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The Goalless Goal: Escaping the Prison of the Timekeeper

The Goalless Goal: Escaping the Prison of the Timekeeper

by | Dec 29, 2025 | Harmony, Joy, Life, Meditation, STRESS, Zen

It was my habit to sit in the last week of December, reflect on the year gone by, and write down goals for the year to come. All the “Success” literature reinforced this: write it down, and it will manifest. (Though research says most new gym signees in the first week of January drop out within 2-3 weeks—hence the insistence on annual payments. The percentage of readers who never go beyond chapter one is very significant.) For a long time, I even carried that quote from mountaineer W. H. Murray, attributed to Goethe: “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!”. Not that it made any difference to my life per se.  It was one of those things to showcase effort.

And so, during the last week of a December 2022, after “successfully” shrugging off anxiety attacks, sleepless nights, and the annoyance of tinnitus—like that vetala on Vikramaditya’s shoulder—by returning to Zazen as advised by my Zen Master Fr. AMA Samy, I wrote down a vow: for the whole of 2023, I will wake up and meditate every single day. No exceptions.

I had read that if you do something for 21 days, it becomes a habit. Considering the amount of failures I had known, I stretched the vow to a year. And I did it. Even during the Qatar World Cup, when matches ended at impossible hours, I still woke at 4 a.m. and sat. Many times during bus rides to Kodaikanal and back to Bangalore, once even in the early morning cab to the airport. The vow travelled with me.

As the Insight Timer announced milestones along the way, my heart swelled with pride—and my ego too, quite a bit. By year’s end, the streak was complete. 365 days. A circle closed. One evening in the early week of 2024, over tea at Kanzeon, I showed it to Fr. AMA. He might have sensed my vain pride.  He smiled, waved it off, and said: “This is not Zen. Zen does not need adrenaline-pumping, teeth-gritting effort.”

Then, with a twinkle, he asked: “Do you count your breaths too like this?”

Zen does talk about Great Doubt, Great Faith, and Great Effort. While it balances faith with doubt, it does not talk much about Great Effort. May be that is  due to  the most important lesson in Zen:  the Great effort in Zen is effortless effort. As the Zen master teaches Prof. Herrigel in that wonderful book Zen and the Art of Archery.

“I seated myself opposite him on a cushion. He handed me tea, but did not speak a word. So we sat for a long while. There was no sound but the singing of the kettle on the hot coals. At last the Master rose and made me a sign to follow him. The practice hall was brightly lit. The Master told me to put a taper, long and thin as a knitting needle in the sand in front of the target, but not to switch on the light in the target sand. It was so dark that I could not even see its outlines, and if the tiny flame of the taper had not been there, I might perhaps have guessed the position of the target, though I could not have made it out with any precision. The Master “danced” the ceremony. His first arrow shot out of dazzling brightness into deep night. I knew from the sound that it had hit the target. The second arrow was a hit, too. When I switched on the light in the target-stand, I discovered to my amazement that the first arrow was lodged full in the middle of the black, while the second arrow had splintered the butt of the first and ploughed through the shaft before embedding itself beside it. I did not dare to pull the arrows out separately, but carried them back together with the target. The Master surveyed them critically. “The first shot,” he then said, “was no great feat, you will think, because after all these years I am so familiar with my target-stand that I must know even in pitch darkness where the target is. That may be, and I won’t try to pretend otherwise. But the second arrow which hit the first—what do you make of that? I at any rate know that it is not ‘I’ who must be given credit for this shot. ‘It’ shot and ‘It’ made the hit. Let us bow to the goal as before the Buddha!” The Master had evidently hit me, too, with both arrows: as though transformed overnight, I no longer succumbed to the temptation of worrying about my arrows and what happened to them.”

 Later, on Fr. AMA’s insistence I spent time reading Dr. Steven Hays and studying about ACT. Dr. Steven Hayes’ teaching: that we often write our own prison rules for the mind. Our processes build the prison cells like a smart dictator. While we focus on external freedom and borders, we do not notice that we are prisoners of our own mind. The “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts,” the milestone flags it raises, the appreciation and depreciation notes it throws up on our mind’s billboards.

And when we chase our cast-in-stone goals, guided by the chimes of our smartphone timers, zealously driven by the psychological prison-warden in our mind, we hardly realize that the real achievement is gaining freedom from that prison of the watch.

On the last Onam day, after I missed the annual Sadya and ended up instead with a super lunch with Fr. AMA and Prakash at Kodai International hotel, I spent some time reading about calendars and time. The Kollam Era had just entered its new century—Kollavarsham 1200 in August 2024, now 1201 from August 2025. A calendar born in 825 CE, sidereal solar, still guiding rituals and harvests in Kerala. Chingam 1st, Andu Pirappu, the beginning of Onam.

