stands as a hindrance to doing transpersonal
science, for it fails to rise to the challenge of sharing the
most eective uses of esoteric language as scientically
useful data. Yet there is no reason (other than ideological
loyalty) that transpersonal researchers cannot embrace
what my friend and colleague, Ivan Brady calls artful
science—a methodology that is grounded in the media
of poetics. Specically addressing anthropologists, Brady
(2005) notes that artful science:
...pursues knowledge mostly ignored or formally
discounted by the extremes of logical positivism. It
advocates as a complement (not as a replacement) to
a kind of knowing and reporting that (a) promotes
phenomenology as a philosophy that puts the
observer (the seeker, the knower) upfront in the
equation of interpreting and representing experience;
(b) pushes interpretive anthropology back into the
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
28 Laughlin
loop of sensual experience, a body-centered position
that includes a consideration of but transcends the
sweeping metaphor that everything (e.g., people,
landscapes) can and should be rendered as texts
to be interpreted; (c) nds some continuity in the
structures and orientations of body-roundedness
and myth despite important limitations posed by
language itself and by epistemic interference between
the present and our preliterate past; and (d) gives
poets special cachet through their oering forms of
knowing and saying (robust metaphors and more)
that can engage the senses and visions of being-in-
place in ways that both exceed and complement
more conventional strategies in anthropology and
history. (pp. 981–982)
is approach is especially useful for transpersonal
researchers interested in understanding the religious art
and architecture of prehistoric peoples, as well as the
textual expressions of transpersonal experiences by long
dead literate peoples.
More on Methods
us far there are no technological methods
that may independently measure the activity of the
brain while, say, an arhat (Pali: arahant; a person who
is never apart from the stream; indeed may be said to be
one with the stream) is absorbed in Nirvana. She cannot
take a camera with her and record the experience. She
cannot tape record her description of the experience as it
occurs. She cannot draw or paint the experience in other
than metaphorical terms. Most importantly, we do not
know how the brain mediates stream-entry. Is sotāpatti
mediated by isolating prefrontal cortical attention
structures from the structures mediating the sensorium?
Or does the sensorium simply cease to function for the
duration of the experience, leaving in its wake something
like “pure” consciousness, consciousness with only itself
as object? We do not yet know. We do have a literature
pertaining to the psychology of post-stream-entry
sotāpanna. For example, Full, Walach, & Trautwein
(2013) interviewed advanced Burmese eravadā
Buddhist meditators who presumably had experienced
stream-entry in order to establish whether meditation at
this level of maturity leads to signicant and permanent
changes in perception. ey found: “Changes could be
identied concerning the quality of perception, especially
in aspects of clarity; comprehension of interdependences
in perception processing, i.e., mental condition and
perception; successive cessation of a subject/object-based
perception; and nally, a nonconceptual perception
including the deconstruction of the notion of I, self,
or me” (Full, Walach, & Trautwein, 2013, p. 61). But
the authors caution that their study could not parse-out
cultural conditioning that may have inuenced their
data. I would add that being labeled a sotāpanna may in
some cases be due to status factors in Burmese monastic
culture—a way of acknowledging advanced status as a
meditator or teacher—and is not a guarantee that the
individual has actually experienced stream-entry. Again,
there is as yet no independent method of measuring
stream-winners.
Obviously there is also no way to draw a random
sample from a known universe of stream-winners among
all peoples everywhere. us the use of parametric
statistics in analyzing the data from a non-random
sample of stream winners, even when available (as in the
study above) would be invalid. Does that mean that the
study of rare states of consciousness cannot in principle be
“scientic?” Hardly. To require quantitative experimental
evidence in such cases would amount to the most absurd
kind of scientism, one that denies the foundations of
all scientic disciplines in naturalistic research. By such
an account, most of Darwin’s work aboard the Beagle
would not make the grade. In fact, as William James
argued, much can be empirically learned from individual
experiential case studies, and trait comparisons between
such studies, even when the experiences are rare and
the universe of such cases remains unknown. e great
neurologist, V. S. Ramachandran addressed this issue in
the following way: “By way of analogy, imagine that I
cart a pig into your living room and tell you that it can
talk. You might say, ‘Oh really? Show me.’ I then wave
my wand and the pig starts talking. You might respond,
‘My God! at’s amazing!’ You are not likely to say,
‘Ah, but that’s just one pig. Show me a few more and
then I might believe you’” (Ramachandran & Blakeslee,
1999, p. xiii). Neuroscience,8 as with transpersonal
studies, is grounded in single case studies; often in-depth
qualitative explorations upon which later multiple case
meta-analyses are founded.
Developmental Perspective
If there is a single lesson I have drawn from
reecting on the signal experiences I have had over the
course of a lifetime of meditation, it is that the processes
of neuropsychological development are pivotal to both
spiritual awakening and transpersonal studies. Even when
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 29
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
ethnographers appreciate the cultural signicance of
transpersonal experiences and even leave themselves open
to having such experiences themselves (imbibing the
host’s entheogens, or religiously important psychotropic
drugs, participating in the local healing and other rituals
that evoke extraordinary experiences, or in the present
case, taking on the process of meditation), they have all
too often failed to realize that transpersonal experiences
may occur for their hosts in a developmental continuum
from, say, those associated with initiation early in
life to those typical to elder masters and shamans (see
Assagioli, 2007; Chinen, 1985; Wilber, 1996). In other
words, spiritual paths are developmental processes with
various experiences marking way points along the path
to full maturation. An American learning to become
a lucid dreamer, for instance, is a far cry from being a
dream shaman. In spiritual awakening, transpersonal
experiences may be both symptomatic of one’s level of
maturity, and the cause for a cha nge in self-understanding.
With respect to the Buddhist path, my old
friend and meditation teacher, Tarchin Hearn has noted
(personal communication, 8 May 2014):
Many people can apprentice in a spiritual system
and become adepts and teachers of that tradition.
