My name is Vince Horn. I started a daily meditation practice in 2002, and started practicing vipassana meditation soon after as it is taught in the Insight Meditation tradition. During that time I focused primarily on the noting method of the late Mahasi Sayadaw of Burma. Intensive noting was my primary practice for much of the first 4 years that I practiced, while also dabbling some in concentration and metta practice. Lately my practice has become a bit more unstructured. I find that a more methodless type of practice works very well at times, but that structured vipassana also comes in very handy at other times. I've also at times found self-enquiry and the Big Mind process to be useful techniques. The interesting thing seems to be that the practice itself is constantly evolving in response to the unfolding of realization.

By following the noting practice consistently and doing around 4 months total of intensive practice I attained to stream entry (the 1st stage of enlightenment) in the summer of 2006 while on a month-long retreat in Barre, MA. The next spring, while on a 2-month course, I experienced another significant shift of identity/perspective after which I began to effortlessly perceive the empty nature of phenomena in real time. This corresponds pretty strongly with what Daniel Ingram calls the 3rd stage of enlightenment. Other shifts have taken place since, but I wouldn't categorize any of them as major attainments, nor do I know how useful it would be to get caught up to much in a mind-state of attainment, as these shifts have everything to do with dropping the sense of someone becoming something. Instead they seem to be about seeing in deeper ways that everything is as it is, and that there is no need to change or manipulate things.

I'm here on the Dharma Overground because I'm a huge fan of practical dharma, and of using the stages of practice as a motivation to practice, while not falling into the trap of it becoming some sort of measure of one's self-worth. I'm all for going back to the hardcore teachings of the Buddha and seeing that meditation, enlightenment, etc. need not be shrouded in mystery and ambiguity, but instead can be extremely normal and down-to-earth (as indeed they are).

In addition to participating here I also host a Buddhist podcast called Buddhist Geeks and have a blog which is aptly titled, Numinous Nonsense.