The Guest Who Stayed:
How my North Star Taught Me Love. I met Ahnung in October 2008 at Red Lake Reservation in northern Minnesota. She had recently given birth to eight puppies. She was haggard and worn down and carried the unmistakable marks of a difficult life. She had no front teeth. Later I would learn she had survived…
Keep readingAn Invitation: Inhabiting the Space Between
Where Presence Begins and Possibilities Emerge The space between is sacred. It is there at dawn, where the first light gently meets the last breath of night. Neither darkness nor daylight disappears. For a brief moment, they belong to one another. Much of our lives unfold in these spaces between. Between certainty and not knowing.…
Keep readingMa*: In the Water, I Learned to Listen
I learned early in life how to be in the water. When I was six years old, my mother enrolled my siblings and me in swimming lessons after my brother nearly drowned in a pool in Thailand. What began as a protective act by my mother became a path that shaped me as a young…
Keep readingMa: The space that holds and heals us
In Japanese philosophy, there is a concept called Ma. It is often described as the space between—the pause between notes, the silence between words, the stillness that gives meaning to movement. It is not empty. It is alive, relational, and full of possibility. I have come to learn that our deepest work, our deepest healing…
Keep readingPlaying the Space Between: Ma on the Pickleball Court
I first learned about the Japanese philosophy of Ma from my taiko drumming teacher. The first time I watched a taiko performance, I found myself deeply moved at a vibrational level—the power of witnessing Asian women on stage taking up space, being loud in a way that wasn’t noise or chaos. What made it so…
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Ahnung Way 