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You Are Here (Even in the Over-Lit Corporate Corridor)…

You Are Here (Even in the Over-Lit Corporate Corridor)…

by | Jan 21, 2026 | Joy, Life, Peace, Zen

The voice from the google map app in iPhone tells us to turn left, then right, then merge. We follow the blue dot, but the feeling grows: this is not just a wrong turn. This is being lost in general. The highways multiply, the paths diverge, and we whisper:

 Where am I, really?

We are lost on the over-lit corporate corridors, moving from one identical meeting to another.

We are lost in the labyrinths of relationships—with the dear and near, with friends, or in the outer circles of Dunbar’s number, wondering which connection is true.

We are lost in the marketplace of choices and voices.

We are lost on our own spiritual path, where the signposts are confusing or gone.

We have endless guidance for roads, and none for this.

It is here, in this specific modern wilderness, that David Wagoner’s poem Lost isn't just pretty verse. It is a radical, necessary command.

Lost  by David Wagoner

“Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you

Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,

And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,

Must ask permission to know it and be known.

The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,

I have made this place around you.

If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.

No two trees are the same to Raven.

No two branches are the same to Wren.

If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,

You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows

Where you are. You must let it find you. “

This applies to anywhere. Especially here. Especially now.

That over-lit corporate corridor? It is your forest. Stand still. Listen to its hum. Let this Here be known. That labyrinth of a relationship? Stand still. Not in silence, but in deep attention. Let the space between you breathe. Ask permission to know it anew. The noise of the marketplace? Stand still. Let the frantic churn become a powerful stranger you observe, before you buy. The confused spiritual path? Stand still. The path is not ahead; it is under your waiting feet.

In Zen practice, there is a bow. You bow to the doorman at the zendo entrance. You bow to the Buddha on the altar. You bow to the person across from you. It is not a bow of blind reverence to others. It is a bow to the Buddha within yourself, and within them. When you bow, you empty yourself—your pride, your rushing, your frantic need to be somewhere else—and in that emptying, the world comes in.

It is the same as swimming. While you struggle in frantic motion, you drown. Only when you relax, when you release the fight, do you start to float. The water was always holding you; your panic was what sank you.

It is the same as Tai Chi. I remember when François taught us at the zendo. He did not rush into teaching forms. He spent a good three weeks teaching us to stand still—Wuji, the primordial stillness. And he said, all Tai Chi movements start by themselves from that stillness. The form does not begin with a step, but with a surrender. The first movement is not made; it is allowed, born from the quiet fullness of standing.

Standing still is that bow. Standing still is that floating. Standing still is that Wuji. It is the surrender that precedes being upheld, the emptiness from which true movement spontaneously arises. Emptying yourself of the frantic navigation so that the forest—the corridor, the labyrinth, the path, the water, the qi—can find you. Can move you.

The poem’s genius is its transferable truth: "If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you, You are surely lost."

If what your colleague's silence does, or the labyrinth's turn, or the marketplace's buzz does is lost on you—you are surely lost. So you must stand still. You must bow. You must stop thrashing. You must find your Wuji. Not to figure it out, but to let it find you. To let it carry you. To let the first real movement begin from you, not through you.

Only when we empty ourselves—when we bow to the Here, when we relax into the float, when we root into the unmoving stillness—does the world come in. The corridor, the labyrinth, the path, the water, the life force... it knows where you are. It has always known. You must let it find you.

You are not a blinking GPS dot,  not a line on a map, not a corridor endlessly lit. You are a breath in a breathing world, a silence that listens, a stillness that bows.

Stand still— and the corridor becomes a forest. Stand still— and the labyrinth becomes a path.

Stand still— and the marketplace becomes a stranger you can greet.

The world has always known where you are. It waits for you to stop thrashing, to empty, to float, to bow.

Here is not a mistake. Here is the beginning. Here is the place that finds you.

You are a breath in a breathing world. And it knows exactly where you are, even here. Especially here. 

 

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.

The Song of Silence That Remains…

The Song of Silence That Remains…

by | Dec 19, 2025 | Harmony, Joy, Life, Meaning, Meditation, Peace, Zen

The Music Around Me (Inheritance)

Music was always present in the background of my life, though I never claimed it as my own. My late father, Sankara, was a devoted fan of Rafi and Mukesh. In our home stood an old radio, and before that, I remember an even older one—so old it required a license from the post office. Listening to Vividh Bharati and Ceylon Radio was a daily ritual. My father often spoke with fondness about how Rafi would visit Thalassery for annual concerts, and those stories carried a kind of magic, even if I did not yet understand the music itself. 

