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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.

Yudhishthira’s Dog at the Gate: Dogs, Dharma, and the Paradox of Compassion

Yudhishthira’s Dog at the Gate: Dogs, Dharma, and the Paradox of Compassion

by | Nov 8, 2025 | Compassion, Friendship, Gratitude, Grief, Joy, Life, Zen

 

On the Kodai Ghat road, as you turn from the plains of the marketplace toward the winding hills, one notice stands out. The Forest Department urges travellers: Do not feed the wild animals. It is a reminder written in bureaucratic script, but it carries a deeper teaching. Feeding them changes their nature. They lose the instinct to forage, they grow dependent, they become aggressive. What begins as kindness can end as harm.

This question of compassion follows me into Kanzeon Zendo. Here too, there are three kinds of visitors:

  • Dog lovers, who see every wagging tail as a chance to practice kindness.
  • Those who are scared of dogs, whose compassion is mixed with fear and hesitation.
  • Those who don’t mind either way, who pass by without much thought.

Visitors who come for short stays often feed the stray dogs. Perumalmalai has no shortage of them—thin, hungry, territorial creatures, starved of food, care, and warmth. For a moment, the dogs are happy. They have found a good Samaritan. But when the visitors leave, the dogs remain. They linger at the Zendo gates, waiting for the next act of kindness. Compassion, offered in passing, leaves behind ripples that are not always gentle.

This paradox is not new. The Mahabharata begins with the curse of a dog and ends with the loyalty of another. As a child, I read Mali Bharatham, the Malayalam retelling of the epic sweetened for children. What struck me then, and now, is how dogs frame the epic.

The first story is about the curse of a dog on a king. Janamejaya, son of Parikshit, was conducting a yaga. A dog named Sarameya entered the arena and was beaten by the king’s brothers. Sarama, the mother, confronted the king. Not satisfied with his response, she cursed him.

The epic ends with Yudhishthira, who refuses to climb the celestial chariot to Heaven without the dog that had accompanied him on his final journey. He had lost his brothers and Panchali along the way, but he would not abandon the dog.

Between these two stories lie pages of valour and cowardice, justice and injustice, joy and sorrow, sacrifice and self‑centeredness. And yet, the dog remains—at the beginning and at the end—as a mirror of compassion and responsibility.

Much later, rereading these epics through the hermeneutical eye my Zen Master encouraged, I saw how curse is the last weapon of the helpless. When powerless, the curse becomes the cry of frustration. Wuji, too, came into our Zendo life as a living koan of compassion—sometimes blessing, sometimes burden, sometimes curse.

And then there was Jackie Mu.

The first dog in my imagination was Buck, Jack London’s hero in The Call of the Wild. Later, in childhood, Jackie the mongrel stood guard at our Thenkara gate. But Jackie Mu was different. She arrived at Kanzeon Zendo, half‑tamed, majestic, part Indie, part hound. Adopted by Tithi, cared for like Elsa in Born Free, she became part of our practice. She had her blanket, her medicine kit, her morning walks. She even had her koan: Mu.

Mu is the first case in The Gateless Gate. A monk asked Jōshū, “Does a dog have Buddha nature?” Jōshū replied, “Mu.” Nothingness. Yet Jackie Mu, without doubt, had Buddha nature. She knew which doors to knock at, which people to trust, which paths to guide me along. She led me from Kanzeon Zendo to Bodhi Zendo, waiting at every turn, stopping at Surya tea stall for biscuits while I had chai.

But Jackie Mu was not only a guide. She was also a hunter. She never liked monkeys or cats, and chased them away whenever she could. She killed more than a few. One morning, during our walk toward St. Joseph farm, she spotted a kitten in the hands of a child waiting for her school bus. The kitten leapt from the child’s arms, tried to run, and Jackie Mu caught it in an instant. My screams did nothing. The child wailed, the mother tried to console her, and I sat on the kerb in anger and sorrow. And then, beside me, Jackie Mu appeared—obedient, present, as if nothing had happened. For a moment I did not know how to respond.

That weekend, when I was in Bangalore, came the news of her death. It seemed someone had poisoned her. The paradox closed: the dog who carried Mu, who embodied both loyalty and violence, was gone.

Whatsapp  message drenched in grief said: Jackie Mu had passed away. She lay down outside the meditation hall, her favourite place, and breathed her last. A pang struck deep, as if some part within me had died. Mahayana does not speak of soul, but I am sure Jackie Mu left her Buddha nature behind at the Zendo.

