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The Tax of Goodness…

The Tax of Goodness…

by | Feb 14, 2026 | Compassion, Life, Zen

It is not really easy to be a good human being. It is in fact quite difficult. I mean to be a good human being in practice. Not as an idea or ideal in our mind.

That is because to be a good human being we got to fight with our nature. Our DNA. DNA is for hierarchy and followership. DNA—our basic nature—is not for equity, equality or thinking mind with awareness.

The paradox of the "natural"

Awareness and equity are not natural to our hardware. We are running on millions of years of code optimized for tribal survival, not universal compassion. But the fact that we can even recognize this limitation is evidence that we have already transcended it.

A fish does not know it is wet. A human, however, can observe the water and decide to build a boat.

Our DNA gives us the instinct to push others aside to reach the fruit; awareness gives us the ability to plant an orchard for the next generation. That act of planting is "unnatural," but it is precisely what makes us human.

Religious vs spiritual

Religions were initiated in an effort to make us all into good human beings. If you carefully and hermeneutically decode those scriptures across any tradition, they are all gentle teachings, advice and nudges to align our selfish gene to being good. They span from strict commandments of Judaism, Christianity or Islam, to the precepts of Buddhism, to the teaching through parables and Gitas of Hinduism.

Those who scripted those scriptures might have believed that those who follow would end up as good human beings.

But following is being religious. Religiosity calls for just faith and following to a hierarchy. It is, in a way, deciding not to use our rational brain—not to work the small space between stimulus and response. We surrender our personal agency to something beyond us. Our existence out here is preordained; very little we can do about it. It is very easy to be religious. That explains the milling crowds.

Religion fills our cup with the Shepherd's process, procedure, worksteps. Soon there is space for nothing else.

Being spiritual means empty that cup quite a bit, so that there is mindspace for the world in general and others in particular. The Zen Master, filling the professor's overflowing tea cup until it spills, was pointing to this.

Being spiritual is an entirely different ball game. Spirituality accepts and aligns our instincts and nature to the well being of ourselves and others, using our ability to think and decide for ourselves. One got to be really aware of our thoughts, sensations, basic nature and not to identify with it. To choose a way that is good for us and good for others too. But being aware and being an observer is not basic nature of a human being. That is an evolved quality. It takes effort. Often it is taxing.

A small parable:
Religion is like following a shepherd into the valley. You trust the path is laid out. You surrender your agency to the flock.
Spirituality is like planting seeds in wild soil. You decide where to place them. You water them, protect them, wait.
The shepherd gives you belonging. The seed gives you responsibility. Both are paths. But only one asks you to awaken in that small space between stimulus and response.

True spirituality is not about floating above the muck of human nature. It is about wading through it without losing sight of the shore. It is easy to feel enlightened in a quiet room. It is hard to feel enlightened when your nervous system is screaming at you because a toddler is screaming at you.

The battle is real.

The child as mirror

That is why as adults, we can't really communicate with small children. Have you ever observed how adults communicate with small children who often babble and talk quite incoherently? We do try to listen for some time and then give it up and try to distract the focus of the child to something else.

This is not because we lack love or affection for that child. Basically to be with that child does take energy.

Two areas in human life that receive the most research and advice are leadership and communication. There are terabytes of knowhow on the internet. Especially in community groups of helping professionals such as coaches. On empathy and communication. We pay hefty sums to listen and learn from the fancy sage on the stage.

And yet we often forget: the best teacher of empathetic communication could be the infant child in our own homes. If we could communicate with that infant child, then communicating with anyone else—leave alone humans, even animals, flowers and trees—could be a cakewalk.

The taxing nature of awareness is not a flaw but the very gate of practice. The child's incoherence is not a barrier but a reminder of the raw ground from which awareness must arise.

Adults often assume communication fails because the child lacks vocabulary. In reality, it fails because the adult lacks presence. To be with a babbling child is to abandon the linear, goal-oriented mind—Where is this conversation going? What is the point?—and enter a state of pure process.

This is energetically expensive because we have been conditioned to value outcomes over encounters.

The child is not incoherent. The child is speaking the language of pure sensation. We find it taxing not because it is difficult, but because we refuse to learn the language.

The dance floor

And when we transform that battle into a dance, that is when we really transcend it—without rejecting our basic nature. Using the energy of instinct as fuel for awareness.

The dance happens the moment we stop saying "I must suppress my irritation" and start saying "Ah, there is irritation. Hello, old friend. I see you want me to shut this child down. I am going to feel you, but I am not going to obey you."

The energy of the instinct does not vanish; it is transmuted. The heat of frustration becomes the warmth of patience. The sharpness of hierarchy becomes the clarity of boundaries.

Yes, it is taxing. But a muscle only grows when it is torn first.

Is our nature the shadow?

Our nature is shadow when we remain unconscious of it. Our nature is fuel when we bring awareness to it. Our nature is Buddha when we dance with it.

The shadow is not evil—it is unintegrated. When we fight it, it becomes battle. When we dance with it, it becomes energy for awareness.

In Zen, nature is both instinct and Buddha-nature. The paradox is that both are true: our raw DNA is shadow, but our capacity to see it is Buddha-nature. To transcend is not to reject, but to integrate.

The quiet heroism

We often look for goodness in grand gestures. But the space between the impulse and the action—that gap—is where the real work happens.