Around me, others carried the thread forward. A cousin of my father in Mannarkkad was a flutist, his son a skilled mridangam player. Our family friend, Dr. Anju, now balances her life as a doctor and a singer. I still remember attending her very first concert when she was a child—watching her step onto the stage with a voice that has since grown to embrace Carnatic, semi-classical, and even pop.

Even in my own home, music appeared in unexpected ways. My elder son, Many, learned tabla for a while, and though he dropped it midway—as children often do—his teacher at TVS insisted he had talent. My younger son, Rishi, sings, strums the guitar, and listens widely. Yet both of them, true to the Krishnamurti school spirit, resisted any attempt at dictation. For them, music was never about performance or achievement. It was simply part of life, woven into their days without showmanship.

Looking back, I see that they were living out something I only discovered later: music is not about being “talented” or “rhythm deaf.” It is about how it inhabits the spaces of our lives.

The Music I Found (Awakening)

For much of my early life, I was not even a listener of classical music. Perhaps I was rhythm deaf, or perhaps I simply stood outside its circle. But one day, on Church Street in Bangalore, I picked up a CD—Colours by Kunnakudi Vaidyanathan and Ustad Zakir Hussain. That album opened a door. I began to build a small collection of instrumental music, and slowly, listening became a quiet practice.

When I moved to the Zendo, music took on a new role. Each evening, we chose music for meditation. Sometimes, visiting musicians played live. At other times, I curated recordings—Kitaro, Hikari Ōe, Naomi Sogbe, and others. Fr. AMA was particular about the choices, and I learned to listen with care, to sense how sound could prepare the ground for silence.

Through Rishi, I discovered Agam, the Carnatic progressive rock band. He insisted that all music is good music, and I began to hear through his ears. Their fusion of Carnatic depth with rock’s energy felt like a bridge between traditions, a reminder that music is always evolving, always finding new forms.

The Music That Remains (Revelation)

A long time back, in 2015 i guess, i was attending annual KFI conferences in the verdant settings of KFI, Rajghat. And they organised a concert on Kabir, by the side of Vasantha college , under that giant and old peepal tree by the side of ganges. There were diyas around and stars and moon in the sky to give us some light. There were no sound boxes or other artificial enhances. And that atmosphere, kabir dohas, melodious siinging, it was just mesmerising and just seeped into my heartmind.

But then not all music connects. I once heard T. M. Krishna at The Valley School, but something in his manner left me distant. By contrast, Harish Sivaramakrishnan of Agam felt closer—perhaps because of his spiritual intensity, perhaps because his birthplace was near Mannarkkad, perhaps because his music carried both rootedness and rebellion.

I once tried to attend an Agam concert in Bangalore, but the tickets sold out before I could get them. Still, their recordings reached me. Their third studio album, Arrival of the Ethereal (2025), was their most ambitious yet, with a hundred-piece orchestra recorded in Czechoslovakia. One track, The Silence That Remains – Mokshamu Galada, lingers with me.

Its words echo a truth I have come to know in Zen practice:

What is longing but the soul remembering something once held— and lost?

When the body fades, when the curtain falls, what remains?

For those who never sought—emptiness. For those who clung—regret.

For those who fought the tide—fear.

But for those who saw, who surrendered, who walked open handed and unafraid— silence. light. freedom.

 And still, the song remains, whispering:

Did you find your way home,

or are you still searching in the dark?

When the music fades, what remains is not the sound but the silence it reveals. That silence is not empty—it is luminous, alive, free.

The Teacher’s Voice And Hakuin's healing ( Integration)

Once, to a question of mine, Fr. AMA said:

“I too had a long struggle with religions, orthodoxy, sexuality and SJ. What I can tell you is it is possible to go beyond them and continue your spiritual journey. It is tough and not easy. But possible. Zen did help me. What I can’t do is to explain to you how to do it. You got to find a way and do it by yourself. But being aware, is a right start. Also remember, Humour makes humans. Animals are not known to have it. Some humans too. That is what makes us not only cope up, but successfully face the absurdity of our life. Please remember Humour and Music elevates the human mind. They are very much part of Zen.”