That night, I wrote to Fr. AMA:

Dear Fr. Ama, Tithy messaged me at 9:37 pm saying, “Laddo / Jackie Mu passed away.” Suddenly I felt a pang in my heart. As something within me had died down. I never had a pet before in my life, leave alone a dog. And I just happened to remember the koan Mu. As you used to teach us, all beings are connected in a way. Regardfully, Vishy Sankara

His reply was simple, tender, and true:

I too was saddened by the death of Laadu. It was fond of you, followed you often. I am in tears. Peace to Laadu and to you and to me. — AMA Samy

But compassion is not the same in everyone. In our Sangha, there are members like Robert, who genuinely care for dogs. He takes them along on his hikes, brings them to the vet, ensures vaccinations, medicine, and good food. His care is steady, embodied, and responsible.

And then there are those who are more superficial. They pet the dogs, feed them Zendo biscuits, and enjoy their company for a while. But when their time at the Zendo is over, they move on. They forget the true nature and requirement of being compassionate when a fine being reveals its great Mu nature to them.

This difference is itself a teaching. Compassion is not measured by the warmth of a single gesture, but by the continuity of care. To see the Buddha nature in a dog is to recognize both its joy and its vulnerability, and to respond with responsibility as well as affection.

So the Forest Department’s sign, the stray dogs of Perumalmalai, the curse of Sarama, the loyalty of Yudhishthira, the koan of Wuji, the life and death of Jackie Mu, the Sangha’s varied responses, and the tears of my teacher all converge. Compassion is not sentiment. It is awareness. It is foresight. It is the willingness to see the whole field, even when it complicates our desire to help. Sometimes compassion is feeding. Sometimes compassion is not feeding. Sometimes compassion is simply sitting on the kerb, seeing the dog, seeing our own heart, and bowing to the paradox.

The Mahābhārata ends with Yudhishthira, who refuses to climb the celestial chariot to Heaven without the dog that had accompanied him on his final journey. He had lost his brothers and Panchali along the way, but he would not abandon the dog. Perhaps our visitors too will take the cue, and be truly compassionate—not only in passing gestures, but in the continuity of care, in the willingness to walk alongside, even when the path is steep, even when Heaven itself beckons.

Bhim, the Zendog ...
Three Birthdays and a Remembrance: The Ensō Circles of November

Three Birthdays and a Remembrance: The Ensō Circles of November

by | Nov 2, 2025 | Gratitude, Grief, Joy, Life, Peace, RElationship, Zen

2 November. Today is Nithya Chaithanya Yati’s birthday. A long time back, when I started reading Malayalam newspapers, one of the must-reads was his articles—mostly about day-to-day life and challenges. Later in high school, my grand uncle, a National Award–winning teacher, used to talk about him as well as Krishnamurti. Gopala thatha was considered an atheist by many of my relatives. But he was quite spiritual, just not religious. Much before I started seeing Nithya as a spiritual guru, I read him as someone who wrote Malayalam prose really well. Like another spiritual master, Eknath Easwaran’s English.

In my collection, after Krishnamurti’s books, the most number of books I have are by Nithya and Eknath Easwaran. While Easwaran’s spiritual life was almost like that of JK and UG, Nithya belonged to the illustrious lineage of Śrī Narayana Guru—the great Advaita teacher and social reformer from Kerala. Nithya’s guru, Nataraja Guru, was Narayana Guru’s disciple. Nataraja Guru, after a PhD from Sorbonne and teaching in Switzerland, returned and accepted sanyasa. Nithya, after being a monk, went on to do a PhD from TISS and taught in many universities such as Stanford. He also headed ICMR’s yoga division.

Though I was not fortunate to meet them in person, they were all great influences on me—connected through their writing. And another connection: I share my birthday with Nithya Chaithanya Yati, 2 November.

I missed that with my late father Sankara, whose birthday was on 3 November. He passed away on 20 November. So November is a bittersweet month. Like that movie Four Weddings and a Funeral, for me it is “three birthdays and a remembrance (śraddhāñjali) day.”

Like that classic movie Four Weddings and a Funeral. It was such a wonderful comedy and a must watch… especially for that eulogy Matthew delivers during the funeral service of Gareth. That W.H. Auden poem— “Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone…” And the best in my view: “He was my North, my South, my East and West, My working week and my Sunday rest.” Maybe someone would rephrase it for me at my memorial in the Zendo: “My resting week and my Sunday work.”