Not so many people can as a result of their practice,
transcend or go beyond the very tradition that
nourished them. Buddhism teaches us how to live
well in the present moment. It doesn't know what
will unfold in the moment to come. is universe has
not yet arisen. Namgyal Rinpoche once suggested
to me that I should study Buddhism, realize it and
walk on and then I should study Western traditions,
realize them and walk on. I've come to realize that
the “walking on” is the forefront of this evolving
universe in the collaborative act (with everything
and everyone else) of creative being. Put in another
way, when I was young I thought that I needed
to understand and perhaps even master Buddhist
teaching. I had no idea that Buddhist teaching was
an attempt to skillfully nudge me towards a way of
being and a eld of questioning that, at the time,
I was not able to even imagine and that today I
discover hour by hour.
Numerous ethnographers have worked among
peoples with polyphasic cultures. Relatively few of them
have gone so far as to participate in a culture to the extent
of attaining the alternative states that ground each of the
host's worldviews. is is the common pattern among
ethnographers who have studied shamanistic religions,
many of which require initiation into the proper use
of entheogens and secret ritual practices, a process of
apprenticeship that may last for years (see the articles by
Robin Rodd, an ethnographer who has apprenticed to a
South American shaman; Rodd, 2002, 2006; Rodd &
Sumabila, 2011). ere are cases in which the society’s
mythological system may reect a developmental
progression of understanding and realization from the
simple levels of childhood through to the comprehension
of the master. For instance, Dan Jorgensen (1980)
discovered that the mythology of the Telefolmin people
of Papua New Guinea have something on the order of
ten distinct levels of complexity ranging from many
short “just-so” stories for children to a master’s level in
which all the many myths are integrated into a single
story that takes days to narrate.
e course of meditational maturation—
of meditative individuation, to wax Jungian for a
moment—is perhaps one of the most empirically
available, because more and more dedicated meditators
have become what the late Eugene d’Aquili and I liked
to call mature contemplatives (d'Aquili, Laughlin, &
McManus, 1993; Laughlin, McManus, & d’Aquili,
1990, Chap. 11). We now have sucient evidence from
psychological and neuroscience research supporting the
notion that meditation results in changes in perception,
attention, aect, and cognition (see Baron Short et al.,
2010; Chiesa, Calati, & Serretti 2011; Garland, Gaylord,
Boettiger, & Howard, 2010; Jha, Krompinger, & Baime,
2007; MacLean et al., 2010; Murphy & Donovan, 1999;
Shapiro, Carlson, Astin, & Freedma n, 2006). It also seems
very likely, as suggested by Ledi (2007), that most really
signicant changes in neurophysiological, psychological,
and cognitive functions caused by meditation will be
found among mature contemplatives. For instance, it
is far easier for me to enter access concentration now
than when I rst experienced it so many years ago. Still,
I am unable to access that state at will, a skill that is
prerequisite for an arhat, which I am decidedly not.
Notice that when I got close to a second absorption
into the stream (phalasamapatti), there was sucient
aversion to letting go of phenomena to thwart the
process. What I learned from this “near miss” is that my
“clinging” to phenomena—to sensorial productions—
and my emotional reaction to sudden transformations in
consciousness have not matured suciently to allow the
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
30 Laughlin
crystals, skrying bowls thrown on the ground, starlight
passing through a crystal, images in a skrying bowl, and
so forth. Of course, there is no way to know for sure
when shamanism rst became linked with meditation
practices (Lewis-Williams, 1997).
A pivotal distinction must be made here:
Whereas most shamanic meditation practices very likely
involved following and interacting with dynamic imager y
in much the same way that C. G. Jung advocated in his
method of active imagination (see Jung, 1997; Von Franz,
1997[1979]), Hannah, 1981), Buddhist mindfulness
discourages interacting with imagery, except in Tantric
traditions where more shamanic methods are used solely
to energize the real work of mindfulness training, the
realization of stream-entry, and cessation of phenomena.
Keep in mind that the Buddha considered clinging
to (dialoguing with) phenomena was a major cause
of suering (dukkha), and he wished to discover the
“builder”9 of phenomena by snung out this clinging
and thereby embracing cessation (Rahula, 1974). As far
as I know, no known shamanic tradition is founded upon
the realization, or even the knowledge of stream-entry.
But again, for the methodological reasons mentioned
above, we simply cannot know for sure.
Husserlian and Buddhist Methods
As noted above, I recognized many parallels
between Buddhist mindfulness practices and Husserlian
transcendental phenomenology. Indeed, I early on
suspected that Edmund Husserl was to some extent what
Buddhist psychology calls a pratyekabuddha, or “self-
awakener.” is is someone who is so suciently advanced
in mindfulness that they rediscover the development
of the path of awakening all by themselves with no
instructions or teachers. It was clear to me that using
either Buddhist mindfulness or Husserlian “reduction”
would inevitably lead one into the same transpersonal
domains of self-awareness (Hanna, 1993b), and lead
to the most accurate phenomenological understanding
of consciousness. Moreover, considering Husserl as a
pratyekabuddha seemed to me to explain why so many of
his students and followers failed to “get it” with respect
to actually attaining the phenomenological attitude and
transpersonal comprehension. is failure is at the very
core of Husserl’s disappointment with his protégé, Martin
Heidegger, who ran o to teach university philosophy
before becoming a mature contemplative (see Husserl,
1997). Others of Husserl’s students (e.g., Eugene Fink,
Gerhard Funke, Ludwig Landgrebe) did hang around
experience to occur. e recognition of what was about
to happen emotionally hindered the happening. I am able
to project to a time when, should I live long enough, the
emotional reaction will be either gone or of insucient
intensity to thwart another entry into the stream.
Origins and Pervasiveness of Meditation
Meditation—dened as the “sustained
awareness aimed at nonreactive and nonattached
mental observation, without cognitive or emotional
interpretation of the unfolding moment-to-moment
experience” (Braboszcz, Hahusseau, & Delorme, 2010,
p. 1910)—is neither a recent phenomenon, nor was it
rst invented by Eastern spiritual traditions (Goleman,
1996). Indeed, most of the classic meditations used by
the Buddha in his teaching were inherited from traditions
that were ancient even in his time (Gunaratana, 2002;
Wynne, 2009). As C. G. Jung (as cited in Hannah,
1981, p. 3) noted years ago, human beings have very
likely been meditating for millennia—possibly as long as
humans have been both self-aware, and able to share and
discuss subjective experiences such as fantasies, visions,
dreams, hallucinations, drug induced imagery, as well
as meditative “countersigns”, and so forth. Of course we
will never know the precise evolutionary Rubicon leading
to a “meditative brain,” for, short of a time machine, this
momentous event will remain a matter of speculation
and theory (Filmer-Lorch, 2012, pp. 6–7).
