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Sunlight Through the Gate: Bringing Emptiness to a Metric-Obsessed World…

Sunlight Through the Gate: Bringing Emptiness to a Metric-Obsessed World…

by | Jun 17, 2026 | Change, Harmony, Integrity, Joy, Life, Management, STRESS, Wisdom, Zen

Achievement, metrics and make it count are the buzzwords of our world.

Sometime back, as a Six sigma lead black belt, when I had put in a quote which said “Everything that can be measured is of not value and everything that is of value cannot be measured”, I was met with ridicule and scorn across the room.  That was a long time back.. 20 years or so. Now as a Zen practitioner when I think about it I feel it was kind of prescient. May be I was into Zen in. my previous births too.

The Japanese art of doing nothing is best represented by concepts like Tayutau and Ma.

It is the concept of less is more. and more is less.

These distinct concepts represent the "ways of doing nothing" in Japanese culture in general and in Zen in particular.

 Tayutau (たゆたう). This term describes the act of drifting, swaying, or trembling like a boat on water or clouds in the sky.  It is much subtler than the Zen meditation of Shikantaza.

But, unlike traditional meditation or mindfulness, which involves focusing your breath or controlling your thoughts, tayutau is about letting go completely. You simply gaze at something with an ever-changing flow (like light reflecting on a river or leaves blowing in the wind) without trying to fix, solve, or judge your thoughts.  It allows thoughts to surface and drift away without anchoring your brain to them, enabling your mind to process and sort itself naturally. [

Ma (間) is the space between.

It's one of the most beautiful and untranslatable words in Japanese aesthetics . One can roughly translate it as "the space between," this concept applies to physical gaps, pauses in conversation, or moments of stillness in a day

The character itself shows it: a gate (門) with the sun (日) shining through the opening. Light coming through a gap. That's the image at its root — not the gate, but the space the gate frames.

Ma is the pause between two notes that lets the music breathe. The silence after a teacher speaks, in which understanding arises. The empty space in a sumi-e painting that the viewer's own awareness completes. The gap between two pillars that gives a room its character. The unhurried moment between exhalation and the next in-breath. It isn't emptiness as lack — it's emptiness as the condition for meaning. Remove the ma and the music becomes noise, the painting suffocates, the room loses its proportion.

When  Dogen writing his texts with deliberate lacunae — that was ma. When  the teacher who fills every silence robbing the student of the space where understanding can land — ma. The breath directed to the hara, the pause before the next koan, the gap between the voice that says "skip zazen" and the rising — all ma.

The Tao Te Ching points at the same truth from another direction: the wheel is made useful by the empty hub, the vessel by its hollow, the room by the space within its walls.

The thing has value, but the emptiness makes it usable.

I work with people on a long drawn programs and not short high energy ones , which leaves high and dry..  In nature too everything has its own rhythms.. and takes its own time… 2 minutes noodles and 30 sec insta reels may be the fashion of the day. But I doubt whether it leaves any lasting change leave alone a transformation in the viewer and reader. They are like sugar spikes for the dopamine system. But they miss out the universal principle. The Highter the initial energy , the faster it dissipates in this world of entropy.

Some time back, I was asked to design a short and sweet program on  what else spirituality. I did give it a long thought , as I was in dire need of Money… $, INR , Euro.. or even Crypto.  The advice was in this world, no one has the time and energy ( and focus) for a long drawn out program. And if one is in the business of transformation, one should cater to the needs of customers.

After due consideration, I realised,  as a connoisseur of good beer — and I say this with full sincerity — am  in the business of fermentation—which takes time, darkness, and stillness. Fermentation cannot be rushed; it relies on the Ma between the stirrings to let the cultures grow. Kokoro-Zen-Do in Action, which is an year long long  program are the koji spores of  real transformation. They are invisible, untraceable by standard dashboards, yet they fundamentally change the flavour of the entire personhood.

In this society of spectacle and current modern digital culture, everything is an "Event"—a launch, a reel, a metric spike. But Zen knows that the event is merely the crest of the wave; the process is the entire ocean.