So many calendars humans have made. Yet most of us stick to the Gregorian one, imposed by empire, just as Greenwich became the zero of time. And more curious still: we inherited this whole architecture of hours and minutes. The Babylonians and Egyptians gave us the duodecimal system—that’s why we have 24 hours and 60 minutes. The French Revolution tried to decimalize time, with 100 minutes in an hour, but it didn’t stick. For millennia, sundials and water clocks (clepsydras) measured in broad strokes. In medieval China, they even used incense sticks that burned at a fixed rate—you could literally smell what time it was. Early mechanical clocks in Europe had no minute hand. The second hand is a very recent invention. We’ve even had human alarm clocks: in Victorian England, “knocker-uppers” were paid to tap on workers’ windows with long poles.

And I see now: just as we count days, we count breaths, we count streaks. We build cages of time, cages of achievement. The streak was my personal calendar. The Insight Timer was my Greenwich. My ego was the minute hand, ticking away, and my pride was the knocker-upper, jolting me awake to meet a man-made deadline.

But Zen says: Now.
Wu Wei says: the river flows without measure.
Krishnamurti says: the observer is the observed.  Or to paraphrase him in my own crude way the achiever is the achieved.

And Khalil Gibran too, in The Prophet, saw time as immeasurable and sacred. He said: “They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.” He called time timeless, boundless, like love. Not fleeting seconds to be quantified, not a commodity to be sold. He reminded us that yesterday, today, and tomorrow blend into one, that the richness of life is soulful purpose, not profit.

And so the goalless goal emerges not as passivity, but as release.
From outcome to process.
From accumulation to letting go.

From Greed to need.
From time to presence.
From selling days for gold to living them as gifts.

The practice remains—the 4 a.m. wake-up, the cushion—but the why has evaporated. It is no longer a brick in the wall of a spiritual identity. It is simply what I do, as naturally as breathing. And in that naturalness, the freedom the traditions speak of is not something found at the end of the streak. It is felt in the very texture of the sitting itself, unadorned by accomplishment.

And again From Zen in the Art of Archery:

“You see what comes of not being able to wait without purpose in the state of highest tension. You cannot even learn to do this without continually asking yourself: Shall I be able to manage it? Wait patiently, and see what comes—and how it comes!”

I pointed out to the Master that I was already in my fourth year and that my stay in Japan was limited.

“The way to the goal is not to be measured! Of what importance are weeks, months, years?”

“But what if I have to break off halfway?” I asked.

“Once you have grown truly egoless you can break off at any time. Keep on practising that.”

Zen, which grew within the Mahayana stream, reflects this spirit of non-standardization. It resists being carved into fixed formulas. Instead of clinging to texts or doctrines, Zen points directly to experience: the sound of the wind, the rustle of a leaf, the ordinariness of attention. Where Theravada often emphasizes preservation, Zen emphasizes immediacy.

This brings us to Ikkyu, the great iconoclastic Zen master. A man once asked him to write down a maxim of the highest wisdom. Ikkyu took up his brush and wrote a single word: Attention.
The man frowned. “Is that all?”
Ikkyu calmly wrote again: Attention. Attention.
The man, now irritated, said, “I don’t see much depth in what you’ve written.”
So Ikkyu wrote a third time: Attention. Attention. Attention.
Exasperated, the man demanded, “What does this word mean, anyway?”
Ikkyu replied gently: “Attention means attention.”

The story is deceptively simple, but it cuts to the heart of Zen. Wisdom is not hidden in elaborate doctrines or clever formulas. It is in the quality of our attention—to breath, to thought, to the rustle of a leaf, to the ordinariness of life. And yet, being attentive cannot be taught by anyone.

The breath, after all, never counts itself. It just rises and falls. And in that endless, unmeasured rhythm—from the very first inhalation at our birth to the last exhalation at our death—everything is already complete.

Vanaprastha for Our Times: On Burnout, Busyness, and the Third Path

Vanaprastha for Our Times: On Burnout, Busyness, and the Third Path

by | Oct 12, 2025 | Career, Change, Harmony, Joy, Life, Peace, STRESS, Transformation, Zen

When M@@@@Lee first arrived at our zendo, I was struck by his quiet discipline. Middle‑aged, yet carrying the vitality of someone twenty years younger, he never missed a single zazen session. He spoke little, preferring to rest his gaze on forests, hills, and waterfalls rather than books. Only later did I learn of his past: 18 years in the United States as a chartered accountant, often working eighteen‑hour days in investment banks, living in luxury until burnout forced a reckoning.

For the last One and half decades, he has lived like a nomad, frugal and free. He speaks of happiness and contentment not as achievements, but as discoveries. His story is a living commentary on Byung‑Chul Han’s The Burnout Society. Han, another son of Korea, describes how the achievement society—with its relentless drive to optimize, perform, and succeed—leads not to freedom but to exhaustion. He contrasts deep attention, the contemplative focus that gave rise to philosophy and art, with hyperattention, the restless scattering of the mind across endless stimuli. In losing boredom and silence, Han warns, we lose the very conditions for renewal.

Lee embodies the medicine Han prescribes. His burnout was the breaking point Han diagnoses. His nomadic simplicity is the refusal of the achievement society. His steady zazen restores the deep attention Han says we have lost. His gaze on forests and waterfalls is a return to what Han calls the contemplative dwelling that modernity has abandoned.