However, I would argue that prior to a certain
point in prehistory, virtually all human cultures would
have been polyphasic in their world view, grounded in
their belief that experiences had in alternative states of
consciousness are but dierent perspectives on reality
(Laughlin, 2013). Many cultures would have discovered
the practice of intense concentration upon images and
other somatic phenomena available to their mind’s eye,
and this perhaps widespread practice could well have
inuenced the evolution of certain cognitive functions
(see Mithen, 2003; Rossano, 2007). Doubtless also,
meditation of various types would have played a central
role in ancient shamanic mysticism and healing (Lewis-
Williams, 1992, 1997; MacDonald , Cove, Laughlin,
& McManus, 1987; Pearson, 2002, p. 95; Peters,
1989; Winkelman, 2010, pp. 72–73). e fact that
countersigns often arise as a consequence of intense
concentration upon any object, it is suggestive that
many shamanic healing traditions involve the healer
or diagnostician meditating upon (“reading”) some
pattern ; per example, bones, entrails, sandals, stones,
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 31
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
Husserl and did do the requisite mindfulness work,
and their comprehension of, and reections upon the
phenomenological attitude are very useful to meditators
wishing to understand Husserlian methods (see Fink,
1995; Funke, 1987; Landgrebe, 1973).
At the time I was reading Husserl’s books, it
was part of the English-speaking Husserlian zeitgeist
that he had not come into contact with Buddhism, or
the Pali Canon, for he never mentions Buddhism in any
of his major writings. Some scholars had acknowledged
the similarities and dierences between Husserlian
phenomenology and various forms of Indian philosophy
(e.g., Mohanty, 1972). Turns out, however, that Husserl
did engage with the Buddhist literature—the Pali Canon
had just been translated into German—and he even
wrote a short note expressing his feelings about what
he had read. anks to Fred Hanna (1995), we have an
English translation of that 1925 note entitled “On the
Teachings of Gotama [Gautama] Buddha.” In that note
Husserl seems to thoroughly identify with the aims and
methods of Buddhist phenomenology:
at Buddhism—insofar as it speaks to us from
pure original sources—is a religio-ethical discipline
for spiritual purication and fulllment of the
highest stature—conceived of and dedicated to an
inner result of a vigorous and unparalleled, elevated
frame of mind, will soon become clear to every reader
who devotes themselves to the work. [emphasis added]
Buddhism is comparable only with the highest
form of the philosophical and religious spirit of our
European culture. It is now our task to utilize this
(to us) completely new Indian spiritual discipline
which has been revitalized and strengthened by this
contrast. (as cited in Hanna, 1995, p. 367)
One important factor inuencing my use
of Husserlian methods was the simple fact that,
coming from a wealth of experience while practicing
Buddhist mindfulness (vipassana), Husserl’s methods
of bracketing, “reduction,” the epoché, returning “to
the things themselves,” etc., were perfectly transparent.
Despite his turgid prose, it was blatantly obvious to me
what Husserl’s project was about. I do not intend to get
further into Husserlian methods here, because that would
take us on another tangent—besides, my colleague Jason
roop and I have engaged in that discussion elsewhere
(Laughlin & roop, 2009). Suce to say here, as Hanna
(1995) wrote: “Eugen Fink once told Dorion Cairns
‘that the various phases of Buddhistic self-discipline
were essentially phases of phenomenological reduction’
(Cairns, 1976, p. 50). is statement is especially
signicant in light of the fact that Fink was Husserl’s
chief assistant, and was considered by Husserl to be his
most trusted interpreter” (Hanna, 1995, p. 366). It is thus
also signicant that Husserl considered the eort and
dedication of attaining the phenomenological attitude
results inevitably in psychological development. Again,
as Hanna (1995) notes: “Husserl claimed side benets
of phenomenological seeing in terms of self-exploration
and self-development. He said that the insights gained
from performing the transcendental phenomenological
method of seeing brings about ‘a complete personal
transformation’ (Husserl, 1970[1936], p. 137)” (p.369).
ere is one other important factor that I do
need to emphasize, and that is, I can nd no evidence
that Husserl himself experienced stream-entry. His use
of the concepts of “transcendental phenomenology”
and “pure consciousness” refer more to something like
access concentration, a state few of his students and
followers apparently developed. His descriptions of
that state involve the falling away of all preconceptions,
all discursive knowledge, and a complete openness to
intuitive insight. His project was fundamentally dierent
than the Buddha’s in that Husserl wished to explore the
essential structures of phenomenal consciousness, and
was not guided into a course of meditation that would
lead him, or any of his students so far as I know, to
sotāpatti; that is, transcending phenomenal experience.
Moreover, my hunch has always been that, given Husserl
was perhaps a pratyekabuddha, he found it easier to enter
access concentration without the disciplined calming
and centering exercises (samatha) required by most of us
to reach that state (see also Hanna, 1995, p. 371).
Conclusion
I
have had numerous transpersonal experiences over the
course of the last half-century of phenomenological
exploration, especially while dreaming (see Laughlin
2011, Chap. 13). What I have described above are three
of the most seminal experiences arising during the course
of mindfulness work—the realization of sensorial dots,
of no-self, and of stream-entry. ese three were not only
real experiences, they were “seal” experiences, ones that
resulted in permanent transformations in my perception,
self-knowledge, and phenomenological insight. ey
are also understandable as way stations along a path
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
32 Laughlin
of gradually developing, intuitive understanding of
how consciousness works. I do not mean to imply that
discerning sensorial dots or no-self are either necessary
or sucient conditions for attaining stream-entry (hence,
a non-linear process). It is clear from the literature that
steam-entry can be attained without either previous
realizations having occurred. In those cases, the
realization of no-self, if it has not occurred previously, is
an inevitable consequence of stream-entry. Also, stream-
winners may never actually realize that all phenomena
are “built” of sensorial dots. What I am able to say from
my own experiences is that, in my case, one realization
followed the other in a sequence that, in retrospect,
appears to have been the result of a maturation of
introspective view. What does seem to be a necessary,
but not a sucient condition for stream-entry is the
maturation of access concentration, for only in that state
will the consciousness be able to let go into the experience
of absorption without being hindered by aversion.
