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Writing that isn’t about code — Buddhism, practice, and whatever else is worth thinking through slowly.

• August 9, 20267 min read

  Thirty-One Realms, and Why None of Them Is the Goal

  Theravāda maps thirty-one planes of existence, from hells to formless absorptions lasting aeons. Read as a menu of destinations it is bewildering. Read as an argument that there is no good destination, it snaps into focus.

  • Theravāda
  • Buddhism
  • Rebirth
• August 9, 20267 min read

  Still Relevant Is the Wrong Question

  Buddhism keeps getting recommended for modern life, usually as stress relief. The parts that actually still bite are sharper than that — and the popular repackaging quietly drops the half that made it work.

  • Buddhism
  • Theravāda
  • Attention
• August 9, 20265 min read

  Leaving the Palace — Twice

  Siddhattha Gotama gave up everything he had to become a wandering ascetic. Six years later he gave that up too, and the second renunciation is the one I keep thinking about.

  • Theravāda
  • Buddhism
  • Renunciation
• August 9, 20265 min read

  The Sixteen Steps: What Ānāpānasati Actually Instructs

  Mindfulness of breathing gets summarised as watching the breath. The instruction in the sutta is far more specific than that — sixteen steps in four groups, in an order that turns out to be the point.

  • Theravāda
  • Meditation
  • Buddhism
• August 8, 20267 min read

  Why the Breath Comes First: Ānāpānasati, the Kālāmas, and Pāyāsi

  Three Theravāda texts I'd been reading separately — a meditation practice, a teaching about how to decide what to accept, and an argument with a materialist prince — that turn out to be closer to one continuous thought than three.

  • Theravāda
  • Meditation
  • Buddhism