And then there is Gopal, a respected corporate leader who recently reflected on his own transition into retirement. Quoting his father, he wrote: “To catch a train that has already started, you may have to run alongside it before jumping in.” It is a wise metaphor for transitions, yet it also reveals the subtle compulsion many of us feel—to keep running, to keep filling life with activity, even when the train we are chasing may not be ours to board.

In observing these two paths—Lee’s and Gopal’s—we see a fundamental dichotomy in how we face life’s transitions. On one end lies the person who is totally burnt out… On the other, the person who, even after a great innings…

So it is safe to assume there are two kinds of people out there. The exhausted renouncer and the restless achiever. One who feels totally burnt out and want nothing to do with it. For him, emptying his mind about anything about it is what makes the rest of his life worthwhile. While the other, after a great innings and having done brilliantly well in his chosen profession, still is eager to jump into the next train of achievement. After reaching the top of the pyramid, why the eagerness, why the worry about the next phase of productivity? Monetary considerations of worry about a lesser lifestyle may not be the reasons. If one is intended to use their great expertise and knowledge of serving the mankind for the rest of their life after a great fist innings, may not get that wary about what s/he will be doing with their time. Being not comfortable about not being in limelight, could be one. Or maybe it is due to the worry about how to be with the void /emptiness in their life.

Even if  they worry about the next innings for none of the above mentioned reasons and it is just for timepass, when we call it timepass—scrolling reels, flipping channels, or filling the calendar with trivialities—it is rarely innocent. Beneath the surface lies the same movement: the fear of the void.

We are uneasy with silence, with the space where applause fades and identity loosens. So we keep ourselves busy, not because the activity nourishes us, but because it shields us from emptiness.

But as Krishnamurti reminds us, emptiness is not a defect to be patched over. It is a doorway. When we stop trying to fill it, the void reveals itself as fullness—alive with creativity, compassion, and presence.

The real courage is not in passing time, but in letting time pass through us, unresisted.

Here, Pascal’s old warning rings true: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Whether it is the youth endlessly scrolling through reels, the middle‑ager flipping through channels, or the retiree rushing to fill the calendar, the root is the same: our discomfort with stillness.

Krishnamurti went even deeper. He observed that as long as the mind is seeking to fill its emptiness, it will remain empty. We try to fill the void with activity, possessions, relationships, or applause, but this only perpetuates the sense of lack. He wrote: “As long as the mind is seeking to fill itself, it will always be empty. When the mind is no longer concerned with filling its own emptiness, then only does that emptiness cease to be.”

For Krishnamurti, emptiness is not a defect to be patched over, but a doorway. “In emptiness alone can there be creation,” he said. When the mind stops running, stops filling, stops chasing trains, it discovers a silence that is not absence but presence. From that silence, something new can be born—innocence, creativity, compassion.

This is the crucial distinction:

  • To fill hunger is natural, necessary, life‑sustaining.
  • To fill psychological emptiness is endless, and often destructive.

When activity arises from genuine need or from the joy of service, it nourishes. When it arises from fear of silence or the craving for applause, it drains.

Zen would call this the great death of the striving self. And in that death, a new life appears—one that needs little, yet feels complete.

In the ancient Indian worldview, Vānaprastha—the stage of “going to the forest”—was not only for ordinary householders but also for kings and emperors, who were expected to renounce power and wealth at their peak and turn toward contemplation. King Bharata, after whom Bhārat (India) is named, is one of the most striking examples: he gave up his throne and retreated into the forest to seek liberation.

Today, the forest may not be a literal place, but a state of mind—an inner withdrawal from applause and limelight into presence.

Between the exhausted renouncer and the restless achiever, there are a few rare ones who discover meaning early and live it seamlessly until their last breath. For them, life is not about applause or limelight, nor about withdrawal in exhaustion. Their work itself is their prayer, their service, their offering.

Saba Naqvi once wrote of Mallikarjun Mansur, the saintly Hindustani vocalist from Dharwar. Stricken with lung cancer, doctors had given up. His daughter was told not to deny him the things he loved most. In his final moments, he asked for a bidi, and as he drew on it, he was still humming Raga Jogiya, almost inaudibly. With the raga on his lips, his head rolled over, and he was gone. His art was his final breath.

Another story is told of Abdul Karim Khan, founder of the Kirana gharana. On his way to Puducherry to sing for Sri Aurobindo, he sensed his end was near. He stepped off the train at an unknown station, spread out his prayer mat, and sang his last song. He died there on the platform. He did not board the next train of achievement—he stepped off, to let music itself carry him across.

And I see the same spirit in my own Zen master, Fr. AMA Samy. At ninety, he still sends emails at 3:30 a.m. with reflections, still walks into the zendo for early morning meditation. His life is not about filling time or clinging to relevance. It is about continuity of presence, a rhythm of practice that does not retire.

