The fear of death used to keep me up at night. I wondered what it would be like to live forever. Imagine, the first thirty years of your life, you’re young and naïve. You make friends, go to college, and learn about the world. In the next fifty years you get a job, you travel, you have a…
“I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest“. ~ Dalai Lama Into the Eye of the Storm A storm is coming. Thick, dark clouds are gathering in the distance, rolling closer and closer towards you. The echo of a deep rumbling shakes the ground beneath your feet. Lightening pierces the sky…
It is far more impressive when others discover you good qualities without your help. ~ Judith Martin Every time you meet someone new for the first time, you have one chance to make a good impression. In the first few minutes, an image of who you are is already formed in your acquaintance’s mind. Naturally, you want…
So you’ve arrived. Now everything you own is piled up in your room, ready for you to unpack. Here are some tips on how to do it in the least time possible, so that you have the most time possible to socialise with your new room-mates. 1. Keep everything in out of the way in…
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…