It is the pause before snapping at a waiter.
It is the breath taken before correcting a child.
It is the choice, despite exhaustion, to listen to one more round of babbling.

This is invisible labour. No one claps for it. The DNA certainly doesn't reward it.

But this is the architecture of a good human being.

To conclude

It is indeed difficult to be good.

Now one may ask: how do all these connect together? Being spiritual—is it just some navel gazing, mindless, solitary walk on this earth?

No. Being spiritual is to be a completely humane human and live a compassionate and caring life.

If we can't communicate empathetically to that infant child within us, then we cannot connect with ourselves, leave alone others. That child inside—the one who still babbles, still feels, still reacts from raw sensation—if we cannot listen to that voice with presence, then all our fancy communication techniques are just performance.

And that is the most basic aspect of being a humane human. That is the ground floor of being spiritual.

The fact that you find it difficult—that you feel the weight of the effort—is not a sign of failure. It is a sign that you are actually doing it.

The person who finds goodness easy has likely never questioned whether they are truly good. The person who finds it heavy is the one carrying the water uphill, building the consciousness of the next generation drop by drop.

The child will grow. The babbling will become coherence. And one day, that child will encounter their own toddler, feel the familiar surge of impatience, and remember:

Someone once listened to me long enough for me to learn how to speak.

That child is you. Waiting.

That is the dance. That is the transcendence.

That is the tax well paid.

The Thief of Joy: Walking the Ox-Herding Path Back to the Marketplace, to the Tune of a Different Drummer

The Thief of Joy: Walking the Ox-Herding Path Back to the Marketplace, to the Tune of a Different Drummer

by | Jan 29, 2026 | Compassion, Harmony, Integrity, Life, Transformation, Zen

Expectation is the thief of joy. We imagine the world, people around us, and life events should conform to our hopes—and when they don’t, peace and happiness slip away. This is all the more piercing in spiritual communities, where many assume fellow practitioners are somehow more evolved than the rest of society. But that assumption is false. Often, people come to the sangha not to deepen realization but to escape the marketplace, and so the same patterns of hypocrisy, ambition, and self-deception repeat themselves—sometimes unconsciously, sometimes with full awareness.

The Ten Ox-Herding Pictures are not simply allegories; they are one of Zen’s most enduring teaching devices. Originating in China during the 12th century, attributed to the Chan master Kuoan Shiyuan, they depict the seeker’s journey through ten stages of practice. The ox itself is a symbol of the mind—wild, elusive, sometimes hidden, sometimes tamed. The pictures begin with the restless search, the ox unseen, the seeker wandering. By the third step, the ox is glimpsed—the true self recognized. The middle stages show taming, riding, and eventually forgetting the ox, pointing to the dissolution of duality. And the final step is the most radical: returning to the marketplace with “bliss-bestowing hands.” Here, realization is not escape but ordinariness, not withdrawal but presence in the midst of daily life.

Yet many begin in the marketplace and end there again, without ever walking through the intermediary steps. They wear the robes of spirituality but never touch the ox. They mistake the outer form for the inner journey. And so, spiritual communes mirror the wider world. The marketplace is always present—even in the zendo. The question is not whether hypocrisy exists, but whether we meet it with awareness. To see the act, the mask, the double face, is itself a koan: how do we walk without expectation, without projecting our longing for purity onto others?

This longing extends far beyond the zendo. It touches the very core of how we move through society. We are all, in some way, following an internal rhythm. Henry David Thoreau captured it perfectly: “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.”

David Keirsey placed this quote at the opening of Please Understand Me for a reason. It is a testament to temperament—to the innate, different guides within us. The spiritual path, at its best, is about hearing that unique drummer with perfect clarity and having the courage to step to it. Yet so often, in our rush to belong to a community—be it a corporate team, a family, or a sangha—we mute our own music. We project onto others the expectation that their drumbeat should match the one we’ve chosen to hear, or worse, the one we think we should hear.

The full passage from Walden reveals more. Thoreau speaks of advancing confidently in the direction of one’s dreams, of new laws establishing themselves “around and within him.”

Here is more of the surrounding text for context from the final paragraph of the chapter titled "Conclusion."  :

"I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavours to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within him; or the old laws be expanded, and interpreted in his favour in a more liberal sense, and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings...

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. It is not important that he should mature as soon as an apple tree or an oak. Shall he turn his spring into summer?"

This is the journey of taming the ox: the inner laws becoming clear, the authentic rhythm undeniable. But here is the paradox: to return to the marketplace with “bliss-bestowing hands” is not to demand that the chaotic noise of the market become your melody. It is to move through it, undistracted by its discord, steadfast in your own measure—and in doing so, to allow others the space to hear their own.

If we can meet even hypocrisy as another face of suffering, then it too becomes part of practice. We see it not merely as a moral failure, but as a profound disconnection—a person who has stopped listening to their own drummer and is instead clattering along to a cacophony of borrowed beats, of shoulds and oughts, of spiritual ambition and unmet longing.

The path is not linear. Some circle back, some stall, some leap ahead, some act out roles without ever glimpsing the ox. But the invitation remains: to strip away masks, to deepen realization, and to return to ordinariness. To live in the marketplace—not as escape, but as presence. And to do so, finally, stepping to the music you hear, however measured or far away, while letting the din of expectation fade into the background where it belongs.