These lives remind us that there is a third path: not renunciation in exhaustion, not striving for the next platform, but a life so deeply rooted in one’s calling that even the final breath is an act of practice, art, or service. For them, there is only one train—the train to eternity.

In the end, whether we are young and restless, middle‑aged and distracted, or retired and still wary of leaving the limelight, the invitation is the same: to stop running, to stop filling, to sit still. The rishis called it Vānaprastha. Han calls it deep attention. Pascal calls it the courage to sit quietly. Krishnamurti calls it the doorway of emptiness. Zen calls it the great death of the striving self. Many names, one truth: the train we most need to catch is not out there on the tracks—it is already here, in the stillness of this very moment.

Truly, We Are What We Are When No One Else Is Watching…

Truly, We Are What We Are When No One Else Is Watching…

by | Oct 8, 2025 | Integrity, Leadershipwithintegrity, Life, Livingwithawareness, RElationship, STRESS

Almost all our problems stem from lack of congruence—lack of integrity. When we are torn between two pieces—the inner voice that knows what is true for us, and the outer mask that seeks approval, recognition, or safety—conflict is the result.

we live in tension. That tension is exhausting. It breeds anxiety, self‑doubt, and the constant feeling of being “out of place” even in our own lives

long-time back, in 1998, I was visiting California. My close friends James Mathew and Komal Jain were working in San Jose then. Unni and I flew in. We were planning to drive down to LA through Highway 1 along the Pacific coast, with a pit stop in Big Sur. I just wanted to see the Esalen Institute. During those times, I was trying to get into a good MBA school. (Though I did land in one of the second‑tier schools then, I did not pursue for want of money.)

James, Unni and I drove down to Stanford. They had asked me to visit the campus and assigned a current student to walk me through. Our host was a Catholic priest from New Zealand, working in the Vatican. One question I had was with respect to our essays and recommendations. I asked him, “Do prospective students write their own recommendations?” He replied, “It is possible. But integrity is for ourselves. We are what we are when no one is watching.”

That learning stayed with me. Integrity is not a social quality—it is a personal one. It cannot be enforced on another, nor can it be measured by applause or recognition. It is the quiet covenant we keep with ourselves, the alignment between our inner compass and our actions when no one else will ever know. Social morality may depend on rules and consequences, but integrity begins where rules end.

And here lies the connection with judgment. Much of our inner conflict comes from the masks we wear in society—performing, projecting, seeking approval. The dichotomy between the self we show and the self we hide creates unease. The Bible says, “Do not judge, and you will not be judged.” That begins with ourselves. The moment we stop judging ourselves, we stop performing for the world’s imagined gaze. We no longer live for recognition, vanity, or pride. Instead, we begin to live from our truest center, where integrity burns like a steady flame—unseen, yet unwavering.

Integrity, then, is not about morality in the social sense, but about wholeness. The word itself comes from integer—to be whole, undivided. When we are congruent, when what we think, feel, and do are aligned, there is a natural ease. Life flows.

And this is where judgment comes in. The moment we judge ourselves, we split ourselves in two: the one who acts, and the one who criticizes. That inner division is the seed of suffering. When we stop judging—even ourselves—we stop tearing ourselves apart. We return to wholeness.

So in a way:  Lack of congruence = lack of integrity = inner division.

Integrity = congruence = wholeness.

And wholeness is freedom. It is the state where we no longer need to perform, defend, or seek applause. We simply are.

After , Thara and I came back to India from the USA ( now disUnited Empire of Trump !)  , we decided to settle down in Kanakapura road. Closer to a Krishnamurti school. Our children, Manu and Rishi were students there and Thara a Teacher and I was a frequent visitor at the KFI study center. I used to be very regular for the monthly study sessions ( first  Sunday of every month). Once, as I was getting ready for the monthly study session, my son Manu asked me where I was going. I said, ‘KFI study centre.’ He looked at me and said, like a young Socrates or UG Krishnamurti: ‘You people are going to talk about things you don’t know. At that point of time, I might have read almost all the books of Krishnamurti ( infact the late Dr. Satish Inamdar used to tell me half seriously and half-jokingly , that when I stopped reading , I will understand JK better.), I also used to be a regular visitor of UG whenever he used to visit Blr. But that question of Manu was like a thunder bolt. And set my own inner enquiry of what do I know about  it . May be , that kind of took me to a full time MA Education course at APU , where I chose courses like Phenomenology , Epistemology etc.  That kind of helped me to read between the lines, whenever someone else , “usually a know all gas bag types”, yap about spirituality.  Whenever I used to write, I stopped being an interpreter of those great knowledge . Rather I started sharing my own inner travels and experiences.  Many of them of insecurity, brokenness, helplessness and what little I understood from my own seeking. But one thing, I ensured, is I spoke what I thought and felt.  Many a times, that got me thrown out of my jobs, ended good relationships, and put myself under the bus.  But still I thought I was being what I am. Some of those who broke away , came back to my life and those relationships were stronger. Some of those ended and I thought that was the way it is.