Those immortal  Tao Te Ching lines we invoked before talks about the empty hub making the wheel useful—is the ultimate rebuttal to the metric-obsessed world. Metrics measure the hub (the tangible output). They cannot measure the emptiness (the clarity, the psychological flexibility and the trust) that makes the Cart move.

The Six Sigma room wanted to measure everything. It had no real ma, though they try to sneak it at the very end. May be in the form of a token mindfulness app or a five-minute breathing exercise tacked onto an agenda—a commodified, hollowed-out version of the real thing.  Twenty years later, I am still in that room — but now I bring the emptiness with me.

There is an old Zen saying: Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. To paraphrase that
Before Zen, measure, optimize, present. After Zen, measure, optimize, present—but with the gate open, and the sunlight coming through.

Standing in line and Sitting in silence.

Standing in line and Sitting in silence.

by | May 21, 2026 | Harmony, Integrity, Joy, Life, Meaning

Kerala ex-CM Pinarayi Vijayan waiting for a train at Kannur station… it reminds me of those earlier gestures of ordinariness my father Sankara spoke of—Achutha Menon quietly boarding a KSRTC bus back to Thrissur, EMS living in a small party flat in Thiruvananthapuram till the very end. Power there is not a throne to cling to, but something handed back without fuss.

Kerala, God's own country and devil's too, carries this paradox in its people. Educated, alert, unwilling to tolerate arrogance—even when the government has achievements to show, they vote it out. And those who lose power do not resist returning to ordinary life. They stand at bus stops, railway platforms, in small apartments, blending back into the crowd.

Once, Sandeep Dixit came to APU as a guest lecturer on Policy and Politics. I asked him about his mother Sheila Dikshit—who governed Delhi for fifteen years, who held a capital city of millions in her hands, who oversaw its transformation through the Commonwealth Games years. He answered without performance, without pride or self-pity. She lives in a small apartment, he said. No lift. Knee pain keeps her from going down the stairs, from attending any public function.

That detail landed quietly but hard.

Power is partly logistics—cars, offices, access, priority, crowds parting. The moment it ends, you discover how much of your physical world was organised around that apparatus. The knees that once carried her through rallies and corridors now needed a lift that wasn't there. The radius of a former Chief Minister reduced to the walls of a walkup flat.

And yet—no bitterness in how Sandeep said it. Just a fact. This is where she lives. This is her world now.

It rhymes with the Pinarayi photograph in a way that surprises you. Both images strip away the Monroe mask and leave just a person. One sitting on a platform bench, waiting for a train that will not wait for him. One sitting inside, unable to go down the stairs.

But you don't have to lose power to practice this ordinariness. Some carry it while still at the peak.

At Wipro, I saw Azim Premji walk into the cafeteria many times — then Chairman of one of India's great corporations — and simply join the queue. No aide holding a tray, no table reserved, no subtle parting of the crowd. He would stand and wait his turn like everyone else, and he always chose the Healthy Menu. Now, I was never entirely sure whether that was a genuine commitment to nutrition or simply the wisdom of a shorter queue — and I say this having tasted it once, it was not particularly appetizing. But there he was. The chairman. Waiting. Choosing the simpler thing.

There is something in that image that belongs alongside the railway platform and the walkup apartment. Not loss, not limitation — but choice. A daily, quiet, almost stubborn insistence on not letting the Monroe mask harden into the only face you have.

And then there is Fr. AMA — our Zen Master at Kanzeon Zendo. His ninetieth birthday was not a different day. As usual, he was there for early morning zazen, sitting in silence as he has through decades of dawns, as if the years themselves were just passing weather. After the sitting, we all joined together to cut a cake and wish him. Before that I asked him — how does it feel to be ninety?

He smiled. And said: "Tired and peaceful."

Not grateful. Not blessed. Not the performance of a milestone. Just two words carrying the honest weight of ninety years, with nowhere left to hide and no desire to hide anywhere. A man who never put the Monroe mask on in the first place — and so had nothing to remove, nothing to hand back, nothing to prove by standing in a queue or sitting on a platform bench.

The cake came after the silence. That detail is everything.