Preparing with Care, Trusting in Execution… Reading the First Half, Living the Second

Preparing with Care, Trusting in Execution… Reading the First Half, Living the Second

by | Jan 19, 2026 | Change, Communication, Compassion, Harmony, Life, Meaning, RElationship, Trust, Zen

My better half’s family was into Krishnamurti and she got out of a well-paying IT job to be a teacher in a. Krishnamurti school and Manu and Rishi too had their entire school education there. Though, it is an alternative education, it did give me some anxious moments, especially when i got to read about the competitive landscape of higher education and career building and livelihood earning outside that protected cocoon. They did end up in really good universities for their UG. But , the elder one, did face the challenged due to changed environment. Someone who was never part of dumb bell curve or exams for most of his life, but who pursued knowledge and wisdom for its own sake, was thrown into the high seas of surprise tests, CGPA and dumbbell curve etc without any life jacket. And it did reflect on his performance for the first two sems… There were O+ with 0 ( Not present). As someone who skipped my final year Engineering exam , for watching World cup football, in spite of my late Father's concerned advice of a lengthy 5 page letter, i knew i did not have the moral capital to advise him. Though indirectly , i tried to share some pointers and nothing much. There was some subaltern tension and concern nevertheless.

But one thing good about him was his zeal of reading and ability to observe. As a very young child, he was into ornithology and could recognize almost all kinds of birds in the Valley school campus. Their daily routing in school, even for 1st std starts with early morning Nature walking. And the first gift i had given was a book by Salim Ali and a Bushnell binocular bought in Johannesburg. And he is one of those who read much more than i do. So in the breaks between semesters, while at home, he started reading the books in my bookshelf and also started buying a lot of books chosen by him. Me and Thara had also kind of stopped asking him about his results. We just used to say in a good way that he got to prepare himself to make a living as there is no inheritance as such.

So i was quite surprised, when he walked in and showed me his Semester marks card last month. It was all O+ and A+. I asked him how did he turn himself around and he talked about Frankl's paradoxical intention and Huxely's law of reversed effort. As someone who was trained in NLP ,Counselling, and did MA in Psychology and got trained in Coaching and read a bit, i was familiar with most of such stuff. But not this. And when i asked about it, he showed it in the book ( my old book of Man's Search for Meaning). I had read the first part and just skimmed thru the second half. 🙁 .. Below is his full note on that. When your own son self-coaches himself, out of trouble into some success and teaches you about it, may be one can’t be more happier than that ... Here is his note in full:

"The law of Reversed Effect

The law of reversed effect can be viewed as a psychological boomerang. When you attempt to wilfully dictate an experience, the harder you try, the more that experience will slip away from you. It’s like trying to hold a feather steady in a gust by grasping it tightly in your hand. Examples of this principle are found in all areas of human experience. The more you attempt to force sleep to occur, the more alert and reactive your brain will become; likewise, if you tell yourself to “stay calm,” all of a sudden, you’ll feel more anxious. The conscious mind, when in a state of contraction, creates a resistance to the natural rhythms required by the unconscious mind to perform its job effectively.

This law points out that the mind is likely going to produce better results through relaxation than through strain. All aspects of performance, confidence, creativity, and memory are likely to grow, develop, and improve when there is less pressure and strain associated with them. Athletes enter into flow states by not trying hard enough, but rather by getting out of their own way. As soon as an athlete stops worrying about the results of a competition and focuses only on the performance, their body takes over and performs at its best.

The law of reversed effect does not imply to “never try.” It means to use intention rather than effort and precision over strain. For instance, aim like an archer: identify the target, align your shot, and release without forcing the bow. In many cases, the most successful result comes from creating a time period of rest and relaxation in between two actions, during which you lead, rather than restrain, your movement toward your desired outcome. Sometimes the best way to make progress toward a goal is to stop chasing after it and allow it to come to you.

Rather than mandating performance, the conditions can be established which will allow the output to develop itself, which means So, you relax the inner grip. You don’t quit, you just change the aim of your effort. Just move your effort from trying to control the end result and start focusing it on the process. When the anxiety pulls you into "I must do this right," you pull back and say, "I'll make the space for good execution."

In a way, this is line with. Viktor Frankl’s Paradoxical intention. Paradoxical intention is a psychotherapeutic technique developed by Viktor Frankl, the founder of logotherapy. It is designed to break the "vicious cycle" of anticipatory anxiety—the fear of a symptom (like insomnia or stuttering) which, through the very effort to avoid it, makes the symptom worse. This directly mirrors the "Law of Reversed Effort". Many who read Frankl’s “Man Search for Meaning”, though it is a small book, reads the first part where he narrated his experiences and let go the second part in which describes the second part of Logotherapy. ( Like my Papa!) . And they don’t realise that , Man’s search for meaning is meaningful, only if you stay with it rather than let go in the middle. 🙂

Coming back to exams, it involves studying for them and going to them trusting what one has prepared for rather than going for what one has not perfected. With anxiety, it involves recognizing the sensations one feels without trying to struggle against them. With skills, it involves practicing them in a structured manner and executing them by breathing into them instead of straining them.

The core is:
Let’s put the effort into preparation rather than execution. Let the trust go into execution. You're not letting go of control; you're choosing the right kind of control: conditions, not grip. The effect appears like a cat; pounce too hard and it runs off; just be still, and it curls up in your lap."