When my father left, I did not cry for a very long time. The tears came much later, one evening as I sat alone on the KAUST beach. With that, my grief cycle turned in full, like the arc described by Kübler‑Ross. Perhaps it turned so full that, later that year, when my mother called to ask if I had done puja on 20 November, I realized I had forgotten the śraddhāñjali day. And after so many years, I see that this forgetting is itself the best śraddhāñjali one can offer to the dear and near—that we forget they are no more, because in truth they are still here, in another form, formless.

I even hope to breathe my last on a 1 November, so that after I am dusted and gone, joyful memories would come up for my dear and near ones after the sad ones—if at all someone cares to remember.

And it is always good to get reincarnated, even in our imagination, like Jesus—though I was not crucified by life in general. After all, don’t we wake up to life after a deep death every single night.

Many religions and concepts of God arose from humanity’s fear of death and the anxiety of being mortal. Some religions and spiritual paths teach that real life begins only after this life, after our death—the very word moksha points to that. But Zen looks at it differently. For Zen, this life is the only life that matters. Samsara is Nirvana.

Fr. AMA often reminds us that life is precious, and any other thought is without true understanding. One begins to live only when one accepts death fully. Only when we accept our mortality and fragility do we become truly immortal. There is no day without night. And if there were an endless day without night in between, would we really value that day at all?

Many years ago, when I joined a Stoic Week program organized by the University of Exeter, there were two important meditations: one to recognize our insignificance in the vast universe as individuals, and the other to face death directly. A few months ago, Fr. AMA too spoke of the Jesuit meditation practice of meeting one’s own death. All these are preparations to face death. And in a way, there can be no better preparation for death than this: to live one’s day-to-day and moment-to-moment life with full presence.

I don’t remember celebrating my birthdays during my growing-up years. One reason was obviously economic—my parents just struggled to take care of the essentials in my and my siblings’ life. And the second reason is that, usually in Kerala, birthdays are celebrated as per the Malayalam calendar. So it kind of complicates things.

The first such celebration was in engineering college hostel, when my friends—the Dagar gang—came up with an impromptu birthday celebration and gifted me a book: Lee Iacocca’s autobiography.

And this time, it is the first birthday in the Zendo. So kind of being reborn.Feel like the first birthday. And like that, life comes in circles… not straight lines. What I missed in childhood, comes back now in another form. Not with cake or candles, but with silence, chanting, and friends on the path. Feels like the day itself is saying—be born again, again and again.

Zen teaches that life and death are not two separate realities, but one continuous unfolding. Yet at the Zendo we still celebrate birthdays, and we also gather in prayer for departed Sangha members. To lean only on the side of the infinite, ignoring the world of form, would be foolishness. We live in this phenomenal world, where grief must be endured and cannot be bypassed. However much one reframes, body pain, loss, hurt—all are truly sorrowful. And just the same, moments we cherish and enjoy bring real joy, laughter, and happiness. To deny either sorrow or joy would make life sterile and empty. To embrace both is to live fully.

Like Kübler‑Ross’s grief cycle, everything else in this universe too has its own life cycle. It is circular in nature. A recognition that the path is not straight, but it is whole. That every loss is woven into the fabric of a larger gain, and every ending is, in some form, a very quiet and gentle beginning.

And perhaps the best wordless way this truth is represented is in the Zen ensō—the circle drawn in a single breath, open or closed, complete yet unfinished.

Yesterday evening, Fr. AMA reminded us of this truth in the most ordinary way: he said today morning we will go   to the cemetery for Alosanai’s remembrance — she, the first staff of Bodhi Zendo, who lived Zen without ever needing to sit in meditation. Today evening 630 pm we will gather again for a memorial service to all departed Sangha members. And i plan to include Nithya and my late father Sankara too to that. And in between, he is taking me  for a birthday lunch. Life and death, grief and joy, silence and laughter — all folded into one circle

Living tributes to remarkable lives : Lighting the incense now

Living tributes to remarkable lives : Lighting the incense now

by | Oct 26, 2025 | Compassion, Gratitude, Life, RElationship, Zen

In 1986, when Doordarshan first arrived in Mannarkkad, the television was not a possession but a commons. A single set in a neighbour’s house became the village square. We gathered for the Mexico World Cup, for Sunday morning serials, for Chitrahaar. The glow of the screen was less about technology than about togetherness.