My suspicion is that I came to realize
sensorial dots and no-self independently of attaining
stream-entry because I was working as much from a
neurophenomenological perspective as from Buddhist
mindfulness (Laughlin, McManus, & d’Aquili, 1990).
What I was doing was bracketing processes that were
integral to perception and interpretation. I also did this
with respect to time-consciousness in a way that is not
required in Buddhist mindfulness, but is fundamental to
Husserl ian phenomenolog y (Laugh lin, 1992; Laugh lin &
roop, 2008). Nonetheless, in retrospect, it is clea r to me
that one realization set me up for the next, and continues
to do so in a complex process of phenomenologically-
oriented neurocognitive development.
Any subjective, “rst-person” methodology is
only useful for a science of consciousness if it produces
reports that lead to further research. At the same time,
and speaking in favor of radical empiricism, research
based upon poor phenomenological descriptions will also
produce poor science. As Dhananjay Chavan (2011) notes,
Whatever may be one’s view of consciousness in the
natural order, there is probably a need for systematic
rst-person methods to study our subjective mental
states and correlate them to physical states (brain
states) which can be empirically characterized.
Given the bewildering variety and range of conscious
mental states it seems unlikely that any methodical
observation can be made of one’s subjectivity without
proper training and grounding in formalized rst-
person methods. (p. 248)
is said, it is hard for me to visualize a method for
studying the neuropsychological underpinnings of
the sotāpatti experience, for it lasts but a moment,
is unpredictable, and very likely cannot occur when
the meditator is wired up or lying at-out in a fMRI
machine. But technological problems aside, this is no
reason why the experience cannot be considered as
scientically relevant.
References
Amaro, B., & Pasanno, B. (2009). e island: An
anthology of the Buddha's teachings on Nibbāna.
Redwood Valley, CA: Abhayagiri Monastic.
Assagioli, R. (2007). Transpersonal development. Forres,
Scotland: Smiling Wisdom.
Austin, J. H. (1998). Zen and the brain: Toward an
understanding of meditation and consciousness.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Baron Short, E., Kose, S., Mu, Q., Borckardt, J., Newberg,
A., George, M. S., & Kozel, F. A. (2010). Regional
brain activation during meditation shows time and
practice eects: An exploratory FMRI study. Evidence-
Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 7(1),
121–127. https://doi/org/10.1093/ecam/nem163
Bellah , R. N. (2008). Tokugawa religion. New York, NY:
Simon & Schuster.
Bodhi, B. (1999). e noble eightfold path. Retrieved
from http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/
bodhi/waytoend.html.
Braboszcz, C., Hahusseau, S., & Delorme, A. (2010).
Meditation and neuroscience: From basic research
to clinical practice. In R. A. Carlstedt (Ed.),
Handbook of integrative clinical psychology, psychiatry,
and behavioral medicine: Perspectives, practices, and
research (pp. 1910–1929). New York, NY: Springer.
Brady, I. (Ed.) (1991). Anthropological poetics. Savage,
MD: Rowman & Littleeld.
Brady, I. (2005 ). Poetics for a planet. In N.K. Denzin &
Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), e Sage handbook of qualitative
research (pp. 979–1026). London, UK: Sage.
Brady, I. (2008). Ethnopoetics. In L. M. Given (Ed.),
Sage encyclopedia of qualitative research methods (pp.
296–298). ousand Oaks, CA: Sage. https://doi/
org/10.4135/9781412963909.n153
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 33
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
Decety, J., & Sommerville, J. A. (2003). Shared
representations between self and other: A social
cognitive neuroscience view. Trends in Cognitive
Sciences, 7(12), 527–533. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
tics.2003.10.004
Deikman, A. J. (1982). e observing self. Boston, MA:
Beacon.
Deshmukh, V. D. (2006). Neuroscience of meditation.
Scientic World Journal, 6, 2239–2253. https://doi.
org/10.1100/tsw.2006.353
Diamond, S. (1986). Preface. Dialectical Anthropology,
11(2 –4), 131–132. htt ps://doi.or g/10.1007/BF 00245735
Federman, A. (2011). What Buddhism taught cognitive
science about self, mind and brain. Enrahonar:
Quaderns de Filosoa, 47, 39 –62.
Filmer-Lorch, A. (2012). Inside meditation: In search
of the unchanging nature within. Leicester, UK:
Troubador .
Fink, E. (1995). Sixth Cartesian meditation: e idea of
a transcendental theory of method. Bloomington, ID:
Indiana University Press.
Flanagan, O. (2011). e bodhisattva's brain. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press.
Full, G. E., Walach, H., & Trautwein, M. (2013).
Meditation-induced changes in perception: An
interview study with expert meditators (sotapannas)
in Burma. Mindfulness, 4(1), 55–63. doi :10.1007/
s12671-012-0173-7
Funke, G. (1987). Phenomenology: Metaphysics or method?
Athens, OH: Ohio University Press.
Garland, E. L., Gaylord, S. A., Boettiger, C. A., &
Howard, M. O. (2010). Mindfulness training
modies cognitive, aective, and physiological
mechanisms implicated in alcohol dependence:
Resuls of a randomized controlled pilot trial. Journal
of Psychoactive Drugs, 42(2), 177–192. https://doi.or
g/10.1080/02791072.2010.10 400690
Goldberg, I. I., Harel, M., & Malach, R. (2006). When
the brain loses its self: Prefrontal inactivation during
sensorimotor processing. Neuron, 50, 329–339.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2006.03.015
Goleman, D. J. (1984). e Buddha on meditation and
states of consciousness. In D. H. Shapiro & R. N.