There is a teaching here: roles dissolve, presence remains. The train platform, the bus seat, the cafeteria queue, the apartment without a lift, the zazen cushion on a ninetieth birthday morning — these are not falls from grace, but reminders that masks cannot last forever. Kerala's greatest gift may not be its backwaters or greenery, but this democratic ordinariness — where even ex-Chief Ministers wait with the people, unadorned, unafraid. And perhaps Delhi's most honest image is not its monuments or its power corridors, but a former CM quietly watching the city she built from a window she can no longer easily leave. And perhaps corporate India's most quietly radical image is a billionaire chairman holding a cafeteria tray, wondering, like the rest of us, whether the healthy option is really worth it.

And perhaps the most radical image of all is a Zen master on his ninetieth birthday, sitting in the same silence he sat in on every other day — because for him, there was never a mask to slip.

It is both God's country and devil's country because it refuses to sanctify power. What it sanctifies instead is the ordinary pulse of life.

The train platform, the apartment without a lift, the cafeteria queue, the zazen cushion — all say the same thing.

You were never the chair. You were always just yourself.

Dilbar Coffee

Dilbar Coffee

by | Mar 17, 2026 | Harmony, Joy, Life, Meaning, Zen

 

Some of the most remarkable insights in life have not come from self-made billionaires on Forbes covers. Or spiritual gurus on mountain tops. The most unexpected people, in the most ordinary moments taught me those wonderful life lessons.

This is one of those.

During those days, post covid Corporates were trying to get out of work from home rule. My boss was in faraway Zurich gave me the freedom to decide. But one jealous senior colleague, with whom I had an argument, did not like that. He made sure that I had to visit my work office in the United States of Sarjapur at least on once in a week. Corporate office was in the United States of Sarjapur, northeast of normal Bangalore. Every second Thursday I would drive cross-country very early in the morning. The reason was simple. To avoid an hour of meditation at the infamous visa and passport check at Silk Board junction. 😄

An early morning breakfast at TRC was a routine affair. That's where I first met Dilbar. The quiet, friendly barista at TRC, brewing that perfect South Indian filter coffee like it was the most important thing in the world.

And in a way, it was.

Now let me tell you a little about Dilbar. He is from Assam — a young boy who failed his 10th standard, with no degree, no diploma, no connections. Just a quiet desperation to support his family. So he did what many young boys from smaller towns do: he packed whatever little he had and came down to Bangalore in search of a job. Any job.

And somewhere along the way, he found coffee. Or perhaps coffee found him.

I was seeing him after some time when I asked whether he had been on leave. He, self-effacingly, replied that he had been in Mumbai. When I persisted, he said he had been at Mota Bhai's house. He was one of those who went with the TRC team for Mota Bhai's son's wedding. And it so seems Mota Bhai and another family member had taken a liking to his South Indian filter coffee .

Now here is where the story gets interesting. In India, no one says no to Mota Bhai. So when his managers spoke to Dilbar's employer, there was no notice period. Dilbar was now working at one of the most prestigious addresses in India — may be beyond India too.

His entire job there was to make one or two cups of coffee. Every single day. For Mota Bhai. And the ritual was something else. When Mota Bhai arrived for breakfast, his personal butler would radio the kitchen manager. Only then would Dilbar begin his work. He would brew that perfect cup, hand it to the kitchen manager, who would walk it to the butler, who would then serve it.

A relay of respect, for one cup of coffee.

But here is the twist in the tale.

After a few days, Dilbar got bored. Not even the other kitchen staff drank coffee — they were either tea drinkers or badam milk people. 😄 A coffee maker with no one to make coffee for.

Think about it: a musician without an audience. Sanju Samson batting in front of an empty stadium. A writer without a reader (like me?). Or a barista without that beautiful chaos of steam, clinking cups, and a queue of sleepy people waiting for their first hit of caffeine.

Making two cups in a palace, how much soever prestigious in LinkedIn — safe and secure, but not alive. So after a few days, he walked up to the kitchen manager and said he wanted to leave. Word reached Mota Bhai. He did not meeting him in person. Through the kitchen manager he enquired and offered to double his salary.