What he has written is not just a psychological principle, but a Dharma gate. The law of reversed effect is nothing but the Zen koan of “trying not to try.” The feather in the gust, the archer’s release, the cat curling up in the lap—these are not metaphors alone, they are lived gestures of life teaching us that control is often the enemy of presence.

I see in his words the same paradox that Krishnamurti pointed to when he said, “The more you pursue pleasure, the more pain you invite.” Or in Zen, when Master Dōgen reminds us that practice is enlightenment itself, not a means to it. The reversal is the teaching: when you grip, it slips; when you soften, it arrives.

And perhaps this is the most ordinary miracle—that a boy who once walked the Valley campus identifying birds by their calls, now identifies the subtle calls of the mind itself. He has moved from Salim Ali’s field guide to Frankl’s logotherapy, but the movement is the same: attention, observation, and trust in what reveals itself when you stop forcing.
For me, reading his note was like being shown my own bookshelf anew. I had skimmed, he had stayed. I had read the first half, he had lived into the second. And in that reversal, the son became the teacher, the father became the student. That is lineage too—not only bloodline, but wisdom line, where insight flows back and forth, unowned, ungrasped.
So I take his words as a reminder: prepare with care, execute with trust. Grip less, condition more. Let the cat curl up. Let the arrow fly. Let the feather dance. And let the law of reversed effect be not just psychology, but practice—practice of living, practice of dying, practice of being.

And perhaps, this is where the circle of education and life shows its hidden symmetry. What began as a child’s morning nature walk in Valley School, listening to bird calls, has now become a young man’s walk through the inner valley of mind, listening to the calls of anxiety and learning to let them perch and fly away. The binoculars of Salim Ali have turned into the lens of Frankl, but the act is the same: seeing clearly, without grasping.

It reminds me that the true inheritance we give our children is not wealth or security, but the courage to observe, the patience to stay, and the humility to learn from reversals. My father’s five-page letter was one kind of inheritance; my silence with my son was another. Both carried concern, but only one gave space. And in that space, he found his own way.

This reversal is not a defeat of the parent, but the flowering of lineage. The son teaches the father and  the feather teaches the hand. And life, in its ordinary rhythm, teaches us again and again that the way forward is sometimes to soften, to trust, to let go.

So I bow to this teaching—not as a principle in a book, but as a lived koan in my own home. The law of reversed effect is not only his discovery; it is now mine too.

Chronicles of Meeting: The Languages We Meet In

Chronicles of Meeting: The Languages We Meet In

by | Jan 2, 2026 | Communication, Compassion, Empathy, Friendship, Joy, Life, Zen

 

There are four French practitioners in our Zendo this week. Their presence stirred a memory—first through a reel I happened to see of a tuk‑tuk driver in Jaipur who had picked up French from his passengers, and then through my own halting attempts at the language years ago. He was speaking with surprising fluency. After Thara and I got married, she wanted to better her French. She had studied at Church Park Chennai with French as one of her languages and I had my schooling at the notorious KTMHS Mannarkkad ( which the locals often read it as. Kerala Themmadi Memorial roughly translated to Kerala Rascals Memorial School. ) where language of life was taught without any fees. As I am writing, one of my best friends, classmate and benchmate is the current Head Master of that school.  It kind of reminded me, the story of Franklin Roosvelt making. Joseph Kennedy. ( the father of the famous John Kennedy) as the first chairman of SEC in USA.  It was reported one of the President’s aid, reminded him about the crooked and dishonest side (especially in Stock market) of the Sr. Kennedy to President’s notice.  Roosevelt seems to have replied, “It takes one to catch another”.  And my good friend, current Head master indeed reformed and transformed that school .

Back to the French story, so on weekends we would drive down to Alliance Française near Cunningham Road in Bangalore. In those days, the city still had a certain ease, and that part of town was worth visiting just for the atmosphere and food. I too signed up for the course. To the best efforts of my teacher, the only phrase that stayed with me was: “Comment allez‑vous ?”

When Frédéric rode in from Auroville on his bike and entered the Zendo, I greeted him with that phrase. He looked at me with surprise—“You speak French?”—and in that moment, the classroom laughter of long ago returned. I remembered how Thara, my classmates, and even our French teacher would laugh heartily at my expense. What was once comic has now become a bridge.

These days, it is Tamil that surprises me. Sometimes, when I am not self‑conscious, I find myself conversing in the Kodai tongue with the garden workers. But the moment someone comments on my Tamil fluency, the flow collapses. It is like practice itself: when the watcher steps in, the natural ease is lost. The other day, driving toward Dindigul, I began reading aloud the place names painted on the back of a bus. Prakash, our Zendo manager, was astonished. Yet for me, it was simply another reminder: language is not something we master; it is something that meets us when we forget ourselves.

When I shared this Chronicle with Thara as she waited for a doctor’s appointment, it sparked a sudden flurry of French on WhatsApp—messages and voice clips of “Allez, Au revoir, Bon nuit, Bonjour, Merci beaucoup, Très bien.” What began as a memory became play once again. The laughter of the classroom, the greeting at the Zendo, and now the joy of a few words exchanged across a waiting room—all of it, the same language of meeting.