His words stay with me. They remind me that music and humour are not diversions from the path, but companions on it. They are ways of lifting the mind, of facing the absurdity of life without despair.

During another question and answer, Fr. AMA told us why music . meditation is as important as Zazen, or Samu.

It so seems Zen Master Hakuin, who wrote the Song of Zazen

Zen Master Hakuin suffered from what he called “meditation sickness”—a burning sensation in his chest and mental agitation from overzealous practice. He was healed by a Taoist hermit who taught him the “Butter Method of Meditation”, a visualization practice that soothed his nervous system. Later, Hakuin himself recommended healing practices that included sound and chanting, showing how music and vibration can restore balance when meditation becomes excessive fierce and uncompromising in his youth, once drove himself into collapse. His practice was fire—unceasing meditation, relentless striving, a refusal to rest. The body rebelled. He described it as “Zen sickness”: burning in the chest, agitation in the mind, sleepless nights.

Seeking relief, Hakuin found a Taoist hermit, Hakuyū, who offered not more effort but gentleness. The teaching was simple, almost childlike: imagine soft butter melting from the crown of the head, flowing slowly down through the body, soothing every nerve and bone. This “Butter Meditation” restored him. The fire cooled. Breath returned. Practice became whole again.

The Music of Healing

Though Hakuin’s cure was imagery, the principle is the same as music: vibration, rhythm, and softness that re-tune the body-mind.

Chanting sutras is not performance but medicine—breath and sound aligning with heart.

Temple bells and gongs are not decoration but resonance—waves that settle agitation.

Silence itself is music, the pause between notes, the butter melting into stillness.

When meditation becomes too sharp, music reminds us of roundness. When practice burns, sound cools.

In our own Zendo, music is not entertainment. It is presence. The bell before Zazen, claps before kinhin and meal gatha, the chant that rises and falls, the quiet hum of voices sharing tea—all are therapies for the subtle sickness of striving.

Hakuin’s story is not about weakness but about balance. Even the fiercest Zen master needed butter, needed sound, needed softness. His sickness became his teaching: practice must heal, not harm. And so, perhaps the silence that remains is not solemn, but smiling. A silence alive with laughter and song. A silence that is, in itself, the song of Zen.

Usually at the zendo, we play recorded music.. Sometimes, when a musician visits us, it is live music. Yesterday for evening music meditation, a very accomplished French violinist and composer Chloe Netter performed. And in between , there was a silence.

It kind of transported me back in time to that Kabir concert by the banks of Ganges.

Sound is a path to silence, and that silence, when attended to, is itself a song.

A Celebration for Nothing: Pizza, Zen and the Inner Shrine

A Celebration for Nothing: Pizza, Zen and the Inner Shrine

by | Dec 14, 2025 | Joy, Life, Meaning, Peace, Zen

Perhaps that’s what this is—a long journey brought to stillness in a shared meal, a remembered verse, a slice of pizza in the hills. No reason. Every reason. A celebration for nothing. For everything.

It was a Celebration for nothing… mean no particular reason… per se…

Today morning, I was watching again the documentary An Original Cloud in the Mountain. And after that we, Fr. AMA, Prakash, Sreenath, Robert, Inaki and I, headed for a Sunday pizza at George’s Gourmet Kitchen. George is a Canadian settled in Kodai Kanal… and many have vouched that he makes really good pizza. (That many includes my second son Rishi and many of our guests who have travelled around the globe.)

On the way, Jill Mistry, who is the Director of the movie, stopped our vehicle for a lift… She was on her way to Kodai town for a haircut. She was asking me to visit her and Cyrus. While Cyrus Mistry is a well-known award winning author and playwright, she is into films. And Rohinton Mistry (who wrote those best sellers A Fine Balance and Such a Long Journey; who got nominated for the Booker Prize thrice and even made an appearance in Oprah Winfrey’s talk show) is Cyrus's younger brother. And to add to all that, Jill's and Cyrus's son is into Psychology and Counselling. So whenever we meet, endless talk on movies, books and psychology. She was also telling me that she was into shooting a documentary on the lives of tribals. There is a tribal hamlet a bit far off from Kodaikanal, where they still live their ancient ways, closer and in alignment with nature. Jill was telling me that they are more spiritual than many others in the modern world.