Some one who as a master communicator thru Coffee, Dilbar had to struggle to explain: it is not about the money. This is a society of spectacle where increments on a payslip, or designations in LinkedIn profile are success barometers. In this world, Dilbar's quiet "no" was nothing short of a revolution. Corporate workshops spend millions trying to teach Corpoarzens this: "purpose over package".

Because how do you explain to the richest man in the country that a craftsman needs his crowd? That a barista needs his rush? That making two cups a day, how much soever prestigious, is not living — it is mere existence?

Think about what happened here. A boy who failed his 10th standard, from a small town in Assam, was being offered a doubled salary by the richest man in India — and he said no. Not out of arrogance, not out of foolishness, but out of a deep, unshakeable understanding of what truly fulfils him.

How many of us — with our degrees, our MBAs, our LinkedIn profiles — can say that with such clarity? Sooner than later, he was back. To TRC. To his station. To his thousands of coffees a day (including the one for yours truly 🙂). Back to the chaos, the steam, the noise, the orders. Back to where he belonged.

No fanfare, no Instagram post, no "as seen at Mota Bhai's house" badge on his apron.

A man, his coffee, and his calling.

And this story dismantles a myth we all grew up believing — that success is a linear ladder, always pointing upward. For Dilbar, success was a circle that led him right back to his station at TRC. He didn't see working for India's richest man as a promotion. He saw it as a detour.

Think about it. In one of the most discussed wedding where everything was curated to perfection. In that world of million dollar wrist watches and Michelin-star menus, what lingered was a humble cup of South Indian filter coffee. Brewed by a boy who failed his 10th, who travelled from Assam to Bangalore with nothing but hope.

That's not luck. That's mastery.

And mastery, I have come to believe, has nothing to do with where you studied, or where you come from, or what certificate is framed on your wall. Mastery lives in your hands and heart—not in your head. And in the way you show up for your craft every single day in an honest manner.

In a city like Bangalore, which runs on ambition and caffeine, Dilbar is as essential as the morning news. Some people don't chase the spotlight. The spotlight finds them. And some people — after standing in the spotlight — quietly walk back to where their soul sings ☕.

Now here is the part that gave me goosebumps. I looked up the meaning of his name. Dilbar, in Urdu, translates to one who fills the heart. A boy named Dilbar, who fills hearts for a living, with a cup of coffee. You can't make this up. He doesn't only serve coffee. He administers a small dose of warmth, and a quiet sense of normalcy, to hundreds of strangers every single morning. He brewed a life lesson. And yes, some coffee does fill the heart. Especially when someone whose heart is already full makes it. The boy from Assam taught me more about purpose, mastery, and self-awareness than most books I have ever read.

Some people inspire me. Some people remind me that purpose is brewed, not bought. And yes—there are things money can’t buy. For everything else, there’s Mastercard.

P.S. When I first shared this story with my near and dear over WhatsApp, I did include his photograph — taken with his permission. After his narration, over a second cup of coffee, I told him I was going to share this in my group, and he said okay. But as I write this for reach, I realise the story's soul is that this man walked away from the spotlight. As a coach, the most empathetic thing I can do is not drag him back into one without his full, informed blessing. So Dilbar's face remains, in a befitting manner, between the steam and the silence

Dilbar taught me that purpose is brewed, not bought. But if you'd like to help me keep brewing these stories, you're welcome to buy me a coffee — every cup fuels the next.

☕ buymeacoffee.com/vishysankara.     

Or simply click the coffee cup on the right side of this page — it's always warm and waiting. 😄

 

Kanzeon Zendo Chronicles: Eyes of Wuji … Light Seeking Eyes

Kanzeon Zendo Chronicles: Eyes of Wuji … Light Seeking Eyes

by | Feb 27, 2026 | Harmony, Integrity, Joy, Transformation, Zen

Wuji, the Zen kitten is the youngest inmate at our Zendo. It is Wuji’s practice to sit at my Window and listen through the Coaching conversations. No idea, what the kitten has found it so amusing to listen to coaching calls !  

