About This Answer
Does someone who breaks the fetters know it immediately, or only after reflection? Ajahn Dtun says one need not review oneself for sakkāya-diṭṭhi (personality view), doubt, or attachment to rules and practices. One simply practises sīla, samādhi and paññā, and the fetters are cut by themselves. Some who review themselves this way, under delusion, wrongly believe they have attained.
He says he knew nothing of these scriptural terms until he had already let go of much, and only later found a book listing the ten fetters. Picturing the defilements as four portions, he says each is known in the heart when let go, without review, and what is released does not return. When the fourth portion is gone, it is irreversible: the end of saṃsāra, one's last life.