And during the pizza lunch, I was telling Fr. AMA that just today morning I was watching the documentary, here she is…

Sometimes life is like that. It is wonderful as it is. Hence the Celebration for nothing…

Please do watch that documentary at Kanzeon Zendo you tube channel. ( if you can spare some 50 minutes.) It is on Zen. Some of the scripts I remember from that movie are from Fr. AMA on his Zen vision… and that wonderful and most spiritual poem of Tagore from Gitanjali.

From Fr. AMA:
"I am often asked to what religion I owe my allegiance. I say I stand in the in between of Advaita Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity. My vision of Zen is dynamic and liberative though I am rooted in the Buddhist tradition I have gone beyond its approach and yet differs in varying degrees from that are many Buddhist teachers.....

The mind is emptied so that the world can be received as it is. It reflects the world as it presents itself. It is consciousness becoming conscious of itself like a mirror that reflects whatever comes before it, itself being empty of colour or form. Now it's a universe becoming conscious of itself, stepping forth and manifesting itself.....

You are the universe and the universe is yourself. When you sit in meditation it's Earth sitting, it is a mountain sitting. When you breathe it's a universe breathing and when you walk it is a universe that is walking....

The heart is a mystery here where the Divine and the human meet. The way is perfect like vast space where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess. Indeed it is due to our choosing to accept or reject that we do not see the true nature of things....

In Zen there is no why. Zen does not try to explain suffering or evil or any of the ultimate realities of life. Why is there suffering? So that you may respond to it. Why do I suffer? So that I may bear it. You are called and you respond to the call. You become yourself only in this call and response.
You are Buddha, become Buddha. To use Christian terms in the light of Zen you are Christ and you are called to become Christ who bears and suffers all. There is no God outside of you. The only answer is to respond in your compassionate action to the suffering and the broken. When you pervade the world with the consciousness of compassion and love, you are the awakened Bodhisattva."

Tagore’s Gitanjali
"The time that my journey takes is long and the way of it long.
I came out on the chariot of the first gleam of light,
and pursued my voyage through the wildernesses of worlds
leaving my track on many a star and planet.
It is the most distant course that comes nearest to thyself,
and that training is the most intricate which leads to the utter simplicity of a tune.
The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own,
and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.
My eyes strayed far and wide before I shut them and said “Here art thou!”
The question and the cry “Oh, where?” melt into tears of a thousand streams and
deluge the world with the flood of the assurance “I am!”"

Some 40 years back, I had read an old Malayalam novel written with the background of Kodaikanal Astronomical Observatory—Pullippulikalum Vellinakshathrangalum (Spotted Leopards and Silver Stars). It was serialized in Mathrubhumi Weekly and I might have read it when I was in high school. Written by C. Radhakrishnan, a famous Malayalam novelist known for his wonderful fiction work with a lot of metaphysical background.

Last time, after the sesshin got over, we went to a pizza at George’s Gourmet Kitchen and on the way back, I saw that Kodaikanal observatory. I did share with Fr. AMA about the novel I had read some 40 years ago, written by a scientist who worked there and with a lot of metaphysical underpinnings. And laughingly but very affectionately, Fr. AMA told me: no wonder you have reached the same place.
And today before our sesshin starts, we went again for a pizza at George's.

And as Tagore wrote so wonderfully:
The time that my journey takes is long, and the way of it long… The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own… and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.

Perhaps that’s what this is—a long journey brought to stillness in a shared meal, a remembered verse, a slice of pizza in the hills. No reason. Every reason. A celebration for nothing. For everything.

Reclaiming the Temple of Sleep: The Lotus Pond and Night stars.

Reclaiming the Temple of Sleep: The Lotus Pond and Night stars.

by | Nov 18, 2025 | Harmony, Life, Meditation, Peace, Trust, Zen

Sometime back, I asked Fr. AMA what the mark of a spiritually evolved person is. He replied, "They may have reconciled their relationship with money, power, sex, and hunger." Later, when I read Buddha's five Nīvaraṇa (hindrances), when I saw sloth and sleepiness (Thīna-middha) as one of the Nīvaraṇa, I added one more of my own: a sound, deep sleep.  Not as a hindrance but, essential for spiritual evolvement.  If one can’t sleep well, may be how can one be awake well and live well.