Some songs and images from those days remain etched like stone inscriptions. Mile Sur Mera Tumhara—a melody of national integration, sung in many tongues—was not just a broadcast, but a vision of belonging. Later, Piyush Pandey’s creations—the Hutch pug, the Fevicol bus—entered our folklore in the same way. They were not merely advertisements; they were shared jokes, shared tenderness, shared recognition.

When Pandey passed away, the tributes poured in. Ogilvy’s full-page homage in The Times of India was unlike anything we had seen before. And yet, a question lingers: why do we wait until death to say what we truly feel? Would not the living heart have been gladdened by those words while it still beat?

I remember in 1998, when Wipro became the first company in the world to achieve SEI CMM Level 5, they printed the names of all employees in the Economic Times. For me, it was the first time my name appeared in print. Recognition in life, not as epitaph, but as celebration. How much it mattered.

Of course, there are a few who are fortunate in this regard. Some lives are bathed in recognition while still unfolding. Sports stars like Pele, Maradona, and Sócrates were not only admired but serenaded in their lifetimes—Pele hailed as “The King”, Maradona as “El Pibe de Oro”, Sócrates as the footballer-philosopher who stood for democracy as much as for the game. Writers like O.V. Vijayan and Kamala Das received living recognition through reviews and cultural debates. Scientists like Einstein and Richard Feynman became beloved public figures, their wit and humanity as cherished as their discoveries—Feynman even laughed at reading his own obituary while alive. And sages too: George Bernard Shaw once called Krishnamurti “the most beautiful human being he had ever seen”; Kahlil Gibran, upon meeting him, whispered, “Surely the Lord of Love has come”; Aldous Huxley introduced him to the world with reverence in The First and Last Freedom. These were tributes spoken in life, not carved in stone after.

But alongside these celebrated ones are the countless unheralded—the teachers who shaped generations without ever being quoted, the neighbors who quietly held communities together, the elders whose wisdom never reached print, the Sangha members who sit in silence and sustain the field of practice. Their names may never appear in newspapers, their faces never on television, yet their impact is no less real. They are the hidden roots of the tree, nourishing unseen.

On 12 July 2009, when a dear one passed away untimely, I wrote in my blog Sunday Sambar under the title Lasting Impressions of Some Remarkable Lives:  https://sundaysambar.blogspot.com/2009/07/lasting-impressions-of-some-remarkable.html

“Having crossed so many tragic moments lately, it just seemed odd that this one would make any difference. But still I couldn’t quite put my finger on why it felt different. Maybe only, when someone known to you goes back to Mother Earth as basic elements, we steal some precious moments to step back and think what life means to us and more importantly what matters to us. Then it struck me that it was the people, who live still in my mind long after they are gone from here. It had nothing to do with the environment. They weren’t many. I could count within my hands… They weren’t famous people in that sense of the word. When some of them died, only near and dear knew, wept and prayed for their souls… Nevertheless they were really remarkable people, who led remarkable lives. At least for you.”

But when I look back, I wish I had sent those notes while they were still in flesh and bones, alive and kicking.

It is a socially accepted practice never to badmouth the departed. We are careful not to speak ill of the dead, yet we hesitate to speak well of the living. But there is no written or unwritten practice that says we should not share with the remarkable people in our lives our living tribute — while they are still here to hear it.

So I wonder:

What would it mean if we practiced “living tributes”?
What if we wrote letters of gratitude not after funerals, but on ordinary Tuesdays?

No one really knows where we go after our lives here. People write of heavens where the departed crack jokes, or of philosophers teaching God himself. But what happens after we die is still hypothesis, no matter how finely written in holy books. What is real is this: this very land is lotus land, this very body is Buddha.

Perhaps this is the Dharma of enoughness: to speak the word of thanks now, to bow while the other can still meet our eyes, to let affection and recognition breathe in the present. Impermanence is not only loss; it is also the urgency to love without delay.

The unspoken word is like incense unlit. Let us light it while we can.

Whom do you want to write a living tribute today? Maybe they are not as famous as the names above, but remarkable all the same — at the very least, for you.

Willing the Will: From Material Assets to Essence

Willing the Will: From Material Assets to Essence

by | Oct 5, 2025 | Compassion, Gratitude, Grief, Joy, Peace, value

A few days ago, in our Coaching WhatsApp group, there was a conversation about writing a will. Many wise and practical suggestions were shared, mostly focused on financial assets—how to ensure they are passed on smoothly to loved ones. In a way, our will reflects what we owned while alive, even after we have stopped living.

