Venerable Ajahn Chah

so the Buddha did not advocate or encourage it.

The only people he praised were the ones who were able to liberate themselves from suffering.

To accomplish this requires training, and the tools and equipment to get the job done are generosity,

virtue, samadhi and wisdom.

We have to take them up and train with them.

Together they form a path inclining inwards and wisdom is the first step.

Using the tools of practice entails hardship and arduous challenges.

We rely on patience, endurance, and going without.

We have to do it ourselves, experience it for ourselves, realize it ourselves.

Scholars, however, tend to get confused a lot.

For example, when they sit in meditation, as soon as their minds experience a teeny bit of tranquility, they start to think.

Hey, this must be first jhana.

This is how their minds work.

And once those thoughts arise, the tranquility they'd experienced is shattered.

Soon they start to think that it must have been the second jhana they'd attained.

Don't think and speculate about it.

There aren't any billboards which announce which level of samadhi we're experiencing.

The reality is completely different.

There aren't any signs like the road signs that tell you this way to Wat Nong Pa Pong.

That's not how I read the mind.