That thunderbolt from Manu deepened my inquiry into what I truly knew, and it prepared me for the uncompromising honesty I would later encounter with my Zen master, Fr. AMA. That seed of integrity, planted in me by a Catholic priest in California, found its full flowering years later under the guidance of another Jesuit Priest and my Zen master, Fr. AMA. Fr. AMA who is also my Zen Master and Mentor.   Over the last 12 years , after being accepted as a student , I would have asked him more than 1000 questions. And especially during the last 3 years, when I became a resident at Kanzeon Zendo and his assistant.  Many of them were very provocative and came from my ego , “all knowing” arrogant self.  Many were in Dokusan 1 -1 interviews and many during our open  Q &A session at the Zendo hall. Infact Dr. Meath Conlan a Sangha member from Australia wrote in his memoir that “His thoughtful questions during evening sangha sessions with the Master leave me dumbfounded. I admire his comprehension of Zen and his courage in asking questions. I sense that often Vishy voices exactly what the rest of others were wondering but hadn’t found words or forthrightness to express.”  Fr. AMA  He always answered with the same calmness and smile. Not once he had flinched. Some the questions he said he does not know. And some of them, even personal ones, he answered honestly. The questions including in the problems with religions, sexuality, greed and anything under the sun.

His unwavering calm in the face of my ‘arrogant self’ and provocative questions embodies the very wholeness I was seeking. He didn’t need to perform the role of an ‘all-knowing’ master. By sometimes saying “I do not know” and always answering honestly, he modeled the integrity I was looking for He was a living example of a person who is no longer torn between pieces, who has dissolved the inner critic, and who operates from that “truest center.”

And that is the ultimate lesson in spiritual seeking I learnt. 

Living an ordinary life of compassion and service, with integrity, is the Way. Not elsewhere, not in some other world, but here. As Hakuin Zenji wrote: ‘This very body is Buddha, this very land is lotus land

The Crane That Could Not Lift and the Compassion Shift

The Crane That Could Not Lift and the Compassion Shift

by | Sep 29, 2025 | Change, Compassion, Grief, Joy, Meditation, Peace, RElationship, STRESS, Transformation, Zen

Yesterday night, was on my way to Bangalore from Kanzeon Zendo, Perumalmalai. The KSRTC Volvo semi sleeper  bus stopped in the middle of nowhere. At first I thought , it was a momentary halt. But then as it lingered on  A, most of the passengers stepped down from the bus to look for the cause of block on the ghat road. I continued to read Mother Mary comes to me. Then Driver Krishnappa , came back and asked me to go and see. There was a mini truck off the road, almost landed perfectly on all four.

 Krishnappa, the ace KSRTC driver is one of my new found friends from my sojourn to  Perumalmalai over the last three years.  For the first two years, I had made a monthly trip of. Blr- Kodai- Blr  and since last December. It is. Kodai-Blr- Kodai.  Mostly on Sunday to Friday  or Friday to Sunday.  And most of these days, drivers were  Krishnappa, Girisha and  Sunmadhappa ….  I used to get down at Perumalmalai some 13 km away from Kodaikanal , the bus stand.  Though my initial interactions with them was just friendly courteous smiles and a thank you as I stepped off from the bus.  It was Krishnappa who broke the ice.  Once while having early morning coffee at that way side coffee shop during a pitstop, he asked me what I am doing at that place , making so may visits.  And when I shared about Zendo and Zen, he  told me with a hearty laugh, that they thought I am a drug carrier from Blr.  Especially since I used to travel lightly and used to get down before the check post and town limits.

From then onwards, those coffee became on the house for me. If Krishnappa was the driver,  he used to announce to them,  Nammavaru to the coffee “barrista”  which roughly translates. “ He is one of us”.

He was a very interesting character. One who took immense pride in being one of the really early Volvo bus drivers in Karnataka.  He told me that. It was Karnataka RTC which bought Volvo buses first in India and they  had put their best drivers for that fleet.  And I have heard that story from him quite a number of times.

So when a Pilot of an aero plane, a Captain of a ship and driver of your bus, tell you something, you think twice, or at times thrice before saying a  reason to say know. So I got down from the bus and made my way to that  accident spot. Just  10 – 20 meters ahead. 

