Listening to the Dharma leads to contemplation, contemplation to meditation, meditation to the direct experience of mind -- that's what Jamgon Kongtrul says. Then he adds a few lines specially for me:

Thus the previous stages act as causes for the arising of the latter.
When this is not the case, it is like desiring results without any cause.
You may claim that your accumulation, purification, and practice are most excellent,
Bemoaning the hardships of a practice that is merely conjectural.
This kind of experience will not lead to conviction.
Without conviction, you are stranded in doubt,
And doubt is the only supreme obstacle.

I laughed aloud when I read these lines over my slice of pizza at lunch, and kept breaking into laughter as I walked down the street back to work. "Bemoaning the hardships of a practice that is merely conjectural." Surely that's 95% of what I do in this blog.