Throughout human history we’ve never had so much stuff in abundance that we would voluntarily choose to have any less than we can get. Given the chance, it’s in our nature to take everything we can for the sake of survival. But in modern times, taking has gone way beyond the necessities of food and shelter, and…
For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been trying hard to not log on my laptop everyday like I used to, and enjoy my time offline a little more. So the other day, when I sat down to relax but found a slew of comments from people informing me that I had a spam post…
My first time in a kimono Today is my birthday. A whole year has passed since I wrote my first birthday post on this blog. I remember it was just turning midnight when I sat down, took a deep breath and wondered, what in the world will this year bring? Little did I know, the…
Just outside my window, a beautiful clock tower chimes softly every hour. To me, it’s a bell for mindfulness. A reminder that time is passing, and that I should not waste a moment of it. The things that seem like a big deal now, one day I shall forget about them, and realise the things that…
What good can come from a mere toothache? As I have recently experienced, there are a few life lessons to be learned from a small (yet extremely painful) toothache. A few summers back, when I stayed in Plum Village, the monastary of the famous monk Thich Nhat Hanh, there was one day when he made…
In part 1, I discussed Minimalism and Zen Philosophy. This is part 2 of 2 of ‘Zen and the Art of Minimalism’ where I explore the connection between minimalism and art. What does the word ‘art’ really mean? People can spend years answering this question. Quite obviously, it doesn’t purely mean paintings and sculptures. The…
So you’ve pared and pared and pared. You got rid of most of your stuff and you stopped buying what you didn’t need. It was hard work, and it took years, but now you only own the essentials. Congratulations, you’re a minimalist, now what? Do you just sit in your minimalist apartment/travel van/atop your only suitcase, twiddle…
What does it mean to love? To love is to care. To care about something, to care for someone, to appreciate its importance in your life and to be grateful for it. Unfortunately, there are a lot of things that we say we love and care about, but we don’t act upon it. Life gets…
When I started this blog back in 2009, I was on my way to college and living away for the first time. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with my life. I only had a vague idea that I wanted to enjoy it, whatever that might mean. Eventually I came to understand…
What do the most successful men and women in history all have in common? Not all of them were smart, or good looking, or had either poor or wealthy backgrounds. They weren’t all gifted from birth, or went to college, or happened to be in the right time and place. They were from all walks…