 I was told, the driver had passed away on the spot. May be yesterday afternoon. Truck went down and the driver’s soul up. Since the truck load was fruits, the owner had send a crane to lift the truck. Looking at the crane, Krishnappa told me that , that crane wont be able to life the truck with the fruit load. And after more than 1 1/2 hour of effort , those workers to agreed and gave up. On our walk back to bus, Krishnappa told me that many a times, driver die due to heart attacks. ANd accoding to him, that is a better way than live on with pain and severe injiruies. ! Neither i agreed nor disagreed with him. Our journey to Bangalore continued. MAy be that scene was playing up in my mind. When i landed in Bangalore home , very early morning, there in Linkedin popped up a advt brochure on Compassion Shift. An org i had worked ( ?) earlier is part of that program. and i had to type in the below comment. During the last part of my tenure over there, i was in deep depression. My otherwise friendly Tinnitus had turned into a monster in my brain and ate away, my sleep, my wakefulness, peace of mind, joy and hunger and tears. Dont know which crane was able to pull me out of that abyss. But i too landed on all four in Zendo on the Way. On reaching home, went with Thara for our breakfast at The Rameshwaram Cafe… Thara was talking about their new joint named Thirtha in Cunnigham road. May be there was too much butter on that crispy rava dosa. I slept again and woke up for lunch.. 🙂 Pls find below my comment without further comments. Shift / transformation is not a one time act . One constantly and consciously need to be aware and keep working on it. Often reflecting on the past does help. reflecting on the past is crucial. This is wise reflection (yoniso manasikara). We look back not with guilt or pride, but as a scientist studies data: · “In that moment of irritation, where was my compassion?” · “When I acted kindly, what was the true motive? Was it free from the ‘passion’ for gratitude or recognition?” · “How did that word or mindless act of mine land on the other person?” This reflection isn’t dwelling; it’s learning to do better next time. It’s how we polish the lens of our understanding and make the “compassion shift” more accessible, more instantaneous, in the next moment of interaction. And what is a butcher’s compassion . Is it towards the animal or the knife as in Daoist parable of Cook Ding . And who are we in the parable! The animal, knife or Cook Ding ??? From someone who was on the receiving end of compassion…😀

On second thoughts,  I feel  compassion is not about choosing between the animal, the knife, or Cook Ding. it is about seeing that in each moment, we are all three—cutting, being cut, and learning to move with the grain of life. And in that realisation , the shift happens quietly without needing an external prompt, like a bus resuming its journey after a long halt on the ghat road. In the end, the truck stayed where it was, the crane gave up, and the bus rolled on. Life too moves like that—sometimes stuck, sometimes lifted, sometimes simply continuing. What matters is whether compassion travels with us. I don’t know which crane lifted me from my own abyss, or which hand steadied me when I landed on all four.

But I know this: each time I pause to reflect, compassion becomes a little more available, a little more natural. And that, perhaps, is the real shift.

Also the true crane is not outside us at all, but that  quiet strength, boot strap program written in us by that great intelligence  lifts us, again and again, into the next step of the Way.

Half‑Way Up the Mountain: Heights, Depths, and the Twilight Way

Half‑Way Up the Mountain: Heights, Depths, and the Twilight Way

by | Sep 13, 2025 | Change, Harmony, Joy, Meditation, STRESS, Zen

 

John Moriarty  wrote in Dreamtime :

“It is like setting up a ladder against a rock wall by a lake. The lake mirrors your ascent as a descent. And so, thinking that I was ready for the Heights when I wasn’t simultaneously ready for the depths, that was my catastrophe, that was the avalanche I set off, looking ever upwards, on the Mount of Perfection. It carried me down into a Deep below all depths.”

And C.G. Jung, put that in better psychological perspective :

“Nobody can fall so low unless he has a great depth. If such a thing can happen to a man, it challenges his best and highest on the other side; that is to say, this depth corresponds to a potential height, and the blackest darkness to a hidden light.”

Two voices, two views— yet they meet in the same archetypal truth: the vertical axis of human experience is not one‑way. Every genuine ascent carries its shadow‑descent, and every plunge into darkness contains the seed of a corresponding light.

Mariana Kaplan, in her Halfway Up the Mountain  wrote of false claims to attainment. But the phrase reaches further than the problem of fake gurus and faker anti gurus and everyone else in between— it speaks to all of us. We are always, in some sense, halfway up the mountain. The summit is not a fixed point of eternal bliss, as some traditions promise. As we climb, the mountain itself rises.

The Greek philosopher Zeno hinted at this in his paradox: each time we move toward our goal, we can only cover half the remaining distance. Theoretically, we never arrive. The closer we get, the more the horizon recedes.

Buddhist teaching offers a similar lens: everything in this universe — you, me, the tree outside, the big rock near the Kanzeon Zendo waterfall, the distant mountain, the drifting clouds — is a process, not a finished product. There is no final arrival. The moment of arrival is already a moment of departure. In truth, we are always at the twilight of arriving and leaving, like the early morning and evening when sun and moon share the same sky.

And here, the metaphor meets the science: twilight is not when the Sun “shines most.” In fact, the Sun is below the horizon, its light reaching us only indirectly, scattered through the upper atmosphere. It is a softer, more diffused light — the “blue hour” photographers love — neither the full blaze of midday nor the darkness of night. This is why twilight is such a fitting image for the spiritual path: it is a time of transition, of partial illumination, of seeing enough to walk on, but never so much that all shadows vanish.

Many mistake spiritual progress for a straight, one‑way road. We imagine it as a steady climb, step after step, always forward. But the lived truth is far less linear. Sometimes it is one step forward, two steps back. Sometimes two steps forward, one step back. The rhythm is irregular, the pace unpredictable.