The memory of those French classes also brought back another corner of Cunningham Road—Infinitea, the tea shop we often visited. Thara, though from a family of coffee‑estate owners in Wynad and raised in Chennai, has always been a tea person. My mother, Mysore‑born and long settled in Palakkad, brewed close to a million cups of tea for my father and remains a coffee person till now. And I—well, I am both. A coffee, a tea person. I relish each. Perhaps that too is a kind of practice: not choosing sides, but tasting fully whatever is placed before me. Similarly, we did have some very common interests and common friends... People like Komal, Sheik Iyer, Rajalakshmi, Abhijit and Navita et al are my friends too... We both like movies in Tamil and Malayalam.... And music too...

Then there are things which are absolutely not part of that Venn diagram... For ex: i have Zero artistic ability. Thara is a good painter. And she has zero interest in Tech or Social Media unlike me. .. May be more than the languages we know, it is the language of silence that bonded us. May be the language of heart too is the language of silence. During this Dussera holidays, she chose (at last ) to come to Zendo and meditate. That was a bit of surprise for me. May be the fact that Rishi, my second son, came to Zendo and meditated and had some good words about it, might have been an influence. Even then, Thara is her own person. Though she taught at a Krishnamurti school for more than 16 years and her own Grand uncle was into Krishnamurti, she was not a Krishnamuritite per se. While i read. K, she kind of lived that philosophy without reading or talking about. Closing In the end, whether it is a phrase of French remembered, a few words of Tamil spoken without self‑consciousness, the aroma of tea or coffee, or the quiet presence of Thara sitting in the Zendo, all of it points to the same truth: life speaks in many tongues, yet its deepest voice is silence. And in that silence, we meet—not as teacher and student, husband and wife, or even as speaker and listener—but simply as presence itself.

As Lao Tsu reminds us, it is the empty hub that makes the wheel turn, the silence between notes that makes music, the space in a window that lets in light. And as Gibran wrote, the pillars of a temple do not stand together. Both point to the same truth: it is the space between that allows movement, harmony, and relationship. Without the gap, there is no wheel, no music, no light, no love.

 

What I Learnt by Walking Straight on the Road with 99 Curves: Notes from a Late Bloomer

What I Learnt by Walking Straight on the Road with 99 Curves: Notes from a Late Bloomer

by | Dec 25, 2025 | Career, Compassion, Friendship, Gratitude, Harmony, Integrity, Joy, Life, Livingwithawareness, Meaning, Meditation, Peace, Relationships, Transformation, Zen

20 Dec 2025 . Saturday evening 6 pm.

As I was getting into the bus at Kodaikanal bus stand, Amma called. I told her I would call back, and after settling in my seat, I did. She was checking whether I would be coming to Ramapura to visit her. I said yes. Just before the call ended, she asked me whether my training at Kodaikanal had got over. Over the last three or so years, that is what I had told her. She knows I am in a temporary consulting assignment, and she has always been concerned about my future. Last time we met, that was the question in her mind: while my peers in the IT industry are doing well, what ails me? She usually quotes two names she remembers—Komal and Bops—and very wisely, she does not compare me with my own cousin. She knows my past fights at the workplace. And then she cushions the criticism by adding it’s just her concern for Manu and Rishi and my own well-being. It seems nowadays no one really cares for another, and it’s important to have financial security. It quite baffles her that her son, who spent some 30 years in IT, hasn’t learnt it. So, just before the call ended, she asked me again what I am learning new at Kodaikanal, and will it get me a better job. I was about to say yes, and then I did not say it.

Krishnappa, my friend, was the main driver. He is one of my new friends, gained from my three years of regular trips between Blr and Kodaikanal. Now he treats me as though I am also part of KSRTC. When the bus stops at Battalagundu for dinner or early morning coffee near Krishnagiri, he always makes it a point to tell them, “Nammavaru” — our man — so they don’t charge me either.

He was nearing retirement, proud of being one of the early members of the KSRTC Volvo fleet. One summer night, with an extra bus on the route, he suggested I sit in the front seat. I agreed, forgetting my severe fear of heights. For an hour, I was okay. Then, nearing Rat Tail Falls, he overtook a slow car. In that moment, the big bus covered the available width of the mountain road, and I saw the distant lights in the valley like a midnight sun. We were on the just the edge. A sudden, infinite fear switched my senses to high wattage. I got up and moved back to the safety of my seat.

Later, at dinner, he asked gently if I had been frightened. Then he told me, with a calm that was almost Zen-like, that in over thirty years he had not had even a small accident. A state cabinet minister had once asked him to be his personal driver. It was the confidence of a man absolutely sure of his craft—a mastery so complete it needed no explanation, only the steady grip on the wheel and the knowledge of every curve in the dark.

I had fallen asleep after that, and he woke me up for early morning coffee this time. And once I was back in the bus, the questions and concern of Amma popped into my mind. I could not go back to sleep.

I started reflecting on my last three years at Kanzeon Zendo. What did I learn? The second part of her question—whether it will get me a better job—somehow did not land in my mind.

What did I learn… as a late bloomer in the afternoon, if not the late evening, of my life?

Maybe I learned that my path was never meant to be a straight line. It is a spiral. I look at friends in straight lines—they knew what they wanted at 20, achieved it by 25, solidified it by 30. And then there is me. Starting and stopping. Pursuing passions until the meaning drains away. Years that look like stagnation outside, while inside I am fighting wars no one else sees. I remembered a line that found its way to me, as if by some meaningful coincidence: "The first half of life is merely a preparation. A clearing of the throat before the actual speech begins." For people like me, maybe this first half wasn't for achievement. It was for the friction needed to wear away everything that is not you.