Eyes are the mirrors into one's heart mind. Almost 25 years ago, after a visit to Aurobindo Ashram, the only "curio" I bought was a small picture of eyes… just the eyes of Mother @ Pondichery. There was something quite mystical about it. I think that small photo is still there… maybe a bit faded. Still those eyes sparkle with light.

The "curio" was never a souvenir. It was transmission. A point of contact with unknowable in this unknown world. As the Zen koan teaches the way is not in knowing or in not knowing.  Those eyes in a photograph are not merely biological—at that point of time, I felt they are darśana, windows into being. And those eyes have more glitter than that gold domed meditation chamber they were building at Auroville.  We still have that laminated photograph of eyes in Manthari.  Thara’s home. The fading of laminated paper only deepens the power. The sparkle of light is still untouched. I can feel it.

Carl Sagan in one of his documentaries, said that sometimes the stars we see in the sky have disappeared long ago… only the light they emitted still travels, looking for eyes to land in. The star is the saint. The Mother's earthly form is memory, history. Yet her gaze still travels. It landed in me 25 years ago, and lands again each time I look.

The eyes are the real telescope. Not just lenses, but mirrors of heartmind, kokoro. Light doesn't stop at the retina—it enters awareness. That photograph is a telescope, not aimed at galaxies, but at a state of grace.

Wuji is the medium. Limitless, primordial, void of infinite potential. The space through which all light travels. Wuji's eyes— Zendo kitten,  c, ordinary, fragile and feline, yet the medium of limitless presence. The Mother's eyes, the starlight, Wuji the small Zen kitten’s eyes—all vessels of the same formless ground.

And then the eyes of Manu and Rishi… My right eye and left eye.  They were small when they pushed me off the meditation mat, claiming it for themselves. Rishi was looking at with some disbelief; how can one waste one’s time without doing anything and Manu had expressions with his eyes closed. Their expression of that living moment  was playful, innocent, yet luminous in their own way. Not faded, not distant, but immediate. Transmission through laughter, through ordinariness. Their then gaze in that photograph, now reminds me that Dharma is not confined to mats or postures—it arrives in the push, the smile, the sparkle of childhood.

The same goes with Krishnamurti's eyes, too, were spoken of as intense, luminous, compassionate. One could not not notice it in those countless videos of his dialogue. And those who were present in person for his talks vouched for that. A gaze that pierced through thought, dissolving the walls of convention. Observers felt his eyes were darśana, a living transmission, selfless and direct.

And then there is Fr. AMA's eyes. My Zen master. His eyes are a bit of a paradox. Kind and stern. Compassionate and matter of fact. Forgiving and correcting at the same time. He taught me that human beings are paradoxical self. Where finitude meets infinitude, eternal with temporal. And his eyes reflect that. They don't choose one side or the other. They hold both. In one gaze, you feel completely accepted as you are. In the same gaze, you know you are being asked to go further. There is no gap between the kindness and the sternness. They are the same thing, looking at you from different angles. His eyes are the teaching. Not just windows into his being, but mirrors showing you your own paradox. That you too are finite and infinite, temporal and eternal, perfectly imperfect and called to awaken all at once.

So the mandala widens:

The Mother's eyes—promise that light never ceases.

The stars' eyes—light traveling across time, seeking witness.

Wuji's eyes—ordinary, yet the medium of limitless presence.

Manu and Rishi's eyes—innocence, ordinariness, playful Dharma.

Krishnamurti's eyes—penetrating, luminous, compassionate, telescopes of awareness.

Fr. AMA's eyes—paradox embodied. Kind and stern. Forgiving and correcting. The gaze that holds both sides of being human.

And then there was my maternal grandfather. He had moved on the rainbow world more than 35 years ago.  While he was alive (and still i think ), he was respected deeply by all those who met him. One who lived and walked on this earth with a lot of wisdom, compassion, kindness and generosity. And what I still recall in my innermind is the way he used to talk to us , his grandchildren. Especially he was in one of those wise sage mood.   Whenever he had to say something very profound to us, his grandchildren, he would close his eyes.