Though I don't know where I stand on that list of hindrances, one thing I can say is I am not much bothered about it anymore. But one box I can tick is sound, deep sleep. May be that is why I added it to that list.  Those holy books and enlightenment literature always talk about enlightenment as awakening from sleep. But they hardly realise that one awakens well only when one sleeps well and deep. Our own life is nothing but a spark of light between two eternal sleeps. And without that eternal sleep, before the beginning and after the end, there is no spark of light and life. Similarly, ever good day lived in wakefulness, is between two deep good sleeps.

Animals remind us that sleep is never uniform but always adapted to survival. Bears and bats hibernate, entering long torpor where metabolism slows and hunger waits at the edge of waking. Dolphins and whales sleep with one half of the brain at a time, keeping one eye open to guard against predators. Birds too drift in unihemispheric rest, balancing vigilance with renewal. Even creatures like giraffes or certain fish seem to sleep with eyes open, conserving energy while remaining alert. Evolution teaches that sleep is not a luxury but a covenant, reshaped by environment and necessity.

Humans, by nature, are diurnal beings. Our bodies are tuned to the rhythm of sun and shadow, waking with light and surrendering to darkness. Yet the Industrial Revolution, with its artificial light and endless productivity, compelled many into nocturnal patterns. Factories and electric lamps broke the covenant, forcing us to live against our biology. In this dissonance, sleep disorders multiplied, and the ritual of trust was forgotten. To reclaim sleep is to reclaim our natural rhythm, to remember that we are not nocturnal hunters but beings of day and night, of surrender and renewal.

Mythology too circles around sleep, magnifying its power and paradox. In the Ramayana, Kumbhakarna is cursed to sleep for six months and wake for only one day, a cycle that mirrors the hibernation of bears. His story is both comic and tragic — sleep as abundance, sleep as curse. In Greek myth, Endymion is granted eternal sleep by Zeus, a timeless rest that suspends vitality. Hypnos, the god of sleep, is brother to Thanatos, death itself, reminding us that sleep and mortality are kin. In Hindu and Buddhist lore, sages and enlightened beings are said to transcend ordinary sleep, resting in awareness beyond waking and dreaming. Myth remembers sleep as both vulnerability and power, both surrender and transcendence.

Even gods and animals remind us: sleep is not absence, but renewal. Whether in the hibernation of bears, the one-eyed vigilance of dolphins, or the enchanted slumber of Kumbhakarna, sleep remains the covenant between body, mind, and cosmos. To sleep deeply is to trust — to let problems sink into the lotus pond, to let blessings rise and dance in the night breeze, and to awaken renewed at dawn.

During modern times, especially after the advent of scientific management, sleep was looked down upon with contempt. Productivity and efficiency became the new gods, and those who needed more sleep — even the average quota required by the body — were branded lazy, not up to the corporate mark. Higher education institutions, preparing students as future cogs in the corporate machine, began loading them with assignments and work, training them to wear sleeplessness as a badge of honour. To survive on a few hours of rest became a symbol of toughness, a distorted virtue. In the era of social media, even political leaders project this image — sleepless nights as proof of dedication.

Of course, there were exceptions. Winston Churchill was said to take long afternoon naps and then return to work with renewed vigour. And I remember my own corporate days at Wipro in 1995, working on the fourth floor of S.B. Towers, MG Road. The top floor housed the management. Once, passing the narrow corridor that divided the open office from the cabins, I saw Ashok Soota, then our CEO, sleeping on a mat on the floor. A colleague later told me he did this regularly, and everyone knew not to disturb him. Much later, when I tried the same in our EC office, my annual 360-degree feedback carried two criticisms about it. When I shared this with my then boss during appraisal, he laughed and said, “In corporate, the top fellas can do anything. Those who are bonded labourers are not supposed to. And remember, it is not the results, but the perception that matters.”

In essence having a good relationship with one of important needs for our life is as difficult as any other instincts.  Most of the tradition and rituals are developed by societies to take care of those nivarans or to ensure a smooth societal living. Tradition are rituals based on wisdom, and wisdom is always derivative of the knowledge in one particular time. Rituals are not timeless—they carry the imprint of the knowledge available in that moment. When knowledge evolves, rituals must evolve too, or else they become hollow forms. Two points about the wild animals in nature remind us of this evolutionary wisdom. First, they are not programmed for a deep sleep. That is evolutionary. If someone is lost in deep sleep, one may end up as a lunch or breakfast for another. Second, most of the hunting animals, which require speed and faster response, have a higher breathing rate. And they also have a lesser living age. Speed and responsiveness come at the cost of longevity. Evolution balances survival strategies differently depending on ecological niche. Most of the human being problems stem from the fact that though our environment has changed, we have not bothered to reprogram our rituals. Most important of all the rituals is the ritual of sleeping. We all need a long deep sleep to rejuvenate and rebuild our body. Yet we cling to outdated patterns—late-night meals, overstimulation, artificial light—while ignoring the wisdom of renewal. In effect, we have broken the covenant between body and environment.