I read something else that felt like it was written for me. It said: You are not failing to launch. You are undergoing a gestation period that is proportional to the size of the destiny you are meant to carry. The teak tree by the side of the forest near my window at the Zendo does not grow at the speed of the grass. Maybe that’s it. Maybe I was building a foundation for a skyscraper, when everyone else was pitching tents. It made me think of another idea: that "until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate." All this time, feeling adrift, perhaps I wasn't being passive. I was in the difficult, essential work of turning a fate I didn't choose into a destiny I could understand.

The teachers appeared as guides in that work. The first was Orie.

His name means ‘light’ in Hebrew. He was at the Zendo when Hamas attacked Israel across the border. He had been one of those who chose to stay with the IDF beyond his mandated service. But after one operation, witnessing the outcome scene, he quit to seek peace. For seven or eight years since, he had been travelling from one monastery to another across India, Sri Lanka, Burma, and East Asia.

He was built like a panther and moved without making any sound. He would often come late to the meditation hall, tiptoeing in like a cat, and no one would notice his arrival. He had the most tranquil way of debating. On the day of the Hamas attack, we spoke for a long time. He was cool as a cucumber. He taught me Spinoza’s statement: “There are two sides to any story, however thin you slice it.” He said the koan of the sound of one hand clapping was true, because in almost all conflicts, whether you feel like the victim or the tyrant, you are only ever hearing the sound of two hands.

I had wanted to learn the Wim Hof method to do takigyo, the waterfall misogi, at the Zendo—that ancient practice of standing under icy water to purify the body and mind, to seek oneness with nature. Orie told me Wim Hof was a pale imitation and taught me Tummo instead, the inner fire. As we were bonding as friends, he left without announcing it. He just slid a small piece of paper under my door. It said: thank you. O. And nothing else.

Then there was the visitor from Japan. For a week, an elderly Japanese woman stayed at the Zendo. According to her registration form, she was in her early eighties, yet she was the first to complete her full prostrations during chanting—nimble, healthy, and carrying a profound peace. She wanted to visit The Potter’s Shed in Kodaikanal, and I went along, thinking I could stop at the Pastry Corner afterwards. As I went to open the car door from the traffic side, she gently stopped me. She taught me the Dutch Reach: using the hand farthest from the door to open it, which forces your body to turn and your eyes to look over your shoulder—directly into the blind spot where a cyclist might be. It was a safety technique, yes, but she framed it as more. She told me it was an individual’s compassionate and wise response that, when done by many, becomes a community ritual. 

“Compassion for the person in front of you is easy,” she said. “Being compassionate to the one you cannot see, the one who is unknown to you—this is the deepening of the way. It is how we begin to live the vow: ‘Though sentient beings are innumerable, I vow to save them all.’” Enlightenment in a gesture. A small, physical twist to protect an unseen other.

And then, Francois. My journey to him was a spiral of its own. I first heard the word "Tai Chi" from U.G. Krishnamurti, later saw it in Milwaukee, and for years in Bangalore, my wife Thara and I learned the Long Form until life, like the Silk Board flyover, threw its spanner. At the Zendo, split between jungle and city, I couldn't restart. Then I saw him on the terrace—a French martial artist who had spent twenty years in Japan and China. His movement was a perfect symphony. I asked him to teach me. He paused in his considered way, and finally agreed.

For Francois, Tai Chi was not an exercise but a way of living. He took four weeks just to teach us how to stand in Wuji and to master the Tai Chi walk. No forms. Just standing. Just rooting. Root before you rise, he would say. In that endless, patient standing, I finally understood what I had been doing all those years in my career spiral. I wasn't failing to build; I was in the Wuji of my life—the silent, potent stance where all potential gathers before the first movement begins. It was the physical truth of the teak tree growing its roots.

But most importantly, there was Fr. AMA. I first met him properly at a Koan seminar in 2022, as the new Zendo was being built. After hearing my story of living on the edge, his simple suggestion was: do Zazen. By January 2023, I became a regular at the Zendo, taking to Zen as a fish to water. Yet, my questioning mind never stopped. Over three years, I must have asked him a thousand questions, some provocative. He was the only person in my life who never took offence. A mentor in our Sangha once wrote in his autobiography about seeing me in the Zendo, noting how my questions often gave voice to what others wondered but dared not ask, calling it a "questioning spirit and generous heart." After two years of this, Fr. AMA asked me to join him, and I moved in as a full-time student of Zen.

What did I learn from him? Above all, compassion. He taught that without compassion, there is no point in being on the Way. It is as important as enlightenment, if not more. Then, wise discernment—that crucial mindset where great doubt, great effort, and great faith must walk together. It is not about blind acceptance, but about testing everything against the stillness of your own practice. And lastly, the profound importance of striving to live an ordinary life of peace and joy. His teachings became the vessel that held all the other lessons: Orie’s two sides, the visitor’s mindful gesture, Francois’s rooted stance. He taught me how to hold them, question them, and let them shape a life.