Walsh (Eds.), Meditation: Classic and contemporary
perspectives (pp. 317–360). Chicago, IL: Aldine
Transac t ion.
Goleman, D. J. (1996). e meditative mind: e varieties
of meditative experience. New York, NY: Tarcher.
Brady, I., & Kumar, A. (2000). Some thoughts
on sharing science. Science Education, 84(4),
507–523. https://doi/org/10.1002/1098-
237X(200007)84:4<507::AID-SCE5>3.0.CO;2-T
Buddha, G. (1997). e Udana: Inspired utterances of the
Buddha (J. D. Ireland, Trans.). Kandy, Sri Lanka:
Buddhist Publication Society.
Buddhaghosa, B. (1991). e path of purication,
Visuddhimagga (B. Nyanamoli, Trans.; 5th ed.).
Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society.
Cairns, D. (1976). Conversations with Husserl and Fink.
e Hague, Netherlands: Nijho. https://doi.
org/10.1007/978 -94-015-6890 - 6
Carlisle, C. (2006) Becoming and un-becoming:
e theory and practice of anatta. Contemporary
Buddhism, 7(1), 75–89. https://doi.
org/10.1080/14639940600878034
Castillo, R. J. (1991). Divided consciousness and
enlightenment in Hindu Yogis. Anthropology of
Consciousness, 2(3–4), 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1525/
ac.1991.2.3-4.1
Cerqueira, A. C. R. D., Hallak, J. E., Crippa, J. A. S.,
& Nardi, A. E. (2012). Depersonalization syndrome
induced by umazenil. Revista de Psiquiatria
Clínica, 39(3), 112. https://doi.org /10.1590/S0101-
60832012000300009
Chavan, D. V. (2007 ). Vipassana: e Buddha's tool
to probe mind and body. Progress in Brain Research,
168, 247–253. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0079-
6123(07)68019-4
Chinen, A. B. (1985). Fairy-tales and transpersonal
development in later life. Journal of Transpersonal
Psychology, 17(2), 99–122.
Collins, S. (1982). Seless persons: Imagery an d thought in eravāda
Buddhism. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511621499
Damasio, A. (2003). e mental self: e person
within. Nature, 423(6937), 227. https://doi.
org/10.1038/423227a
Damasio, A. (2010). Self comes to mind: Constructing the
conscious brain. New York, NY: Pantheon.
D'Aquili, E. G., Laughlin, C. D., & McManus, J. (1993).
Mature contemplation. Zygon, 28(2), 133–176.
ht t p s://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-974 4 .19 93.tb01025. x
Davidson, J. M. (1976). e physiology of meditation
and mystical states of consciousness. Perspectives
in Biology and Medicine, 19, 345–379. https://doi.
org/10.1353/pbm.1976.0042
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
34 Laughlin
Husserl, E. (1989). Ideas pertaining to a pure phenomenolog y
and to a phenomenological philosophy. Second Book:
Studies in the phenomenology of constitution. (R.
Rojcewicz & A. Schuwer, Trans.). Dordrecht,
Neterlands: Kluwer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-
94-009-2233-4
Husserl, E. (1997). Psychological and transcendental
phenomenology and the confrontation with Heidegger.
(T. Sheehan & R. Palmer, Trans.). Dordrecht,
Netherlands: Kluwer. (Original work published
1927) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9923-5
Hymes, D. H. (2003). Now I know only so far: Essays in
ethnopoetics. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska
Press.
Ireland, J. D. (1990). Udana. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist
Publication Society.
James, W. (1976). Essays in radical empiricism. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press. (Original work
published 1912)
Jha, A. P., Krompinger, J., & Baime, M. J. (2007).
Mindfulness training modies subsystems of
attention. Cognitive, Aective, & Behavioral
Neuroscience, 7(2), 109–119. https://doi.org/10.3758/
CABN.7.2.109
Johansson, R. E. A. (1969). e psychology of Nirvana: A
comparative study of the natural goal of Buddhism and
the aims of modern Western psychology. Garden City,
NY: Doubleday.
Jorgensen, D. (1980). What's in a name: e meaning
of nothingness in Telefolmin. Ethos, 8(4), 349–366.
https://doi.org/10.1525/eth.1980.8.4.02a00060
Jung, C. G. (1967). Alchemical studies (R. F. C. Hull,
Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Series Eds.), e collected
works of C. G. Jung ( Vol. 13). Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press. (Original work published 1948)
Jung, C. G. (1997). Jung on active imagination. J.
Chodorow (Ed.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Khema, Sister A. (1994). All of us. Access to Insight
website. Retrieved from http://www.accesstoinsight.
org/lib/authors/khema/allofus.html#ch12.
King, W. L. (1977). e structure and dynamics of the
attainment of cessation in eravada meditation.
Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 45(2),
226–226. https://doi.org/10.1093/jaarel/XLV.2.226
Kockelmans, J. J. (1967). Phenomenology: e philosophy
of Edmund Husserl. Garden City, New York, NY:
Doubleday.
Gunaratana, B. H. (1988). e jhānas in eravada
Buddhist meditation. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist
Publication Society.
Gunaratana, B. H. (2002). Mindfulness in plain English.
Boston, MA: Wisdom.
Gusnard, D. A., Akbudak, E., Shulman, G. L., &
Raichle, M. E. (2001). Medial prefrontal cortex and
self-referential mental activity: Relation to a default
mode of brain function. Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences, 98(7), 4259 – 4264. https://doi.
org/10.1073/pnas.071043098
Hanna, F. J. (1993a). Rigorous intuition: Consciousness,
being, and the phenomenological method. Journal of
Transpersonal Psychology, 25(2), 181–197.
Hanna, F. J. (1993b). e transpersonal consequences
of Husserl's phenomenological method. e
Humanistic Psychologist, 21(1), 41–57. https://doi.or
g/10.1080/08873267.1993.9976905
Hanna, F. J. (1995). Husserl on the teachings of the
Buddha. e Humanistic Psychologist, 23(3), 365 –372.
https://doi.org/10.1080/08873267.1995.9986837
Hakuin, E. (2010). Wild ivy: e spiritual autobiography
of Zen master Hakuin. Boulder, CO: Shambhala.