Soon after, Thara and I were visiting my sister in Bangalore. During the course of conversation, she shared the sad fate of a distant relative. On the eve of his housewarming, he met with a freak bike accident and has since remained in a coma, tube-fed in a hospital bed. It was heartbreaking to hear.

Seventeen years ago, my father passed away without writing a will. He was a generous man and did not have much to leave behind. The small house he built, he ensured was registered in my mother’s name, along with his family pension. That was his quiet foresight. Last year, my Zen master shared the draft of his will with me, and I was touched to see my name in it.

When I moved to the Zendo last year, I had already given away what little I had of financial worth. Today, I live on a modest four-digit pension. For a while, I felt there was nothing left worth writing a will for. But the question lingered: other than money, what do I truly own that is worthy? This was on my mind as I took the night bus back from Bangalore to the Zendo.

What is rightfully, legally, and morally mine—and more importantly, what am I, legally and spiritually? These are deep questions. In the natural world, animals do exhibit an instinct of “myness”—my prey, my food, my territory. Yet once their life is done, there are no personal claims. They cannot leave behind a will. Nature has no concern for their mortal remains, their cave, or the trees they nested in.

Much later, Marx observed that many human problems began when we started dividing the Earth and creating ownership: of land, water, air, trees, food. In The Communist Manifesto, he wrote:

“The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all private property.”

His point was not about denying people shelter or livelihood, but about how the very act of carving up the Earth into mine and yours created alienation and conflict. Even today, our ownership is often nominal. If gold, diamonds, or petroleum are found beneath the land we “own,” the government claims it.

If this is true of material assets, what about the products of the mind? Many of us claim ownership of those too, and make them part of our will. Yet there are exceptions. U. G. Krishnamurti, for instance, refused to claim ownership of his words. On the front page of his books, he wrote:

“You are free to reproduce, distribute, interpret, misinterpret, distort, garble, do what you like, even claim authorship without my consent or the permission of anybody.”

When I added a similar note to my first published book, The Fallen Flower, Fragrant Grass, the publisher told me they would not allow it. I may have to go to a printer directly and get it printed. In contrast, Jiddu Krishnamurti fought a long, drawn-out court battle with Rajagopal over the rights to his teachings and writings.

And then there are inventions like the three-point seat belt, the internet, and the polio vaccine—gifts to humanity, not possessions to be hoarded.

 

This reminds me also of Kahlil Gibran. In The Prophet, he wrote of eating fruit with reverence:

“When you crush an apple with your teeth, say to it in your heart, Your seeds shall live in my body, And the buds of your tomorrow shall blossom in my heart."

And echoing this spirit, an old proverb says: “We enjoy the shade of trees we did not plant; we eat the fruit of trees we did not sow.” Both remind us that what we inherit and what we pass on are rarely ours alone.

Hearing about my distant relative’s tragedy—much like Michael Schumacher’s accident—brought another thought to the surface. I do not want a medically prolonged life. For two reasons: first, because the most important hope is for a dignified death. And second, because I once read that 95% of one’s lifetime medical expenditure is spent in the last four or five days of life. That struck me as both sobering and unnecessary.

This reflection deepened as I skimmed Paul Kalanithi’s When Breath Becomes Air.

He writes:

“At those critical junctures, the question is not simply whether to live or die but what kind of life is worth living… Because the brain mediates our experience of the world, any neurosurgical problem forces a patient and family… to answer this question: What makes life meaningful enough to go on living?”

That question lingers with me.

And here, again, Gibran’s words return with force (On Giving, The Prophet):

“You give but little when you give of your possessions.

It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.

For what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for fear you may need them tomorrow?

And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring to the over prudent dog burying bones in the trackless sand as he follows the pilgrims to the holy city?

And what is fear of need but need itself? Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, the thirst that is unquenchable?

There are those who give little of the much which they have—and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome.

And there are those who have little and give it all. These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward. And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.

And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;

They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.

Through the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their eyes He smiles upon the earth.

It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding; And to the open-handed the search for one who shall receive is joy greater than giving.

And is there aught you would withhold?

All you have shall some day be given; Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and not your inheritors’. You often say, ‘I would give, but only to the deserving.’

The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture. They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish. Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights, is worthy of all else from you.

And he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life deserves to fill his cup from your little stream. And what desert greater shall there be, than that which lies in the courage and the confidence, nay the charity, of receiving?

And who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed?

See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an instrument of giving.

