Would it be foolish for me to make a formal determination to become a Sotapanna by the end of this lifetime?
I heard there can be side effects to these kinds of determinations.
Yeah, there can be.
There's the concern and the worry and even the guilt.
Suppose then when you die,
you know that you're not a Sotapanna, how would that affect your dying moment, feeling guilty that you didn't fulfill your vow?
So placing time limits on any determination is quite risky.
You don't see it.
I can't think of one instance where it would be found in the Tipitika.
However,
On the other hand, we do encourage in some cases for advanced meditators to train this sort of determination in a simple sense.
Train themselves to enter into a certain stage of knowledge within one hour.
So you're not demanding that it come, you're testing this ability or you're training this ability.
You're saying, within this hour may I attain this stage of knowledge.
Then you practice and if it comes up, it enforces this connection between the determination and the result and it develops what is called the adhitana parmi, the perfection of determination.
And this is a useful trait, the ability to make a determination and have it come true or to be able to follow through with it, to meet with that result.
So that kind of thing.
For example, it would help you to make such a vow to become a sotapanna.
Once you get better at making determinations, determining this, determining that, may I... I mean, that might be one suggestion, is to make smaller determinations.
Say, within this week, may I practice so many hours, or, you know, for example, or...
with this year may I go to five meditation courses, ten meditations, you know, something like that.
Training yourself and encouraging yourself because then it becomes something doable and not something risky.
Because the risk in just making the formal vow now
is that if you're not well trained in determination, and what that really means is that if you don't have your life set up to get to the goal, it can have a deleterious effect.
It can be problematic when you die because
As I said, you can feel guilty about it.
But you can certainly cultivate or develop yourself up to that level.
But yeah, I think making such long-range determinations and putting a fine point on the end is dangerous because you don't know how easy it's going to be for you to become a sotapanna.
I would, you know, such determinations as that I would put aside.
The determination that you should make is to become an arahat.
May I become an arahat.
And if you keep that in mind, it puts you on the right track.
It's not a time limit thing, because a sodapanna has to become an arahat in the end.
They're on the way.
And so focusing, and this is another thing that I would say, is that many people put far too much focus on sotapanna.
You should focus on becoming an arahat.
And the idea being that when you set your sights so high,
you're no longer looking way way up at becoming a Sotapanna and you might find that suddenly you're a Sotapanna not in a week or a month or something but you might find that you at one stage become a Sotapanna without really expecting it
Because your sights were set so high.
The arahat is one without any defilement.
So if you set yourself on that, at some point along the path you have to become a sodapanna.
At some point along the path you'll become free from the first three fetters.
So...
Those kind of things we don't put, I mean I'm sure you're aware that in general people don't put time limits on them.
I wouldn't encourage it simply for that reason.
And I would encourage much more to make a general determination, repeated determination to become an arhat, to become enlightened.
If that's your goal.
Now, if your goal is to become a Buddha, which obviously it's not, then you would make that determination.
If your goal is to meet Maitreya Buddha, the next Buddha who's coming, then make a determination for that.
And so on.
but making determinations for certain attainments can be done, can be made, but much better to start small and to make determinations in terms of the practice that you're engaged in.
Because, you know, in meditation practice, people will make determinations that seem to lead them to states such as becoming a sotapanna, but they would do it during an intensive meditation course.
So they make a determination, within this hour may I experience palasamapati, which is attainment of cessation, which is the sotapanna.
and they may not get it, and then they try again, and they try again, and they do it on an hourly basis, you see.
So it no longer becomes such a big deal.
It's just an attempt that they're making, and they get better at it, and eventually they do, or seem to attain palasamapati, which makes them a sotapanna.
That's more how it goes.
Just making a vague and general determination for the end of life thing is...
I don't see it as all that beneficial and potentially dangerous, but not immoral by any means.