As I said, he was respected deeply by all who met him. Of course. Because respect is not earned by what we project outward, but by what we contain. His closed eyes told us grandchildren: I am not looking at you right now. I am going somewhere else first. I am consulting the darkness. I am listening to the space behind my own eyes. And what I bring back from there—that is what I will give you.

All the other eyes in this mandala are outward facing. Beacons. Light seeking landing places. Transmission through gaze. But my grandfather—he closed his eyes. This is the other half of the teaching. The inward turn. The wisdom that knows: before light can be received, there must be stillness. Before transmission, there must be silence. Before the profound can be spoken, the eyes must stop seeking and simply be.

While my children's eyes pushed me off the meditation mat. My grandfather’s eyes pulled me inward.

Pondichéry Mother's eyes travelled across time to land in my heart. Wuji is the formless ground from which all light emerges. But Wuji is also the darkness behind closed eyelids. The primordial. The unmanifest. The silence before the word. Krishnamurti's gaze pierced through walls. Fr. AMA's gaze holds the paradox of walls and openness, self and no-self. My grandfather's closed eyes dissolved the walls entirely—not by looking through, but by looking away, into the source.

The first six are variations on light seeking eyes. The last is eyes seeking light—not outward, but inward. Into the darkness where all light is born.

When he closed his eyes, he wasn't shutting us out. He was taking us with him. Into the place where words come from. Into the Wuji behind the eyes.

And then he opened them and spoke.

That pause, that closing, that inward descent—that was the transmission. The words were just its echo.

Light seeks eyes. Eyes seek light. What my eyes saw was a promise: that light, whether from a star, a saint, a cat, a child, a sage, a Zen master whose gaze holds all our paradox, or a grandfather closing his eyes to speak truth to his grandchildren, does not cease. It travels. It waits. And it finds us—if we have the eyes to receive it.

My grandfather's gaze, too, still travels. Still lands. Every time I close my own eyes, I complete his journey.

Together, that journey form a complete mandala of seeing light seeking eyes, eyes seeking light, and finally eyes closing to return to the source.

Sound Matters: A Sonic Pilgrimage

Sound Matters: A Sonic Pilgrimage

by | Feb 5, 2026 | Harmony, Joy, Life, Meaning, Meditation, Peace, Zen

Sound matters. Not concept. All ancient traditions knew this. Veda, mantra, sutra, dharani, koan — they are not intellectual puzzles but sonic transmissions. Zen too is deep-rooted in this. My master keeps urging: move beyond concepts. When we get stuck in concepts, we lose our way.

There is a story of a Zen master speaking to Alan Watts. He said there is no need to translate Zen, because the sound of rain in all languages is the same. This struck me deeply. It is the purest teaching. Before the word “rain,” there is the sound. Before the concept of “wet,” there is the feeling. The translation happens in the mind; the experience is direct, universal. This is where we must reside.

Zen practitioners  chants sutras, but Zen also says: Do not cling to words and letters. This is not contradiction. It is rhythm. Sound is presence. Chanting is practice. It is the direct transmission, felt in the bones, not processed in the mind. The koan isn’t solved; it is absorbed until it shatters the intellect.

Frequencies and Harmony

Modern seekers rediscover what ancients knew: sound is not just heard, it is embodied. The Solfeggio frequencies — 396 Hz, 417 Hz, 528 Hz, 639 Hz, 741 Hz, 852 Hz — are said to resonate with human nature, unlocking healing, transformation, harmony.

Verdi’s 432 Hz tuning is another example. Unlike the modern 440 Hz standard, 432 Hz is said to align more harmoniously with natural resonance, with the rhythms of the earth and the human body. Musicians, mystics, and meditators alike speak of its calming, centering effect.

Zen would say: do not get stuck in the numbers. Do not cling to the theory. Listen. Chant. Embody. The frequency is not concept but vibration. The practice is the return to resonance. We are tuning the instrument of our being.

The Uninvited Mantra: Sound of the Inner Anechoic Chamber

But what of the sounds we do not choose? The ones that come unbidden, like a ghost in the machine of our own mind?

A few years back, I landed in deep depression due to Tinnitus. A constant, incurable ring. I suffered because I refused to accept it. I fought it. Friends, talks, psychiatrists helped. But what really helped was when I started meditating on it.

