The Allegory of the Lotus Pond: unspeakable bliss and beauty along your Jhana journey

 In July and August 2025, I applied myself to achieve the next milestones on my jhana meditation journey. I made good progress and experienced unspeakable bliss (in the form of extreme joy and extreme calm). I will now attempt to speak it nonetheless!

Well, I’m having the time of my life! And that’s because I took the time to enjoy myself. You see, for this blog, I try to practice a new philosophical exercise every month, so I am always hesitant to revisit an exercise that I have already talked about. I worry about having nothing new or interesting to say about it. I worry about it being “old news”. (I have many such not-so-smart thoughts I’m afraid.) Nevertheless, I reasoned that it would be wise to not chase novelty, and instead to really delve into Jhana practice again!

The jhanas are a series of blissful altered states of consciousness, achieved in sequence. “Jhana meditation” is the type of meditation that allows you to hit those target experiences. It’s a bit tricky to pull off those bliss-states and so I gave myself two months to make some good progress along the sequence. (to give you an idea: it took me 23 days to go from the second jhana to the third jhana; it’s not impossible, it’s just tricky!)

I very much longed to go back to this exercise, so blocking this time seemed worth it. If you asked me “Why?”, “What’s the point there?”, I would feel compelled to try to describe to you the allure of jhana meditation and the jhana states. Its unspeakable beauty. I would do so by asking you to picture the following:

A traveller has been walking for days and days across a difficult plane. They’re staggering along. Weary, dirty from grime & sweat, and – worst of all – parched with thirst. In the distance, they see an oasis.

It is not an illusion, mind you. This one is not a story of disappointment. It is a true pond. It has no inflow from east, west, north, or south, but the fount of water welling up from within fills the pond with cool waters all the way through, and the skies periodically supply abundant showers.

So they see this oasis, and their heart jumps in their chest; they feel relieved. They walk all the way to the oasis, feeling excited.

They finally reach the oasis. They flop down by the side of it on their hands and knees, and they just drink and drink and drink that cool water. Their thirst is quenched.

Eventually, they decide to get into the water. Can you imagine how good it must feel after such a challenging trip? It cleans and cools them.

Perhaps, in the end, utterly relaxed, they sink to the bottom of the pond while holding their breath. They look up and admire the lotuses swaying under water. Born and growing under the surface, the blue, white, or red lotuses stay immersed and flourish without ever standing up and breaking the surface. They are permeated and pervaded, suffused and filled, with cool water from their roots to their tips. The only thing piercing the surface, here, is bright sunlight, reaching down, and dancing on the hidden lotuses; lending them an ethereal glow.²

Art by Colin Goh ; found here along with an explanation of Right Samadhi and the Four Jhānas¹ by Chade-Meng Tan

I include this drawing for pedagogical purposes: to emphasize how visually striking this lotus pond metaphor is. Look at the composition of the drawing, which closely follows the evocative image developed in the literary source material. Hopefully this helps you picture it.

All of this is an allegory. It’s not one that I came up with; I combined different sources from different teachings to arrive at this version, so the text is mostly not mine³.

Let me give the game away:

The excitement that the traveller feels upon learning of the oasis is the first jhana, the “jhana of pleasant sensations”, which I tend to call the jhana of euphoria. It’s a mind-blowing, orgasmic (yet non-sexual) experience.

Drinking the cool water from the oasis is the second jhana, the “jhana of joy”, which I sometimes call the jhana of happiness, though I do like the “joy” moniker. I find that this jhana feels as powerful as falling in love with someone. It’s a very intense joy.

When the traveller enters the water, this is the third jhana, the “jhana of contentment”, which I prefer to call the jhana of peace. This one, feels to me, as powerful as anxiolytic medication! I really mean that! And I don’t know what it could do for my anxiety disorder, but I dare to dream.

Finally, the traveller holds their breath and drops to the bottom of the pond to admire it from below. This is the “jhana of utter peacefulness”, which I tend to call the jhana of equanimity. This last jhana is the very limit of my ability right now; I was successful only in catching tiny glimpses of it. This might not make sense to you, but here is the best way I can describe it: whenever you do jhana meditation, you feel this flow of energy coursing through your body, and the fourth jhana feels as though this flow goes from normal flow to laminar flow. Look it up on Youtube. Laminar flow is this very freaky thing where a liquid is flowing in such a way that it looks like it’s not flowing at all: it looks like time has stopped or like the liquid is frozen like ice. Yet passing your hand through it reveals that it is flowing like usual. Thus, the fourth jhana is an experience of incredibly weird stillness. Often accompanied with an apparent cessation of all breathing from the meditator. The meditator themself, not just onlookers, feels like they are not breathing! Yes, it is extremely weird.

Now, why would I answer you with an allegory if you asked me what the point of jhana meditation was? Can’t I just talk normal? Well, it’s the beauty that I am chasing. Over these past two months, I have been transfixed by the sheer beauty of that allegory, and the sheer beauty of those bliss-states themselves. I did not chase novelty for the blog, I chased beauty. The jhanas are truly marvelous and I find myself stunned and unable to express how beautiful they are. But that allegory comes close. It is a story of having a wonderful time. It has an effect on me (a philosopher) as powerful as Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.

When I look back on my previous article about the jhanas, I see that I tried to cram in there, rather awkwardly, everything that I thought about this new and shiny topic. But right now I am just trying to convey only one take-away message: this is all so beautiful that I can hardly believe my luck.

The water feels good, come join me. 

(PS: On this blog, we explore a new philosophical exercise every month. For example, one time, we discovered the joy and relief of intuitive action [deciding without deciding, doing without doing] and, another time, the beauty of the cosmic perspective. Take a look around the blog for more exercises!)

(10/09/2025)

Pierrick Simon

my email: lemiroirtranquille@outlook.fr

(do not hesitate to reach out)

Bluesky: @pierricksimon.bsky.social

Twitter: @PhiloTranquille

NOTES:

1https://buddhism.net/posts/buddhism-for-all/b802-right-samadhi-and-the-four-jhanas/ Right Samadhi and the Four Jhānas

2 text is not from me ; see next footnote for the sources

3- “Samadhanga Sutta: The Factors of Concentration” translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu (see here: https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.028.than.html )

- and a passage from the Visuddhimagga-Ch IV.100 (pg. 139) see here: (https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/35124/looking-for-citation-p%C4%ABti-and-sukha-of-4-jh%C4%81nas-compared-to-dying-of-thirst-se )

- Most of the text I wrote here is taken from Rob Burbea’s lecture where he combines the same sources: https://hermesamara.org/resources/talk/2019-12-28-the-third-jhana

- The last bit, which represents the fourth jhana, is loosely adapted from some musings that Rob Burbea has in another lecture, about the fourth jhana. It’s also inspired by my own personal experience.