In the Ruifang District of New Taipei City, Taiwan, there is an old mining town called Houtong Cat Village. Myself and some peers decided to take the train from Taipei Main Station to the village. Upon, my arrival, I found many kitties exploring the small village. The pictures in the post contain those very townskitties.

“Without a soul, my spirit’s sleeping somewhere cold
Until you find it there and lead it back home
Wake me up inside, Wake me up inside
Call my name and save me from the dark.”

Amy Lee said, “We have no spiritual affiliation with this music.” in April 2003.
But somehow, as I was lying in my bed in the dark listening to Evanescence after completing an assignment for my class titled “What is Zen Buddhism,” I began to correlate these lyrics with what I had learned.
One term is “Sunyata,” and from my lesson means
“Emptiness but not nothingness.”
“Instead, that all things are interdependent on other things. There is no independent reality or essence to anything because the things we imagine are only a series of happenings related to other things.“
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMC_8BjG3Cc)

Correlation doesn’t equal causation—the words of my statistics professor linger in my ear.
The chocolate chip banana bread I made this week did, however, bring me to life.

It has only been a few weeks into my last semester at school, and I’ve gained so much from my online Intro to Zen Meditation course. The other day, we reviewed the first couple of chapters from The Essentials of Buddhist Meditation by Śramaņa Zhiyi (Chih-i) (Link to PDF). One chapter that spoke to me was Chapter 3: Elimination of the Hindrances.

Hindrances, what a good word to describe the setbacks that keep me from being the person I’d rather be throughout each day. More hours than not, I am utterly exhausted. This has held me back from excelling in school, being sociable, and has led me to make poor financial decisions.

My solution over the last three to four weeks has been replacement. One of the simple ones has been that I’m actively replacing time in front of the screen with time in front of the stove. Hence, the muffins and scones. Side note, when I write down “replacement”, I think of it geologically. In sedimentary rocks, replacement is when one mineral precipitates out and another one forms. Also, my professor often tells us we are rocks when we meditate.

So in short, I’m a hindered rock, but in spite of that, I made some incredible white chocolate & cranberry scones https://www.sugarsaltmagic.com/cranberry-white-chocolate-scones/.

Many of us are looking for ways to occupy our time. In this capitalist society, we’ve been socially conditioned to use our time productively. More often than not, this leads to the overconsumption of media, processed foods, mental distress, and, in short, “crashing out.” At least in my case, it does. In an effort to combat an evening of sadness, I decided to fill my senses with the delectable taste and smell of homemade morning glory muffins. https://weekendatthecottage.com/morning-glory-muffins/

With most tasks, the writings of mother, scientist, and author Robin Wall Kimmerer echo in my head. Her book, The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, ends with an invitation to be a part of the gift economy. “Whatever your currency of reciprocity—be it money, time, energy, political action, art, science, education, planting, community action, restoration, acts of care, large and small—all are needed in these urgent times.” As an act of care for myself and my housemates, baking these muffins was my small act of defiance against participating in this consumerist society.