My psychiatrist, at our first meeting, did not rush to prescribe. He told me: no one can withstand perfect silence. The max time one could stay in an anechoic chamber—the quietest place in the world—are just a few minutes. I read about it. In that room, silence is so absolute, so below the threshold of hearing, that you start to hear the sound of your own blood moving. The click of your eyelids shutting. Your body becomes a symphony of noise you never knew was playing.

For those who have done Vipassana, you know this. By the 7th or 8th day, as you go deeper, you start to hear the voice of your own cells. We are oriented to vibration. We are vibration. But not for an anechoic chamber. And not, at first, for Tinnitus.

When you meditate on Tinnitus, you stop fighting. You listen. You realize it is not one flat ghost noise. There are finer nuances to it. It changes tunes and rhythms. It almost becomes musical. You realize: Tinnitus is not different from you. You are Tinnitus.

Once you reach there, it recedes. It becomes a tone in one far corner of the vast galaxy of your brain. The aha moment comes: The silence of the mind is different from the silence of sound. On top of the Himalayas, one can be troubled by the silence. Right in the midst of a Silk Board flyover traffic jam, horns blaring, one can be at peace.

This is the first lesson. Accepting reality as it is. Life is what happens to you when you have other plans. What you resist, persists. Acceptance is not helplessness. It is choiceless awareness. Seeing the borderlines we draw between our experience and ourselves—seeing that these lines are also possible battlelines. And in that seeing, letting the battle extinguish.

 

Expanding the Practice: Listening Across Traditions

So I started listening. To the Heart Sutra, the Four Great Vows, the Wishing Prayer — not only in  Japanese, but also in Classical Tibetan, Sanskrit, Pali and Chinese Mandarin. Each language carried its own cadence, its own resonance, its own transmission. This is not translation of meaning, but embodiment of vibration. Each language is a different sonic key for the same lock.

Heart Sutra Across Languages

  • Classical Tibetan:
    བཅོམ་ལྡན་འདས་མ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པའི་སྙིང་པོ།
    chom den de ma sherab kyi parol tu chinpai nyingpo
    “The Blessed Mother, the Heart of the Perfection of Wisdom.”
  • Sanskrit:
    गते गते पारगते पारसंगते बोधि स्वाहा ॥
    gate gate pāragate pārasamgate bodhi svāhā
    “Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone altogether beyond, awakening, svaha.”
  • Chinese (Mandarin):
    揭諦揭諦 波羅揭諦 波羅僧揭諦 菩提薩婆訶
    jiē dì jiē dì bō luó jiē dì bō luó sēng jiē dì pú tí sà pó hē
  • Japanese:
    羯諦 羯諦 波羅羯諦 波羅僧羯諦 菩提薩婆訶
    gyatei gyatei haragyatei harasōgyatei bodhi sowaka

Each language shifts the vibration. Tibetan is earthy, resonant. Sanskrit is sharp, crystalline. Chinese is flowing, tonal. Japanese is clipped, rhythmic. Each is sound beyond concept. The Gate Gate Pāragate mantra isn’t a sentence to be parsed; it is a vehicle to be ridden. The sound is the teaching.

The Four Great Vows (Japanese Zen)

衆生無辺誓願度
煩悩無尽誓願断
法門無量誓願学
仏道無上誓願成

Shujō muhen seigan do
Bonno mujin seigan dan
Hōmon muryō seigan gaku
Butsudō mujō seigan jō

Sentient beings are numberless, I vow to save them.
Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them.
Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them.
The Buddha Way is unsurpassable, I vow to become it.

The vow is cadence. The vow is sound. Its rhythm shapes the aspirational mind.

Wishing Prayer (Samantabhadra)

སེམས་ཅན་ཐམས་ཅད་ཀྱིས་སེམས་དང་བསམ་པ་དག་པར་གྱུར་ཅིག
semchen tamche kyi sem dang sampa dakpar gyur chik
“May all beings’ minds and thoughts become perfectly pure.”

The repetition is sonic dedication. Aspiration becomes resonance.

