By Jing S
I sat quietly in the Hakone Gardens today, watching as sunlight filtered through the Japanese maples. It was there, surrounded by carefully placed stones and the gentle ripple of koi ponds, that I reflected on my journey with emptiness.
For the longest time, I misunderstood emptiness. When I felt empty inside, I thought something was wrong — that I was broken. But recently, I’ve been exploring the Buddhist concept of emptiness: a sense of spaciousness, openness, and freedom from fixed identity. And it’s changing everything.
A few months ago, I went through a strange experience. From the outside, everything looked fine. My life appeared good on paper. But inside, I was disoriented, losing connection to what once motivated me. My work, reputation, and title — things I had worked so hard for — suddenly felt less meaningful, somehow hollow and heavy.
My first instinct was to diagnose the problem as “lost momentum.” So I pushed myself harder, set more ambitious goals, tried to create bigger impacts, all in an attempt to regain that feeling of control. Classic overachiever response, right?
But sitting long enough in silence — really sitting with the discomfort — I had a revelation. I wasn’t steering my life; I was merely reacting. Reacting to expectations I had internalized. Reacting to standards I’d never paused to question. Reacting to the constant chorus of “move fast, do more, don’t fall behind.”
This realization hit hard. But it also created space and stillness where I could ask myself deeper questions: What if there was no expanded version of me to chase? What would I feel then? What if I stopped chasing altogether? What would I do?
In that stillness, I started to see clearly that my thoughts were just like clouds, my feelings merely weather patterns. And underneath all the expectations, pushing, and agendas, I found something unexpected — clarity and presence.
That’s when I understood: clarity isn’t something achieved by finishing everything on my to-do list. It’s something that emerges when I create enough space to hear what’s already inside me — what’s been there all along. Clarity isn’t something we conquer; it’s something we uncover.
And that’s the power of “Empty is a Few.” What I once feared as emptiness has become my pathway to fullness. The space between my thoughts is not a void to be filled but a garden to be tended.
So now, when I feel that sense of emptiness creeping in, I don’t rush to fill it. Instead, I bow to it, grateful for the wisdom it brings.
Hakone Zendo 