Someone asked for confirmation of a four-step method of practice: 1) establish the name Samma-Arahang, letting the Buddha image arise, 2) let the Buddha image arise, 3) unite the body so that we become the Buddha image and the Buddha image becomes us, 4) unite the mind. Is this correct?

The teacher confirmed that it is correct. Step one is establishing the name — Samma-Arahang — which is the name of the Dhamma body: one who has practiced well and rightly, in a way that leads far from all the defilements that cloud the heart. When we establish this name, the state associated with that name — the qualities it represents — begins to appear. Once established in the heart, those qualities appear within the heart itself: higher virtue, higher mind, higher wisdom. The heart perceives the purity of virtue, concentration, and wisdom, to a greater or lesser degree depending on how coarse or refined the heart currently is — just as the Great Reverend Teacher taught: "Generate the cause, then observe the result; taking interest in this is truly excellent." Establish the name, and the state associated with it naturally appears — just as when we recite the Pali names for the earth, water, wind, and fire elements, such as pathavī, the taste-quality of earth becomes perceptible; the taste-quality of water, āpo, likewise appears.

Establishing the Name Naturally Brings the Form That Follows

Establishing the state associated with the name means establishing the qualities it represents. Once that is established, the form associated with it naturally follows, because form and name are paired together. When we establish Samma-Arahang, a crystal-clear, pure Buddha image, alive and radiant, seated upon a meditative platform surrounded by a sphere of Dhamma, appears within our heart — because Dhamma cannot arise anywhere else; it can only arise within our own heart. Wherever we direct our attention, the mind goes there, and both the form and the name-state appear right there, with merit flowing through that very point as well.

Uniting the Body: Merging into One for the Sake of Liberation

The third step is uniting the body. Once the Buddha image has appeared, we unite our human body with the Dhamma body into a single unity — we become the Buddha image, and the Buddha image becomes us — so that we may rely on and be carried by it toward liberation. To let it lead us to liberation, we must merge ourselves with it into a single unity. The moment that merging into a single unity occurs, liberation on the coarser dimensions begins to arise. But once we've united our mind with its mind, a continuous stillness deepening inward begins to occur — stillness within stillness, calm within calm, moving into the center of the center — and complete liberation arises. Because our body has united with its body, and our mind with its mind, into one unity, as it becomes liberated, we become liberated along with it, moving continuously from one dimension to the next, until, becoming clean and pure, we come to perceive our movement along the inner middle path, moving as one, throughout the whole of our being.