Through the Ten Fetters to Awakening
For some, enlightenment strikes like lightning. Others find it after years of searching – years of meditation, or through meeting a teacher. It may seem unlikely that awakening could just happen to you. And yet, it’s very simple.
With the Ten Fetters, the Buddha described a clear, step-by-step path to awakening.
What is Streamentry?
Streamentry is not a state – it’s the end of an illusion. It’s the clear seeing that what you call I has never truly existed. The path the Buddha described leads step by step through ten fetters – ten assumptions that obscure awakening.
Bahiya, this is what you will realize:
In what is seen, there will be only the seen.
In what is heard, only the heard.
In what is thought, only the thought.
In what is known, only the known.
In all of this, you will not be seen, heard, thought, or known.
When you are not seen, heard, thought, or known – you are not there.
When you are not there, there is no you – neither here nor elsewhere.
This is the end of suffering.
Buddha
The 10 Fetters
The Buddha described ten fetters that obscure the clear seeing of reality. When they are seen through, suffering naturally falls away.
Self Illusion
The first fetter is the assumption that there is someone who exists independently – someone who thinks, decides, and acts. When you look closely, it becomes clear: this “I” is just an idea.
We simply assume
that we are as we think we are,
and that reality is as we believe it to be.
And from there, we set out on our way.
We accept these things as fixed and certain,
and move forward from that point.
Thus the fundamental error –
from which all others arise –
has already been made,
and is safe from being discovered or corrected.
Jed McKenna
Guidance
I’ll guide you if you truly want to see what is actually here – in a quiet, clear dialogue that requires no method. Together we’ll look at what can be found in direct experience – and what cannot.
Since 2019, I’ve been guiding people through the Ten Fetters. Over time, a small and vibrant community has grown – a space for shared inquiry, seeing, and mutual support.
Community
Over the years, a small community has formed – a space where we explore together what is truly present in direct experience. Open, quiet, kind – without doctrine, without a master. Just honest looking.
We write daily, meet weekly in small groups focused on the respective fetter, and gather every six weeks as a larger circle. There’s an open group you can drop into, a forum for exchange, and a private online space where I guide you.
If you want to look more deeply, you’ll find the space for it here – together, quietly, sincerely.
Steffi
10 fetter guide – beyond fetter.
Since 2019, I’ve been guiding people in German and English through the Ten Fetters - in direct dialogue, without methods, closely aligned with the original teachings of the Buddha, continued in the lineage of Kevin Shanilec and Christiane Michelberger.
My approach is direct, dialogical, and experiential - not theoretical, not meditative. It’s about seeing clearly, in direct experience, what is actually here - and what is not.
How to begin
Four simple ways to explore what is truly here
End the search
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