Om Mani Padme Hum

ཨོཾ་མ་ཎི་པདྨེ་ཧཱུྃ།
Om Mani Padme Hum
“Om, the jewel in the lotus, hum.”

Avalokiteśvara’s vow embodied in syllables. Compassion as frequency.

21 Taras

ཨོཾ་ཏཱ་རེ་ཏུ་ཏྲེ་ཏུ་རེ་སྭཱ་ཧཱ།
Om Tare Tuttare Ture Soha
“Homage to Tara, swift liberator.”

The syllables themselves are Tara’s activity. The chant is protection, not the idea of protection. The vibratory pattern is the swift, motherly response.

Gregorian Chant: Sanctus

Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua
Hosanna in excelsis

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of ghosts.
Heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.

The resonance of Gregorian chant is cathedral stone vibrating with human voice. It is not doctrine but sound. It is an architectural resonance of awe.

Śaṅkara’s Nirvāṇa Ṣaṭkam

मनोबुद्ध्यहंकार चित्तानि नाहं
न च श्रोत्रजिह्वे न च घ्राणनेत्रे ।
न च व्योम भूमिर्न तेो न वायु
चिदानन्दरूपः शिवोऽहम् शिवोऽहम् ॥

manobuddhyahaṅkāra cittāni nāham
na ca śrotra jihve na ca ghrāṇa netre
na ca vyoma bhūmir na tejo na vāyuḥ
cidānandarūpaḥ śivo’ham śivo’ham

“I am not the mind, intellect, ego, or memory.
Not the senses of hearing, taste, smell, or sight.
Not space, earth, fire, or air.
I am the form of consciousness and bliss — I am Śiva, I am Śiva.”

The cadence of Sanskrit dissolves identity. Each syllable is a negation, each refrain is affirmation. Not concept, but vibration. To chant Shivo’ham is to let the repeated sound dissolve the very "I" that would claim it. The sound does the work.

 Kanzeon Zendo, Perumalmalai

Here at Kanzeon Zendo, Perumalmalai, the name itself is practice of compassion . Kanzeon — Avalokitesvara, Kannon, Guanyin — the Bodhisattva of Compassion who hears the cries of the world. Tara — his emanation, swift motherly response. One listens, one acts. One is presence, one is movement.

Our practice extends into the night. Every single evening, we close with music meditation. We sit in Hakuin Zenji’s Nanso no ho—the Soft Butter Meditation—allowing the body and mind to melt like soft butter, while listening to carefully selected music. The music is not entertainment. It is the container, the environment of resonance in which the "soft butter" of awareness can dissolve and flow. On some blessed nights, when a musician visits, the meditation deepens. The live vibration of guitar, flute, or voice merges with the practice of Nanso no ho. There is no separation. The musician breathes, the listener breathes. The note vibrates, the body vibrates. It is all the sound of rain.

Our broader chanting — Heart Sutra, Four Great Vows, Wishing Prayer, Om Mani Padme Hum, Tara praises, Gregorian Sanctus, Nirvāṇa Ṣaṭkam — is not about concept. It is about sound. Sound as Dharma. Sound as transmission. Sound as ordinariness.

The Zendo becomes a mandala of sound. Tibetan syllables, Sanskrit cadence, Pali rhythm, Chinese tone, Japanese vow, Latin resonance, the note of a flute, the falling rain—all dissolve into one practice. Not separate traditions, but one vibration. In this sonic mandala, the canter is listening-compassion, and every chant, every note, is an arranged element of the integrated whole. We are not blending doctrines. We are experiencing sonic unification. The Dharma has no native language. It is the sound of rain.

When we chant, when we sit with music, we do not explain. We embody. We dissolve. We return.

At Kanzeon Zendo, Perumalmalai, this is our root.
Compassion as sound.
Wisdom as sound.
Aspiration as sound.
Protection as sound.
Presence as sound.

These are not abstract virtues described by sounds. They are activated and transmitted as sound.

Sound matters. Not concept. The pilgrimage is the return to this resonance. To listen, to chant, to melt like soft butter into the note, into the silence after the rain. To dissolve. To return.

 

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.

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