When we trudge toward the light, we do not leave the darkness behind; we carry it with us. The shadow is not an obstacle we “overcome” once and for all — it is a companion, a counterweight, a reminder. Light and shadow are not separate territories but a continuous spectrum, each shading into the other.

The movement is often like a pendulum swinging toward the light. But unlike a physical pendulum, the swing is not symmetric. The arc toward illumination may be long and slow, the return into shadow sudden and steep — or the reverse. The asymmetry is part of the work.

Dr. Kaustav Roy taught us phenomenology at APU, and one of the books he insisted we must read was R.D. Laing’s The Politics of Experience. That book held a distilled essence of human nature — a wisdom phrase to cherish in almost every paragraph. But one quote that stayed with me is:

“A good man is aware of what is not good in him, while a bad man is not.”

Awareness of the shadow is not a flaw in the journey; it is the journey. To see what is not yet whole in us is already to stand in the light. To deny it is to remain in darkness, even if our words and gestures point upward.

Moriarty’s mirrored ladder and Jung’s law of correspondence remind us that readiness for the heights is inseparable from readiness for the depths. To prepare for one without the other is to court collapse. The avalanche Moriarty speaks of is not a moral failure; it is the psyche’s way of restoring symmetry.

And so, halfway up the mountain is not a place of shame — it is the only place there is. The climb is endless, the summit ever‑rising, the path a dance between ascent and descent, light and shadow, arrival and departure. The measure of progress is not how far we have climbed, but how honestly we can stand in both light and darkness, in both coming and going, without losing our balance.

Perhaps this is why the old traditions speak of Great Doubt alongside Great Faith. The lake and the ladder, the light and the darkness, the ascent and the descent, the dawn and the dusk — they are not two journeys, but one.

In the end, the Way is not about reaching the top, nor about avoiding the fall. It is about walking with the mountain as it rises beneath our feet, with the lake reflecting both our ascent and our descent, with the twilight sky holding both sun and moon. Arrival and departure are the same step.

And in that step, the journey is complete — even as it begins again.

 

 

Karpov’s World championships in Thenkara

Karpov’s World championships in Thenkara

by | Dec 15, 2024 | Empathy, Peace, Sports, STRESS, Uncategorized

Maybe I might have been just around 4.5 years old.  Might have been a troublemaker for my parents. They chose to edit my Date of birth by 6 months so that I started going to school. 1st standard in ALP School Mannarkkad. One evening my father got a chess board in Mannarkkad and he taught me the moves.  On the very first game, I happen to win.  That might have boosted the early ego of a very young boy.  It took me some 30 more years to understand, my late father Sankara was a great parent and that was his way of motivating his son.  I too chose to lose games, when I was teaching my sons Manu and Rishi the rules of chess game.

 Soon we moved to Thenkara, a small village on the road to Silent Valley national park. There me and my brother Sasi went to a Govt Upper primary school. A good 2 – 2.5 km walk from our home. There was no electricity there in when we moved.  As I had shared , the village was closer to Silent Valley national park. And people out there, protested and stopped a hydroelectric project across Kunthipuzha river in Silent Valley national park. So KSEB wanted to punish us for that transgression. It took a long constant fight with the authorities med by my father to ensure  the village got electricity. By then I was at 7th standard. Though the school did have big ground, it was uneven and there was an old dilapidated open well in one corner of the ground. So we were allowed to play only during PT hours supervised by teachers.   Leave alone other organized games such as football etc., the school did not have even a proper urinal those days.  But Sasi and me tried to make that up in our neighborhood in our own innovative ways.  A few years back, someone who lived there during those times had written a FB post, in which he narrated, how two Kannadiga boys brought the game of Cricket to Thenkara.  And someone else posted the inauguration of electricity connection in Thenkara, where my father was speaking. 

But this isn’t about him. This is about the Chess rivalry between Sasi and Me. Those were the days of Karpov and later Kasparov came to picture. There were no Indian greats in the game of Chess before Vishy Anand. There was one Pravin Thipsay and another Divyendu Barua if I remember rightly. What I remember absolutely is we, Sasi and I got to toss to decide who is going to be Karpov. And then started our best of 5, 7 or 9 game series.  Usually, it came after my mother’s warning. No more fights. But the great World Championship in Thenkara always ended in major fight. My father had bought us a chess book in Malayalam, which had rules of games plus a few opening, middle and end game strategies.  And the fight was always started by the player who was losing against Karpov.  Sometimes me and most of the times by Sasi.  There would be a challenge on legality of some move. Since there were no FIDE referees to oversee, that book was our judge and jury.  But then it never ended in a proper judicial process. One of us , the losing side, will throw the board and pieces and would storm off.  And my mother, strict disciplinarian as she was, would ensure the probable winner, to collect the pieces and board and keep it back. And winner too cried while collecting the chess pieces, like Gukesh did when he won the World Championship recently, but mostly in pain.

As we grew up, our Chess rivalry ended and the passion for the game too. Much later, I tried to teach Manu the game rules. Manu was much smarter than I was and he picked up the game quite fast.  But then, I was not as good as a parent like my father. After one game, he stormed out and there ended the chess coaching.