For in truth it is life that gives unto life—while you, who deem yourself a giver, are but a witness.

And you receivers—and you are all receivers—assume no weight of gratitude, lest you lay a yoke upon yourself and upon him who gives.

Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on wings; For to be over mindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity who has the freehearted earth for mother, and God for father.”

Perhaps, then, the real will we leave behind is not a document of assets, but a testament of choices—how we wish to live, how we wish to die, and what we wish to pass on that cannot be measured in currency.

For me, it is the dignity of a simple life, the freedom of a simple death, and the hope that my words, my friendships, and my small acts of belonging may outlive me.

My late father was an ordinary man who lived an ordinary life of extraordinariness. Even after seventeen years, when my siblings and I speak of him, and when those who once knew him remember him, I realise this truth: in the end, a will is not measured in possessions, but in the meaning we leave behind. 

Truly, it is not our assets that matter, but the essence we bequeath.

When the race ends, the path begins with the myth that is yours…

When the race ends, the path begins with the myth that is yours…

by | Sep 19, 2025 | Gratitude, Joy, Peace, Transformation, Zen

When Bill Moyers asked Joseph Campbell what someone in a midlife crisis should do if they had lost their way, Campbell’s answer was deceptively simple:

“Follow your bliss, and if you follow your bliss, doors will open where there were no doors before.”

It is a phrase that has been quoted endlessly, often mistaken for a call to chase pleasure or excitement. But Campbell was pointing toward something far deeper — the kind of joy the Sanskrit word ananda evokes, a quiet, abiding sense of rightness that arises when we are in harmony with our true nature.

This bliss is not something we manufacture; it is already here, like the sun behind clouds. Most of the time, the mind is noisy — restless commentary, anxious planning, comparisons, compulsions. In that noise, bliss is not destroyed, only hidden.

When the mind grows still, even for a moment, the clouds part and the light is revealed. Campbell himself warned that if your “bliss” is just excitement or fun, you are on the wrong track; you must come down to a deep place in yourself, a place beyond the surface ripples of mood and circumstance.

I started reading Joseph Campbell after a chance whistle‑stop visit to Giza near Cairo. The Power of Myth and The Hero with a Thousand Faces are must‑reads.

Often, you realise your bliss not when you go after it, but when life seems to have thrown you out of the race entirely. You reach a dead end. You feel like a failure on all counts, and the thought of living feels heavier than the thought of dying.

And then, something happens deep inside. Something flips. You look straight into the eyes of what you had feared most, and instead of turning back, you step into it. You immerse yourself in the very thing you once resisted.

From that moment, public applause, acceptance, bank balance, readership, mindshare, likes and emojis — none of it matters anymore. You don’t want to be a groom in every wedding and a corpse in every funeral. Being anonymous is equal to being famous.

And strangely, after that turning and churning, even those dearest to you begin to align with your life in ways you could never have orchestrated.

My better half, Thara, told me when Fr. AMA asked me to join Kanzeon Zendo as his assistant, that a calling is different from a job, a career or a profession. When you are called by life, you go with it. And I did just that.

In our time, the idea of bliss has been reinterpreted in many ways. Some see it as living in alignment with one’s deepest values, others as the contentment that comes from mindfulness and presence. Neuroscience and positive psychology frame it as a trainable state, cultivated through meditation, gratitude, and compassion.

In a world of constant stimulation, bliss can also mean mental spaciousness — the relief of being free from endless distraction. For creatives and athletes, it can resemble the flow state, where self-consciousness drops away and time feels fluid.

Across these interpretations, the thread is the same: bliss is less about acquiring something new and more about uncovering what has always been here.

Campbell often reminded us that we all live within myths, whether we recognise them or not. Some myths confine us, keeping us circling in patterns that feel safe but small. Others guide us toward the deep place where bliss resides.

To follow your bliss is to follow the myth that is truly yours — the one that opens doors you never knew were there, not because the world has changed, but because you have. And when the noise quiets, you may find that the path was here all along, waiting for you to walk it.

As the Spanish poet Antonio Machado wrote:

Caminante, son tus huellas el camino y nada más;
Caminante, no hay camino, se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace el camino, y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante, no hay camino sino estelas en la mar.

Wayfarer, your footprints are the only road, nothing else.
Wayfarer, there is no road; you make your own path as you walk.
As you walk, you make your own road, and when you look back
you see the path you will never travel again.
Wayfarer, there is no road; only a ship’s wake on the sea.

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