If Time Stood Still

There is a place where time stands still.

Raindrops hang motionless in air. Pendulums

of clocks float mid-swing. Dogs raise

their muzzles in silent howls. Pedestrians

are frozen on the dusty streets, their legs

cocked as if held by strings. The aromas of

dates, mangoes, coriander, cumin are suspended

in space.

As a traveler approaches this place from

any direction, he moves more and more

Taming the Emotions

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers 

within yourself that you have built against it   

-Rumi

They say happiness comes from within. They say it's created there - within. They say it's self-triggered. If we haven't figured out how to trigger the creation of happiness from within, it's only because we don't know where to look. We don't know how to look. They say it's the same for all human emotions, positive and negative. They are all triggered and created within.

Beneath Your Feet

HAD I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with the golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and half-light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams beneath your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams...

-William Butler Yeats

One year ago today I was preparing to send admissions essays and recommendation letters to various MBA programs. It never happened. I dropped it all and changed course to embark on a different path. It was not easy, especially when facing so much resistance from people around me -- even from those closest to me. We all have an opinion on how others should conduct their lives. But learning to yield and embrace the dreams of others may be the better way. In fact, I'll put it a bit more honestly: it is the better way.

The Way of Grace

The nuns taught us there were two ways through life - the way of nature 

and the way of grace. You have to choose which one you'll follow.

I've never written a movie critique before, but after watching the Tree of Life for a third time, I'm feeling particularly inspired. Sure there are many movies that some people like and some people don't (i.e. Saw VI), but never before have I experienced such a radical degree of polarization over a film. After arriving home from the second viewing, a neighbor staunchly commented that it was the worst movie she had ever seen. How's that for a movie review? Other people I know have snored their way through it and even left the movie theater in extreme consternation - partly because the theater staff wouldn't provide a refund. On the other hand, there is a certain type of people that has been moved to tears and profoundly affected by the emotional and existential significance of the subject matter. But how can this extreme contrast exist? How is it possible that we lie on such opposite ends of the spectrum of internal experience? I use the term experience because even if one doesn't understand the film the first time through, one is still capable of feeling its effect.

In other words, you don't have to fully understand it to be significantly moved. But how are we being moved exactly? What aspect of us is being moved? Could it be worthwhile to explore this? Could it be worthwhile to find out how to access this state more often? So what exactly is this state (for lack of a better term)?

Meditation: How to do it

Chaos is a friend of mine

-Bob Dylan

Before traveling to Thailand to learn meditation, I had no idea that my friends and family would be interested in ever practicing it. Since that trip however, I've had the pleasure of showing it to loved ones in various cities, including new friends here at Harvard and MIT. We are all motivated to learn meditation by something, perhaps curiosity at first, perhaps because we feel there is something missing from the way in which we experience daily life, perhaps we've come across a significant life event that becomes unmanageable, or perhaps it's due to something else. Whatever your motivation, below are a set of simple instructions (as simple as I could make them) that will show meditation to anyone willing to spare 5 minutes of their day.

I hope you find it useful.

The Grandest Illusion

The great obstacle is always the representation and never the reality

- Etty Hillesum

Preconceptions and misconceptions have engulfed the concept of meditation. Some people believe it's tied to Buddhism and cannot be detached from archaic supernatural beliefs. Others believe it's simply a tool to relax and reduce rampant stress levels in the mind and body. Still others who ponder it a bit more deeply - though still erroneously - argue that it detracts from our very human ability to experience the full spectrum of emotions. One common theme seems to unite the people who believe any or all of these things however - none of them have ever truly meditated. So what is it really about then?

It is about dispelling an illusion - the illusion that our subjective experiences are equivalent to objective reality.  

Say what?

Opening the Mind

Know Thyself

- engraved at the Temple of Apollo at Delphi

Many civilizations have regarded self-knowledge as the catalyst and indicator of wisdom. The path to self-knowledge is self-examination, but that is no longer a component of our education system as it once was. This is unfortunate by any account. In our modern westernized world, self-examination seems to have been limited to the areas of interpersonal counseling and few others.