Hannah, B. (1981). Encounters with the soul: Active
imagination as developed by C. G. Jung. Wilmette,
IL: Chiron.
Harvey, P. (1995). e seless mind: Personality,
consciousness and Nirvana in early Buddhism.
London, UK: Routledge Curzon.
Heatherton, T. F., Wyland, C. L., Macrae, C. N., Demos,
K. E., Denny, B. T., & Kelley, W. M. (2006). Medial
prefrontal activity dierentiates self from close
others. Social Cognitive and Aective Neuroscience,
1(1), 18–25. https://doi.org/ 10.1093/scan/nsl001
Held, K. (2003). Husserl’s phenomenological method. In
D. Welton (Ed.), e new Husserl: A critical reader (pp.
3–31). Bloomington, ID: Indiana University Press.
Herr, B. (1981). e expressive character of Fijian dream
and nightmare experiences. Ethos, 9(4), 331–352.
https://doi.org/10.1525/eth.1981.9.4.02a00060
Husserl, E. (1931). Ideas: General introduction to pure
phenomenology. New York, NY: MacMillan.
Husserl, E. (1970). Logical investigations (Volume 2).
New York, NY: Humanities Press.
Husserl, E. (1970). e crisis of European sciences and
transcendental phenomenology. Evanston, IL:
Northwestern University Press. (Original work
published 1936)
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 35
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
Laughlin, C. D. & McManus, J. (1995). e relevance
of the radical empiricism of William James to the
anthropology of consciousness. Anthropology of
Consciousness, 6(3), 34–46. https://doi.org/10.1525/
ac.1995.6.3.34
Laughlin, C. D. McManus, J., & d'Aquili, E. G. (1990).
Brain, symbol and ānāpānasmrti experience: Toward a
neurophenomenology of consciousness. New York, NY:
Columbia University Press.
Laughlin, C. D. McManus, J., & Webber, M. (1985).
Neurognosis, individuation and Tibetan arising yoga
practice. e Journal of Transpersonal Anthropology,
8(1/2), 91–10 6.
Laughlin, C. D. & roop, C. J. (2008).
Continuity, causation and cyclicity: A cultural
neurophenomenology of time-consciousness.
Time & Mind, 1(2), 159–186. https://doi.
org/10.2752/175169708X309761
Laughlin, C. D. & roop, C. J. (2009). Husserlian
meditations and anthropological reections: Toward
a cultural neurophenomenology of experience and
re a l ity. Anthropolog y of Consciousness, 20 (2), 130 –170.
ht t p s://doi.org/10.1111/j.1556-3537.20 09.01015.x
Lee, W. E., Kwok, C. H., Hunter, E. C., Richards, M.,
& David, A. S. (2012). Prevalence and childhood
antecedents of depersonalization syndrome in a
UK birth cohort. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric
Epidemiology, 47(2), 253–261. https://doi.
org/10.10 07/s00127-010- 0327-7
Ledi, S. (2007). e manual of light: e manual of the
path to higher knowledge. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist
Publication Society.
Lévi-Strauss , C. (1978). Myth and meaning: Cracking the
code of culture. Toronto, Canada : University of Toronto
Press. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203278871
Lewis-Williams, J. D. (1992). Ethnographic evidence
relating to 'trance' and 'shamans' among northern
and southern Bushmen. e South African
Archaeological Bulletin, 47, 56– 60. https://doi.
org/10.2307/3888993
Lewis-Williams, J. D. (1997 ). Harnessing the brain:
vision and shamanism in Upper Paleolithic Western
Europe. Beyond Art: Pleistocene Image and Symbol,
23, 321–342.
Luders, E., Clark, K., & Toga, A. W. (2011). Enhanced
brain connectivity in long-term meditation
practitioners. Neuroimage, 57(4), 1308–1316.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2011.05.075
Kosko, B. (1993). Fuzzy thinking: e new science of fuzzy
logic. New York, NY: Hyperion.
Laderman, C. (1988). Wayward winds: Malay
archetypes, and theory of personality in the
context of shamanism. Social Science and Medicine,
27(8), 799–810. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/027 7-
9536(88)90232-8
Laderman, C. (1993). Taming the wind of desire:
Psychology, medicine and aesthetics in Malay
shamanistic performance. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press.
Landgrebe, L. (1973). e phenomenological
concept of experience. Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research, 34(1), 1–13. https://doi.
org/10.2307/210 6776
Larrabee, M. J. (1981). e one and the many: Yogācāra
Buddhism and Husserl. Philosophy East and West,
32(1), 3–15. https://doi.org /10.2307/1399062
Laughlin, C. D. (1989). Transpersonal anthropology:
Some methodological issues. Western Canadian
Anthropologist, 5, 29–60.
Laughlin, C. D. (1992). Time, intentionality, and a
neurophenomenology of the dot. Anthropology of
Consciousness, 3(3–4), 14–27. https://doi.org/10.1525/
ac.1992.3.3-4.14
Laughlin, C. D. (1993). Fuzziness and phenomenology
in ethnological research: Insights from fuzzy set
the ory. Journal of Anthropological Research, 49, 17–
37.
Laughlin, C. D. (1994a). Transpersonal anthropology,
then and now. Transpersonal Review, 1(1), 7–10.
Laughlin, C. D. (1994b). Psychic energy and
transpersonal experience: A biogenetic structural
account of the Tibetan dumo practice. In D. E.
Young & J.-G. Goulet (Eds.), Being changed by cross-
cultural encounters (pp. 99–134). Peterborough,
Ontario: Broadview Press.
Laughlin, C. D. (2001). Mandalas, nixies, goddesses,
and succubi: A transpersonal anthropologist looks
at the anima. International Journal of Transpersonal
Studies, 20, 33 –52 .
Laughlin, C. D. (2011). Communing with the gods:
Consciousness, culture and the dreaming brain.
Brisbane, Australia: Daily Grail.
