Hello everyone,

I have a question. Some time ago we were talking about... well I'm not sure what we were talking about... hey, gimme a break, I just turned 60 this year! haha... and, anyway, the discussion turned to meditators as judges of their own accomplishments, or some such thing... and anyway, I think it was Balder... hey dude, hope you're well... Balder mentioned someone who had more or less taken it upon himself to train himself in accomplishing the Buddhist jhanas.
Now, does anyone remember the name of this guy? And has he written any books on his adventure?

I think this sort of thing is becoming of greater interest to mainstream scholars working on the history of Buddhist meditation as it relates to textual descriptions. Some of the impetus may be coming from the growing number of 'practitioner scholars' out there, but it is also coming from a genuine interest in what, if at all, some of these terms like jhana, samadhi, prajna, smriti, dhyana, śamatha, vipassana and so on refer to exactly or how what they refer to could have changed over time or between groups or movements.

Thanks!
kela