And I owe the very possibility of this three-year immersion to another teacher of a different kind: my boss, Robert Meier. A Swiss national in a high-pressure role leading a corporate transformation, Robert was the rarest kind of manager. Amidst immense pressure, he never sacrificed his truthfulness, honesty, or his inherent kindness and compassion. He was, in his own way, a Zen Boss. When he heard of my need to be at the Zendo, he allowed me to work remotely from there. For almost three years, the quiet of the meditation hall existed alongside the digital pulse of my consulting work. One thing he told me has stayed: whenever he had to deliver a difficult truth to the powerful, he would say he was prepared to do any job, even clean public toilets, but he would never sacrifice his authenticity and professionalism out of fear. In him, I saw that the "unshakable" security I sought wasn't just spiritual—it could be a quiet, formidable force in a boardroom, too.

There were, of course, so many others—Christa, Olaf, Meath, Robert Amor—a constellation of fellow travellers at the Zendo who offered their own quiet lessons. That gratitude is for another day.

Then came the lessons that turned the path inward, towards home. When I shared Fr. AMA's invitation to live at the Zendo with Thara, my better half, she paused. Then, calmly and lovingly, she said, "You should take it. It is a calling and you are not seeking anything. Don't worry about anything else. We will take care of the home." In that moment, I learned that love also means letting go, not holding on.

And one morning during breakfast, Rishi told me, "Zen seems to be good for you, Papa." I asked him why. With a smile, he said, "You are not random anymore. We all relate to you better." That is when I understood what Krishnamurti meant: we know ourselves only in the mirror of our relationships. My stillness had become a space they could lean into.

So when Amma asks what I learned…

I learned to sit with the silent suspicion that I failed before I began, and not let it drown me.

I learned that my exhaustion is not laziness—it’s from processing reality at a higher resolution.

I learned that the world needs people who can follow instructions, but it also needs those who can rebuild the instructions when they no longer work.

And from Krishnappa, I learned Nammavaru.

Our man. Belonging without a badge. A free coffee that tastes of community. And a mastery of the spiral path so deep, it feels like stillness.

The bus moves on in the dark. The road is a spiral, not a straight line. Jung said the privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are. For a long time, that privilege felt like a burden. But in the humming dark of this bus, surrounded by the smell of diesel and the quiet breaths of sleeping strangers, it feels less heavy. Maybe that’s how some of us find our way—by circling closer and closer to the centre, where the answer isn’t a job, but a man, finally becoming who he is.

The Song from Behind the Wall: On My Grandmother, Kathakali, and Kalamandalam Hyderali

The Song from Behind the Wall: On My Grandmother, Kathakali, and Kalamandalam Hyderali

by | Dec 22, 2025 | Compassion, Harmony, Life, Meaning, Peace, RElationship, Zen

I have mixed feeling about Kathakali.. I have also mixed feeling about my paternal Grandma. … Mixed with likes and dislikes. No idea about the ratio of that proportion though. The artform of Kathakali was introduced to me by my Grandma.. So we got to start from her.

By any yardstick, my grandma was a very strong lady . She went to school only till 3rd standard.. But could remember the poems . especially the song praising the Queen of British Empire, she leant in her school. And she remembered all the slokas from Malayalam version of Ramayana.. Though she was not a great believer of God per se.. Guess her faith was very much rooted in practicality of day to day living. May be she followed Aristotle’s golden mean on that aspect. She liked temples and festivities as such. Especially those temple artforms such as Kathakali.

She was born into a very wealthy family, lost her mother when she was 21 days old. And sooner her father lost all his wealth. Her upbringing was taken care by a relative. She used to tell us that, as in infant she was fed goat milk. May be that explains her health till the very last moment of her life. I don’t remember she was ever hospitalised for any major illness. Though she was as smart or more smart than her cousin brothers, her education was stopped as was the norm during those days. Girl.

And as the daughter of a poor father, she got married to another not so wealthy person in that small Kannadiga community. Her husband, my paternal grandfather had almost a similar story being born into a wealthy family, but his parents squandering all their wealth and become quite poor by the time he finished his FA . ( During those days, intermediate was known as FA.). In our old family home, there was a photo of him in Football jersey . And my father Sankara, used to tell us that he was quite a good centre forward, that got him a job with Spencer’s. Then suppliers of British Army. But when their unit moved to Singapore , he had to leave that job and stay back to take care of his parents at their insistence. Guess not to his choice or liking. As he used to love Football too. And he took a govt. job.. and due to his over honest and over idealistic nature, remained quite poor throughout his life times.

During those times, there were around 10 Kannadiga families in Mannarkkad, 2 temples and a big graveyad just for the Kannadiga community.   Rest of them were quite wealthy and due to that my grandparents were kind of socially ignored. Also was at the end of ridicule by them.

May be that environment made her seek cultural wealth. I guess Kathakali was her connection to the lost grandeur , an equalizer and display of cultivated taste.

Another story she used to tell us was on how she and other relatives planning to grow vegetables. During those days, they used to grow most of their needs. And most vegetables were seasonal. And she always used to plant a few a few week before others did and used to harvest and share with her relatives. May be some competitive streak.

In a life where so much was decided for her—her halted education, her marriage, her social standing—controlling the calendar of a seed was a powerful act of sovereignty. Planting earlier was a way to command time itself. And Harvesting and sharing first wasn't just kindness; it was a subtle restructuring of social dynamics. The relatives who may have "socially ignored" them became, briefly, recipients. She transformed from being overlooked to being the source, the one who provides. It turned perceived lack of enough into plenty.

