In retrospect, the best book I should have read was Shaila Catherine(spelling?)'s "Wisdom Wide and Deep", which sets out a full practice program based on the (Theravada) Buddhist texts Abhidamma and VishuddiMagga. This is about as hard core a book as you can find. Richard Shankman's "The Experience of Samadhi" is a much more lightweight alternative on just Jhana (and not Vipassana iirc), nowhere as deep but an easier read.
In reality, I had to piece together 'algorithms' from random sources and test them out. The basic instructions for jhana and vipassana meditations I ended up with match with those in SK's book, though her path involves getting into extremely deep states of jhana before switching to Vipassana, wheras I developed both skills in parallel (which is a valid method and used by other Buddhist schools)
I used to meditate 2 to 4 hours a day (more on self set 'retreats'). These days I meditate about an hour to 90 minutes per day. I'm not interested in going beyond basic jhana and vipassana and did not do 'skeleton meditation' , 'corpse meditation' etc, because at that point, - about the middle of Shaila's book - the meditations begin to seriously embody Buddhist dogma about the nature of reality and purpose of life etc, specifically ways to 'shake loose' your identification with your body, and so on. I have no wish to be 'liberated' from 'samsara', or otherwise be a full time Buddhist monk or the equivalent, so I stopped with achieving the ability to do either Jhana or Vipassana meditations for a few hours at a time.
I use these purely in a non religious fashion, as 'weight training for my mind' and am happy with my limited achievements.
Even at this relatively minor level of practice, things begin to get funky at the edges, as Steven's paper illustrates.
In reality, I had to piece together 'algorithms' from random sources and test them out. The basic instructions for jhana and vipassana meditations I ended up with match with those in SK's book, though her path involves getting into extremely deep states of jhana before switching to Vipassana, wheras I developed both skills in parallel (which is a valid method and used by other Buddhist schools)
I used to meditate 2 to 4 hours a day (more on self set 'retreats'). These days I meditate about an hour to 90 minutes per day. I'm not interested in going beyond basic jhana and vipassana and did not do 'skeleton meditation' , 'corpse meditation' etc, because at that point, - about the middle of Shaila's book - the meditations begin to seriously embody Buddhist dogma about the nature of reality and purpose of life etc, specifically ways to 'shake loose' your identification with your body, and so on. I have no wish to be 'liberated' from 'samsara', or otherwise be a full time Buddhist monk or the equivalent, so I stopped with achieving the ability to do either Jhana or Vipassana meditations for a few hours at a time.
I use these purely in a non religious fashion, as 'weight training for my mind' and am happy with my limited achievements.
Even at this relatively minor level of practice, things begin to get funky at the edges, as Steven's paper illustrates.