After we started living in better protected shelters than in open spaces and caves, human beings started evolving their sleep habits and used to follow nature's rhythm. Last meals of the day were before the sun set. And though people used fire as light, since those resources were scarce, it was put out well before our ancestors hit the bed. Darkness itself became the cue for sleep. The body’s rhythm was perfectly attuned to the cycle of sun and shadow.

Today, artificial light tricks our bodies into believing it is still day. Screens and productivity rituals have replaced the ancient ritual of surrender. We have forgotten that sleep is not just biological—it is a ritual of trust. Trust in the shelter to protect. Trust in the rhythm of nature to guide. Trust in darkness to renew.

Our body starts sleeping only when our mind starts sleeping and is still. In modern times, with all those electric lights (white) and blue lights of the screen, music, food eaten closer to the sleep time even after birds have rested and sun had set—all cause our mind unrest. The body cannot rebuild if the mind refuses to yield. To sleep deeply is to allow the mind to bow, to let silence and darkness become the true temple.

In Zen practice, breathing is the most important ritual. One Zen quote says: “You can’t wipe away blood with more blood.” Similarly, you cannot wipe out thoughts with more thoughts. Breath is what unites body and mind. Zen emphasizes focusing the breath into the hara (tanden, lower abdomen), rather than at the nostrils as in Vipassana or at the third eye in other traditions. This shift of attention is a way of stilling the mind. At the end of the day, we often take the brain as the seat of all thoughts. But in Zen, the hara becomes the true seat of awareness—breath anchoring us away from the turbulence of thought into the stillness of being. And moving that focus even from hara to heel is even more effective. Sooner, one will know that the mind is still, all our problems, pains, suffering and challenges of the day have been written, cast away, and sunk deep into the lotus pond. And those blessings of the day will start floating on the surface, dancing in the night breeze. And soon, we would have slept.

First, I became  aware of the sleep rituals when I was deprived of it. I was in deep depression due to tinnitus peaking, and at first another doctor, when my Doctor, Dr. Raja Hiremani was away, prescribed a medicine named Olanzapine in a higher dose and another medicine for sleeping. Before that, for days together, sleep left me. It was a very difficult time. I hardly ate. But there was no hunger. No sleep too. Though I used to feel the effects of sleep deprivation. But after those medicines, though I used to fall asleep, suddenly my legs or hands used to jerk so violently during sleep as if they belonged to another soul beyond my mind's control. And I used to be so startled and scared of that.

So I wrote a lengthy email to Fr. AMA. At that point of time, he had moved out of Bodhi Zendo and was living in a small room in Little Flower School. One of those days I called my family friend, Dr. Radhakrishnan. He was undergoing some procedure in a hospital in Coimbatore and his spouse Usha Aunty took the call. Maybe by listening to my sad tone of voice, she handed over the phone to Dr. He did listen for a few minutes and told me that no one really knows how those neurological medicines act on the human body unlike other normal medicines. Since I am into meditation etc., why don’t I try that out.

And on the same day I got a reply from Fr. AMA saying, though it will take some time to build the new Zendo, there is going to be a two-week Koan Seminar in the school. Till then just do Zazen and focus on my tinnitus at home. Maybe I was on the edge between life and death. And one morning, I just threw away those sleeping tablets into the dust bin though Dr. Raja Hiremani advised me to taper it down rather than stopping it at once. I started sleeping well. Maybe my body was getting back all those deprived sleep. There were days when I woke up during the lunch time. But I never had to go back to those medicines or even supplements for sleep. And that is when my own learning and experimentation with sleep rituals started.

Now I can sleep even on a noisy railway platform in a moment. Some time back, when I shared that in my WhatsApp group, a good friend and ex-Wipro colleague Mukesh wrote back that he could sleep even standing in a moving bus. But then Mukesh was one of the coolest persons I had met in my life.

Last meal of the day at the Zendo is at 6:00 pm. Fr. AMA has his light supper a bit earlier than that. Music meditation ends at 8:00 pm and then it lights out. I do check my emails for 10 minutes and write down the day review. Then laptop and phone are out.