All her life experiences had made her a formidable person. And sometimes ruthless too (most of the times she was quite self-centred too.) When a small infant grows up against all odds, it might have ingrained in her that she got to take care of herself. And she is there to take care of herself. And that reflected the way she treated her others in general and her daughter in laws in particular. May be the dislike part in me for her comes from that.

And the like part comes from all the great stories of our ancestors, she shared with us , and especially the stories of Kathakali. ( Kuchelavritham and Karna Sapatham etc were here favourite) and great insights.

For example, when Rajiv Gandhi was PM of India, there was some commotion about his wife, Sonia Gandhi being an Italian. ( Bofors times). And. I remember , her cousin brother, who was a national award winning school teachers talking to her about it. She said, anyone who can ties a saree so well got to be an Indian. Now when I look back, that was great cultural exams, no one can dispute.

Coming back to Kathakali. During those days, 2 or 3 days Kathakali performance was part of the annual festival at MuMoorthi temple in Mannarkkad. And that was something she never wanted to miss. Every single time, she will tell us, next year no one knows whether she is going to be alive so that this may be her last Kathaakali viewing.

I did not like Kathakali is an understatement. For those who wonder what Kathakali is ! It is an 4 or 5 century old temple art form in Kerala. Now almost dying. That is more to do with its form than its content. Kathakali programs used to be like 3 -4 full days. ( Nights in fact... from after the dinner, till just before the sun rises !). Most of the audience used to be Old people.. and often the younger ones with them were there to go with them. As our attention span, ability to really learn nuances and enjoy the slow pace of life declined , Kathakali too moved to reel size appearances in movie songs or on the welcome program of foreign tourists in those fancy resorts.

On that temple grounds, on the grass mat we used to carry as our seating ( in our case sleeping pad), we kids used to sleep .. While elders used to enjoy every moment of it.

I should say that , I was quite happy when that annual sojourn ended.

Much later , it came back. Through the voice of Kalamandalam Hyderali. He came as an arts festival guest at Govt Vicotria college. As the most famous Kathakali singer , as a Muslim , his invite seems to be more of a political statement. But when as an humble man, he said he is no orator and he would sing a kathakali padam for us. And he sang “Ajita hare” without any accompaniments it hit the heart note of all the audience. That song from KuchelaVirttam might have entered into my brain, during my sleeping stint as an audience on that temple ground. Hyderali's rendering of that, just woke me up from my slumber.

Even then I did not make any attempt to learn about him. Again during 2006, he reappeared in the obituary column of the Hindu. And that was a great story. When Mohanlal and Kalamandalam Gopi’s epic movie based on Kathakali “Vanaprastham” was realised, Hyderali was again in news and the legendary Kathakali Artist Gopiasan told in a TV interview, the most iconic kathakali singer was Hyderali.

Kerala is known as God’s own country.. I would hasten to add that it is also Devil’s own country too… In This small Gaul like state , both profound and profane coexist…. Secularism and fanaticism .. kindness and meanness… Openness and narrowmindedness…

Kerala is also home to K J Yesudas, an Xian who is more known for his Hindu devotional songs, K Raghavan an Hindu whose Mappila songs are evergreen. And Kalamandalam Hyderali a Muslim who went to become a legendary Kathakali singer. Kathakali is a Hindu temple art form and was in the hands of conservative echelons of Kerala society.

One of the Best KATHAKALI singers of his generation, Hyder Ali is the first non-Hindu artiste to make a mark in the four-century-old Classical Dance-Drama KATHAKALI.

It was when he was 11 years old that Hyderali joined Kerala Kalamandalam. Hailing from a poor family, his parents had struggled to pay the admission fee -— incidentally "a Hindu and a Christian" helped him secure admission in the premier performing arts institute, as Hyderali later recalls in his autobiography.

Hyderali was blessed with a light, pliant and sonorous voice that tuned well to softer and melodramatic scenes on Kathakali stage. His emotive singing used to earn him praise from masters like Kalamandalam Gopi.

Hyderali, suave and soft-spoken, nurtured the wish to see Lord Krishna in real life, but had to occasionally suffer professional humiliation on religious grounds, as entry to temples, where a chunk of Kathakali shows finds stage, in Kerala is barred for non-Hindus. Kathakali aficionados recall how those in control of an ancient temple near Haripad actually pulled down a part of the compound wall and extended the platform there for Hyderali to sing for the Kathakali performers inside the compound.

And that was a great story.. And Hyderali in one interview says as he was forced to stand on the stage part which was behind the wall outside the border of the temple, “ My body was outside the temple, but my voice was within.. Had I extended my hand, I would have touched the God.”

After a few years in wandering through the Zen way, I would have told him, that God was within him and may be all the Gods go wherever he used to sing to listen to him.

Coming back to my grandma, maybe she too would have felt , she is standing outside the wall of this world, even from a 21 days old infant till she passed away…

It took the story of a Muslim man singing of Hindu gods from outside a temple wall to make me finally hear my grandmother. Her life, too, was a voice singing from behind a series of walls—of poverty, of gender, of social slight. I had resented the formidable structure of her person, as I had resented the endless nights of Kathakali she loved. But Hyderali taught me to listen for the song within the fortress. The 'Ajita Hare' that seeped into my childhood sleep was that song. Her sharp wisdom about a sari was that song. In the end, the walls—of the temple, of the art form, of her difficult strength—dissolve. What remains is the voice, reaching for the divine. And finally, I am listening.

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