Much later, after he had moved to Jindal for his graduation, we noticed, he always used to play in his phone… While he is travelling with us or even at dining tables.   Yesterday morning, he came with me to Little Flower Zendo. He wanted to see for himself, where his Papa is going to live for the rest of his life. And I had plans to take him out and show around Kodai Kanal. But it was raining so heavily here, the Little Flower Zendo waterfalls was roaring like Niagra and we could not even spot the nearby mountain due to mist. We stayed indoor. And he was into his chess.com.  I was watching him play for some time. And after the game, he was telling me about how it works.  He has a very good rating, which means quite an Advanced player. And in Chess.com 2000+ means a GM. I was quite impressed, and I was pushing him to go to tourneys etc. and how it can translate to building a good portfolio for him to apply for his MBAs.  But the boy had Zen like clarity. HE told me the difference between 1800 and 2000 in Chess is like the small mountain in front of our Zendo and Mt Everest.  In Chess, you improve your rating only beating players with a higher rating than yours.  And it is not easy. Secondly, he plays Chess as a de-stressor.   If one start playing it seriously, it really ends up as a stressful act. It is not easy.

 

Then he talked about the recent World championships. He was following every game minute by minute in Chess.com. He pointed out to me, how Ding was crestfallen immediately a microsecond later after he made a bad move and how Gukesh was crying as if to let go of the tension after winning the crown.  According to him Ding Liren too have a very good name in Chess circle as a gentleman and good human being. He seems to have faced server mental health issues and he kind of stopped playing Chess, which had hit his ELO rating badly. People were expecting him to not to even come for the final match. And he did show up and played very resiliently.  May be if he was fully ok, he might have won again too.

The second point he shared was much more incisive. He said “Ding is almost like V Anand.  He is one of the first player form China to play in Candidates or Chess final like V Anand from India.   Gukesh had the guidance from  Anand , being trained with him at WACA.  And in Chess, the advice and inputs matters a lot, while it is important to recall those inputs at the right moment.”

After that, he slept, and I did not. I started googling on Ding Liren. As someone who had suffered depression and who was on the verge of an abyss, for me, both he and Gukesh were Karpovs. The player with the black pieces was/is black shade of our own mind.  

Just a few months back Chessbase reported, “The Ding Liren of a few years ago, who reached a fantastic 2816 Elo, may not return. This is in the Chinese player’s own words, but what happened and what does this mean for the forthcoming title match? The opinions and rumor mill have been in full swing, and everyone, and we do mean everyone, has an opinion.In January 2023, the World Champion’s rating was still at a fantastic 2811, second only to Magnus Carlsen, but things have taken on a dark and dire drop and in the latest list he has plummeted to 2728.”

And in another interview with a German news paper he says and I quote , “

Normally, a title like this boosts the ego. You feel great. It was different for you. You fell into a deep hole and were away for months.

I had a few problems, that’s true. I was exhausted, but I still couldn’t sleep very well. That led to depression. I was treated twice in a clinic. Fortunately, things are slowly getting better again. Chess is mentally exhausting – and if you can’t sleep well, that’s fatal. At least I’ve been able to reduce my tablets from four a day to one at the moment.

Are you the sensitive type? It was also said that you cried after winning the title.

Yes, the world championship duel lasted so long and was so exhausting. I did my best and after winning the title I thought about all the work I had done before the competition. The emotions and memories overwhelmed me. That’s why I had to cry.

You are surprisingly open about your feelings. Doesn’t a professional athlete have to be tough on themselves and others?

I was probably so tough before I had my mental problems. That’s why I suddenly showed emotions. Now I’m trying to become more balanced again. I now also have a doctor who helps me mentally. I discuss all sorts of things with him. I don’t have a mental coach like the table tennis players, who prepares you for the things that are relevant to the game.”

Today morning, it was all bright Sun shine here at Kodai, though the wind was more chillier. Manu and I went to outing with Prakash our Zendo manager. As  Prakash was talking about the Suicide point , between 3 pillar rocks and Guna Caves, Manu was asking him, why would people want to kill by jumping into the abyss from there.

I told him , from a first person account, that when people gets severely depressed, they first jump into the deep abysses of their own mind.  Only when they are not able to get them out of that place, they jump here.  In the games inside our mind, where our dark side plays against us, no Sicilian or Slav  defences work against it.

For those who survive, by getting out of that abyss in their minds, usually have sound Seconds , in the form of good dear and near and Doctors.

As we were heading back home, in the FB page of  FIDE  there was a quote from Ding. “ I  think I played my best tournament of the year.  It could be better, but considering yesterday’s  lucky survive it is a fair result to lose in the end. I have no regrets.”

While, I feel so proud of Gukesh as a fellow country man winning such a great accolade at the world stage at such a young age,  what bring real smile in my heart, when a fellow human being , win against himself in the arena of his own mind.

No world championship is worth that much, when we we successfully turn our back towards   those  low points, including suicide points to face life and live on…

 

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