“Bed is for sleeping.”

I almost chuckled when I first heard it. My teacher a Buddhist nun and I were discussing sleeping problems and the solution from her seemed too simple.

Any day that I have a relaxing afternoon tea time with good company is a good day. Boiling water, choosing tea and matching cups to go with it, adjusting the water temperature, pausing for a few minutes before enjoying a cup of hot tea over a pleasant conversation is a petit ritual and it does wonders in one’s life.

This is a story I heard that impelled me to ruminate on what fairness is in life.

There was a brother and a sister whose mother had passed away when they were young. After some time, the father also left home, completely abandoning them. They grew up from one relative's place to another relative's believing that they had nobody else but only each other to rely on in the world.

2022 has finally commenced. To be precise, the year of the Tiger(寅), the first year of the 12 zodiac signs begins on the 1st of February according to the lunar calendar this year.

When I first met Musim, I couldn't help but think of the old portrait of a beauty painted by Sin Yun-bok. As if the young beauty from the painting had lived gracefully through the time of thunder and lightning, her face held no bitterness or tiredness but only kindness, generosity and gratitude. She looked like a wholesome chrysanthemum wearing the frost veil on an early winter morning.

Life sometimes lets bad things happen to good people while those who cause so much pain to others seem to get away scot free and live well. It seems unfair. However it’s only when we limit ourselves to looking at things happening in this lifetime that we don’t seem to see any sense in this. If we are able to zoom out and look at many life times, we will see that things are all connected with causes and effects. Things then seem to start making sense.

This is the story of Jesan, a legendary Korean zen master from the 30's.

This is a true story.

People in the East believe that heaven protects practitioners and we've heard many unbelievable stories substantiating this belief. This is one of them and describes the experience of a zen monk during his intense retreat.

It is a tale of the early '70s when a monk desired to upgrade his practice for a few months in winters. Thus, he found a small hut in the deep mountain called Crouching Tiger Mountain (虎踞山). Initially, he thought that it might be beneficial for him to stay with a fellow monk so that they could stay in each other’s company and check each other's practices too.

Story one – the fool in the garden

One afternoon, many years ago, I was sitting in a ground floor meeting room at a hotel in Singapore. The company was having a regional meeting. It was one of those corporate meetings where someone was giving a rather long and monotonous presentation and the rest of us were trying hard not to fall asleep.

All of a sudden, a loud shout startled us out of our collective stupor, “Look at the fool outside!”

I still remember the second when I stood in front of the Sunflowers masterpiece very vividly. It was an otherworldly experience as I was instantly captivated by the painting, in general, and its energy, in particular. As I stood there, feeling all kinds of mixed emotions dancing inside me, I could imagine the burning yellow sunflower petals and twisted stems in the vase right in front of me. That was my first encounter with the Sunflowers art series by Vincent van Gogh.

“Be deaf for three years, be mute for three years and be blind for three years.”

The words of wisdom from a mother to a daughter before the daughter gets married and moves into the in-law's place in the old days of Korea. It's not being practiced anymore my grandmother had given her the same advice but up until the time when my mother got married.

My old friend T had very sensitive ears and, as a result, was quite sensitive to noise pollution. But T's other senses were equally sensitive, too. It seemed like T's entire body was not meant for city life — especially not for a hot, humid, tightly spaced and noisy city like Hong Kong.

In a scene from the movie Breakfast at Tiffany's, Holly Golightly (Audrey Hepburn) is seen hosting a massive house party while her Japanese neighbour Mr. Yunioshi, who lives on the top floor, enjoys a tea ceremony by himself. At the party downstairs, drunken Mag Wildwood cuts in on Holly and Rusty's flirting to get her man Rusty back. However, before angry Mag can do anything to her man, she finishes the last sip of her drink and blacks out while standing up. That's when Holly yells, 'Timber!' People clear out the space in front of Mag and the camera from the floor captures her falling flat on her face.

Benjamin Franklin once wrote that nothing is certain except death and taxes. Most of us deal with taxes every year. When it comes to death, we will all most likely need to deal with it at least once in our life.

Here is one unique way (to put it mildly) in which death is faced by an indigenous tribe called the Chukchi people of Siberia, also known as Eskimos of the Chukotka. Chukotka is located in the Far East region of Russia where the sun rises first. Despite being about three times the size of the United Kingdom, its population is only 50,000 because of its harsh environment and lack of food, making it difficult to survive for most people.

In a small desert village, a Cow, a Dog and a Pig lived as neighbours. Water was scarce in the desert, so whenever it rained, all three would go out with a bowl each to collect as much rainwater as they could for drinking and washing until the next rain.

As we were nearing the end of 2020 — the year of the White Rat — the famous quote by boxer Mike Tyson, “Everyone has a plan 'till they get punched in the mouth,” popped in my head and made me chuckle.

Way back when only one TV set per household was a common phenomenon, it used to be the most precious possession in the house and everyone in the family gathered around for entertainment in the evening. Unlike now, we had only a handful of channels to choose from and even then, the power of choosing and switching channels was entirely given to the breadwinner of the family.

"Can a baby’s destiny be changed by fixing its time of birth?" This is one of the most frequently asked questions in my field, and I have a dramatic story to definitively answer it.

告子章 (Gao-Zi-Zhang)

Before God entrusts a man with a ponderous task, He shall distress his mind, tire his limbs, famish his body, deprive him of his possessions, and frustrate his endeavors, so as to strengthen his resolve, fortify his mettle, and enhance his powers.

故天將降大任於是人也, 必先苦其心志, 勞其筋骨, 餓其體膚, 空乏其身, 行拂亂其所爲, 所以動心忍性, 曾益其所不能 。

Forming a good habit is hard to do, but kicking off a bad one is even harder.

This is a well-known story about Kim, Yu-Sin, a famous general and politician of the Silla Dynasty in the 7th century. He was the main force behind the unification of the Korean peninsula with the three kingdoms of Goguryo, Baekje and Silla. Following his demise, he was recognized as an honorary king for his extraordinary contributions servicing over five different kings.

When I recently discussed whether prayers really work with a Buddhist nurse, she shared this beautiful true story with me, which I'd like to now share with you.