My most important learning was: as times change, we need to gain new knowledge about the environment, revise our wisdom and rituals. This reprogramming became my nightly practice, a three-part ritual to close the day.

First comes the Emotional Catharsis—the Problem Sink. I write a day review, beginning with the most problematic event of the day. The first version is an emotional outburst, pure feeling onto the page. This is the act of "casting away." Then, after a few deep chiposoku breaths, I write it again, this time as a clean, objective problem statement. This is the "sinking." I am telling my mind, "It is noted. It is stored. We will address it in the light of tomorrow." This, I realize, is the modern equivalent of our ancestors putting out the fire for the night—a ritual act of closure, trusting that the shelter will hold until dawn.

Next is the Gratitude Journal—the Blessings Dance. Here, I look for the silver linings, even on days of the darkest clouds. A good message from my better half, a show of affection from Zendog Bhim. This conscious cultivation of trust is the active reprogramming of the mind from turbulence to peace. These are not just words; they are the most potent nutrients for the soul. Truly, this practice has become the best sleeping pill, melatonin, and magnesium supplement, all combined into one.

Finally, I engage the Physical Anchors—the path from Hara to Heel. The last read is the Four Great Vows. Then, on the bed, I begin chiposoku breathing. But now, the journey of attention deepens. I let my tongue touch the upper palate, a subtle Tai Chi cue to connect the body's energy and promote stillness. Then, I move my focus from the breath in the hara, down, all the way to the heels. This is the ultimate act of grounding. By rooting my awareness there, I am no longer in the thinking brain. I am planting myself into the earth, into the primal trust of simply being. I become as solid and unmoving as a mountain, ready for the final surrender.

This embodied practice is the synthesis; it is the theory made truth.

That my Garmin notes a sleep score of 80-90, even on short nights, proves a vital point: sleep is not an absence, but a quality of renewal. The ritual itself is what matters. And the ability to sleep on a noisy platform? That is the ultimate proof that the covenant of trust has been rebuilt. The shelter is no longer just four walls; I carry it within me. The chiposoku breath is no longer just a technique; it is the living bridge that unites my body and mind, moment by moment, breath by breath. When the hara steadies, the heel roots. Problems sink into the lotus pond, blessings rise and dance in the night breeze. Ritual is wisdom reprogrammed, and dawn is the seal of trust.

Vedanta speaks of four states of consciousness: waking (jagrat), dreaming (Svapna), deep sleep (sushupti), and the fourth, turiya—pure awareness beyond them all. Though this suggests metaphorical sleep  (ignorance, delusion)  and separate it from the biological, restorative sleep (renewal, trust). In my lived experience biological restorative sleep is not an obstacle to the former but is , in fact it’s essential prerequisite.  To me, my nightly ritual feels like a conscious reprogramming of these very states. The Emotional Catharsis clears the residues of the waking world. The Problem Sink dissolves the forming fragments of dream. The Gratitude Dance prepares the mind for the pristine stillness of deep sleep. And in the Hara-to-Heel grounding, there is a hint of turiya—that steady, unwavering awareness which remains, whether awake, dreaming, or asleep. In this way, the ritual is not merely about sleep, but about touching the very substratum of consciousness itself, where renewal and awakening are one and the same. Moving on to other  spiritual traditions, including the Buddhist nīvaraṇas and certain strands of Christian asceticism, sleep/sloth is framed as a hindrance. The goal is to overcome it, to reduce attachment to the body's need for rest to pursue higher states. The metaphor of "awakening from the sleep of ignorance" is ubiquitous.

Conventional wisdom often places "spiritual practice" (meditation, prayer, study) above "biological maintenance" (sleep, diet).  Zen reframes and  flips this hierarchy. Hakuin Ekaku, one of the most radical and influential Zen Master ever lived, in his song of Zazen says “At this moment , what are you seeking ? Nirvana is right here before youer eyes: This very place is the lotus land ! and This very body, the Buddha!”

I reckon  that deep, ritualized sleep is itself a high form of spiritual practice—a "ritual of trust" and "surrender." It is not the lowly ground crew that enables the spiritual rocket to launch; it is part of the rocket's fundamental engineering. By making sleep a conscious ritual, we can elevate it from a passive state to an active one, from a biological necessity to a spiritual discipline.

 

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