Samatha

The only living companion app for The Mind Illuminated. A quiet instrument: sit, check in honestly, see where you are on the path. Free, no ads, no account.

Samatha is a quiet instrument for practitioners of The Mind Illuminated (TMI), the meditation manual by Culadasa (John Yates, PhD).

It is not a content library. It is the tool you reach for twice a day: a sit timer with a hand-tuned singing bowl, an honest check-in, and the traditional ten-stage painting — alive, interactive, and centered on where YOU are.

THE SIT • Wall-clock timer (survives locks and calls), gentle start and end bowls • Mindfulness bells: halfway, every 5 minutes, or random — the honest startle test for subtle dullness • Six-point preparation and four-step transition, straight from the practice • Your last note to yourself, shown exactly when it helps: before you sit • Live Activity on the Lock Screen and Dynamic Island • A sit can never be lost — killed app, reboot: everything is restored

THE HONEST STAGE LOGIC • After each sit, check what you actually experienced — each observation votes • A sit's lived stage is the median of its votes; in doubt, the lower one • The app NEVER promotes you. After three consecutive diagnosed sits above your stage, it points you to the book's mastery criteria — you confirm, honestly • Going back a stage after a pause is one tap. That's not failure, that's practice

THE PATH • The traditional ten-stage elephant painting, fully interactive • Every stage: what to practice, what to avoid, the signs you're there, obstacles and graduated antidotes, mastery criteria • A safety card for destabilizing experiences — because a serious tool carries the book's guardrails, not just its techniques

YOUR JOURNAL • Every sit, monthly sections, full CSV export anytime • Automatic, private iCloud backup — your data never touches our servers (there are none)

Free. No ads. No account. No tracking. Independent app, not affiliated with Dharma Treasure or the authors. Original text throughout.