Laughlin, C. D. (2013). e ethno-epistemology
of transpersonal experience: e view from
transpersonal anthropology. International Journal of
Transpersonal Studies, 32(1), 43–50.
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
36 Laughlin
Oswald, I. (1959). Experimental studies of rhythm,
anxiety and cerebral vigilance. e British Journal
of Psychiatry, 105(439), 269–294. https://doi.
org/10.1192/bjp.105.439.269
Pearson, J. L. (2002). Shamanism and the ancient mind.
Lanham, MD: AltaMira.
Peters, L. (1989). Shamanism: Phenomenology of
a spiritual discipline. Journal of Transpersonal
Psychology, 21(2), 115–137.
Rahula, W. (1974). What the Buddha taught: Revised
and expanded edition with texts from Suttas and
Dhammapada. New York, NY: Grove Press.
Ramachandran, V. S., & Blakeslee, S. (1999). Phantoms
in the brain: Probing the mysteries of the human mind.
New York, NY: William Morrow.
Rock, A. & Lauglin, C. D. (in press). e advancement
of transpersonal psychological science: A
neurophenomenological trajectory. In D. A.
MacDonald & M. Almendro (Eds.). Transpersonal
psychology.
Rodd, R. (2002). Märipa teui: A radical empiricist
approach to Piaroa shamanic training and initiation.
Antropológica, 96, 53 – 82.
Rodd, R. (2006). Piaroa sorcery and the navigation
of negative aect: To be aware, to turn away.
Anthropology of Consciousness, 17(1), 35–64. https://
doi.org/10.1525/ac.2006.17.1.35
Rodd, R., & Sumabila, A. (2011). Yopo, ethnicity and social
change: a comparative analysis of Piaroa and Cuiva
Yopo use. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 43(1), 3 6 – 45.
https://doi.org/10.1080/02791072.2011.566499
Rossano, M. J. (2007). Did meditating make us human?
Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 17(1), 47–58.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S095977430700001?
Rosch, E. (1978). Principles of categorization. In E. Rosch
& B. B. Lloyd (Eds.), Cognition and categorization
(pp. 27–48). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Schmitt, R. (1959). Husserl's transcendental-
phenomenological reduction. Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research, 20(2), 238–245. https://
doi.org /10.2307/2104360
Shapiro, D. H., & Walsh, R. N. (Eds.). (1984).
Meditation: Classic and contemporary perspectives.
Chicago, IL: Aldine Transaction.
Shapiro, S. L., Carlson, L. E., Astin, J. A., & Freedman,
B. (2006). Mechanisms of mindfulness. Journal of
Clinical Psychology, 62(3), 373–386. https://doi.
org/10.1002/jclp.20237
Luders, E, Kurth, F., Mayer, E. A., Toga, A. W., Narr, K.
L., & Gaser, C. (2012). e unique brain anatomy
of meditation practitioners: Alterations in cortical
gyrication. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 6, 34. https://
doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00034
MacDonald, G. F., Cove, J. L., Laughlin, C. D.,
& McManus, J. (1989). Mirrors, portals, and
multiple realities. Zygon, 24(1), 39–64. https://doi.
or g /10.1111/j.14 67-9744.1989.t b 0 0 975.x
MacLean, K. A., Ferrer, E., Aichele, S. R., Bridwell,
D. A., Zanesco, A. P., Jacobs, T. L., & Saron, C.
D. (2010). Intensive meditation training improves
perceptual discrimination and sustained attention.
Psychological Science, 21(6), 829–839. https://doi.
org/10.1177/0956797610371339
Macmillan, M. B. (2000). An odd kind of fame: Stories of
Phineas Gage. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Mahāsi Sayādaw, V. (1994). e progress of insight:
A modern Pali treatise on Buddhist satipat t āna
meditation. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication
Society.
Merrill, W. (1992). e Ramámuri stereotype of dreams.
In B. Tedlock (Ed.), Dreaming: Anthropological
and psychological interpretations (pp. 194 –219).
Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
Metzinger, T. (2009). e ego tunnel: e science of the
mind and the myth of the self. New York, NY: Basic
Books.
Miller, I. (1984). Husserl, perception, and temporal
awareness. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Mithen, S. (2003). After the ice: A global human history
20,000–5,000 BC. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Mohanty, J. N. (1972). Phenomenology and
existentialism: Encounter with Indian philosophy.
International Philosophical Quarterly, 12(4), 485–
511. https://doi.org/10.5840/ipq197212452
Morris, B. (1994). Anthropology of the self: e individual
in cultural perspective. London, UK: Pluto.
Murphy, K., & roop, C. J. (Eds.). (2010). Toward
an anthropology of the will. Redwood City, CA:
Stanford University Press. https://doi.org/10.11126/
stanford/9780804768870.001.0001
Murphy, M. & Donovan, S. (1999). e physical and
psychological eects of meditation (2nd ed.). Sausalito,
CA: Institute of Noetic Sciences.
Nyanaponika era (1998). Abhidhamma studies.
Boston, MA: Wisdom.
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 37
Sensory Dots, No-Self, and Stream-Entry
anissaro B. (2012b). Into the stream: A study guide on
the rst stage of awakening (Part 2: Stream-entry and
after). Retrieved from http://www.accesstoinsight.
org/lib/study/into_the_stream.html.
Varela, F. J., ompson, E., & Rosch, E. (1991). e
embodied mind: Cognitive science and human
experience. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Varela, F., & Shear, J. (Eds.). (1999). e view from within:
First person approaches to the study of consciousness.
Bowling Green, OH: Imprint Academic.
Von Franz, M.-L. (1997). Alchemical active imagination
(Rev. Ed.). Boston, MA: Shambhala.
Wallace, B. A. (2007). Contemplative science. New York,
NY: Columbia University Press.
Wallace, B. A. (2009). Mind in the balance: Meditation in
science, Buddhism, and Christianity. New York, NY:
Columbia University Press.
Welton, D. (2003). e new Husserl: A critical reader.
Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Wilber, K. (1996). e Atman project: A transpersonal
view of human development. Wheaton, IL: Quest
Books.
Wilber, K. (2005[1983]). A sociable god: Toward a new
understanding of religion. Boulder, CO: Shambhala.
Wynne, A. (2009). e origin of Buddhist meditation.
New York, NY: Routledge.
Xu, J., Vik, A., Groote, I. R., Lagopoulos, J., Holen, A.,
Ellingsen, Ø., & Davanger, S. (2014). Nondirective
meditation activates default mode network and areas
associated with memory retrieval and emotional
processing. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 8, 86.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00086
Zajonc, A. (2009). Meditation as contemplative inquiry:
When knowing becomes love. Aurora, CO: Lindisfarne
Books.
Notes
1. is paper grew from a presentation delivered at
the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness
meetings, Chicago, IL, November, 2013.
2. As opposed to what I call monophasic cultures—
those like modern China, mainstream America,
and other technocratic societies that do not
credence experiences had in alternative states of
consciousness, that do consider such experiences as
unreal (see Laughlin, McManus, & d’Aquili, 1990,
pp. 293–295).
Sierra, M. (2009). Depersonalization: A new look at a
neglected syndrome. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge
University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/
CBO9780511730023
Sierra, M., & David, A. S. (2007). Depersonalization
and individualism: e eect of culture on symptom
proles in panic disorder. e Journal of Nervous
and Mental Disease, 195(12), 989–995. https://doi.
org/10.1097/NMD.0b013e31815c19f7
Smith, R. (2010). Stepping out of self-deception: e
Buddha’s liberating teaching of no-self. Boston, MA:
Shambhala.
Snyder, S. & Rasumussen, T. (2009). Practicing the
jhānas: Traditional concentration meditation as
presented by the Venerable Pa Auk Sayadaw. Boulder,
CO: Shambhala.
Solé-Leris, A. (1986). Tranquility and insight: An
introduction to the oldest form of Buddhist meditation.
Boulder, CO: Shambhala.
Spiro, M. E. (1993). Is the Western conception of the self
“peculiar” within the context of the world cultures?
Ethos, 21(2), 107–153. https://doi.o r g /10.1525/
eth.1993.21.2.02a00010
Suzuki, S., 1970. Zen mind, beginner's mind. New York,
NY: Weat herhill.
Tart, C. (2001). Mind science: Meditation training for
practical people. Novato, CA: Wisdom.
Taylor, E. (1996). William James on consciousness beyond
the margin. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
Tedlock, D. (1999). Poetry and ethnography: A dialogical
approach. Anthropology and Humanism, 24(2), 155 –
167. https://doi.org/10.1525/ahu.1999.24.2.155
anissaro, B. (1997). One tool among many: e place of
vipassana in Buddhist practice. Retrieved from http://
www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/
onetool.html.
anissaro, B. (1999). No-self or not-self? In anissaro
B. (Ed.), Noble strategy: Essays on the Buddhist path
(pp. 71–74). Valley Center, CA: Dhammayut Order.
anissaro, B. (2004). Alagaddupama Sutta: e
water-snake simile. Retrieved from http://www.
accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.022.than.
html.
anissaro, B. (2012a). Into the stream: A study guide on
the rst stage of awakening (Part 1: e way to stream-
entry). Retrieved from http://www.accesstoinsight.
org/lib/study/into_the_stream.html.
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies
38 Laughlin
About the Author
Charles D. Laughlin, PhD, is an emeritus professor of
anthropology and religion, Department of Sociology &
Anthropology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.
He has completed ethnographic research among the
So people of northeastern Uganda, Tibetan Tantric
Buddhist lamas in Nepal, Chinese Buddhists in southeast
Asia, and the Navajo of the American Southwest. He
is the co-author of Brain, Symbol and Experience (1990)
and author of Communing With the Gods: Consciousness,
Culture and the Dreaming Brain (2011). He specializes in
the neuroanthropology of consciousness.
About the Journal
e International Journal of Transpersonal Studies is a
peer-reviewed academic journal in print since 1981. It is
sponsored by the California Institute of Integral Studies,
published by Floraglades Foundation, and serves as the
ocial publication of the International Transpersonal
Association. e journal is available online at www.
transpersonalstudies.org, and in print through www.
lulu.com (search for IJTS).
3. e methodology used by the Buddha, termed
vipassana, is nothing less than a phenomenology
of mind. Indeed vipassana is ‘‘the rst historical
attempt to map the human mind in a thorough and
realistic way without admixture of metaphysics and
mythology’’ (Nyanaponika era, 1998).
4. My rst Buddhist meditation teacher was the
Venerable Tarchin Gelong (aka Tarchin Hearn),
an English born Canadian and an accomplished
insight meditator, and my second was Tarchin’s own
guru, Venerable Namgyal Rinpoche, who was also
a Canadian born meditation master who had been
recognized by the 16th Karmapa as a reincarnated
tulku, or bodhisattva. I later went on to study under
the great Sakya lama, Venerable Chogye Trichen
Rinpoche, who was also my preceptor when I
became a monk in the late 1970s at Lumbini, Nepal.
5. Husserl’s concept of the (or an) epoché derives from
the Greek epoché, meaning suspension (Husserl 1931).
A contemplative enacts an epoché every time she or
he brackets” (isolates, distinguishes, highlights)
some aspect of experience and quarantines it from
inuencing the outcome of self-study.
6. A kasin
.a is a colored disk used to meditate on color
or element. ey are used to stimulate an eidetic
image that becomes the real object of concentration
(see Buddhaghosa, 1991; Zajonc, 2009, Chap. 4).
7. is is a variation of breathing concentration
combined with visualization that I learned from a
monk in ailand, a member of the sangha at Wat
Pak Nam temple in Bangkok. Each monk carries a
small clear marble enclosing a golden Buddha gure
which is used as a kasin
.a. I have also used blue and
red marbles as visualization devices.
8. Consider the impact of the strange case of Phineas
Gage upon 19th century neuropsychology
(Macmillan, 2000).
9. Verse 154 of the Dhammapada reads: Oh
housebuilder! You are seen, you shall build no house
again. All your rafters are broken, your roof-tree is
destroyed. My mind has reached the unconditioned
(Nibbana); the end of craving has been attained.
