This four-part Naikan series grew out of a course I offered at Baltimore Dharma Group in Spring 2025. While Naikan is often framed as a tool for self-reflection, I came to see it as something more relational: not a system of correction, but a practice of returning—again and again—to what holds us, what flows through us, what we leave behind, and what we remain with.
Here, in language, is the closest I have come to tracing the patterns I live inside — and the patterns I see others living inside, too. ...That, to me, is the heart of this offering: not to win empathy through performance, but to make coherence inhabitable — even when the pattern isn't matched. These pieces are not arguments. They do not aim to persuade. They exist to demonstrate — without explanation. To resonate — without claiming universality. To name the cost of asymmetry — without blaming the other. To hold clarity — without self-erasure.
Introduction and Intention:
This is a sutra, but not a sutra in the traditional sense. It is not part of the Buddhist canon, nor is it offered from a seat of transmission or formal authority. It is, rather, a thread — woven from lived practice, shaped by fidelity, and rooted in a vow that did not begin with me and does not end with me.
We all have moments of deep concentration—those times when we are so absorbed in something that the world recedes. A musician practicing alone, refining a passage with exquisite focus. A philosopher turning an argument over in their mind, testing its weight from every angle. A scientist working through the layers of an equation, adjusting variables, refining the logic until it holds. In these moments, the noise of the world fades, and what remains is a kind of clarity, a steady presence of thought moving toward resolution.
Introduction: There are two doors into this work. The one below meets the moment. It is written in accessible language—for those seeking clarity about autistic experience, and especially about how it differs in rhythm, in structure, and in the invisible labor it asks of those who must translate themselves to be understood. But this isn’t the only way in. There is another door—quieter, less translated, more interior. If you're looking not just for insight, but for shape—if you’ve ever sensed that what goes unspoken is sometimes the most coherent thing there is—you may find yourself at home there.
Before you begin: please take a moment, settle in, enjoy the image above—of me holding my baby daughter as a first-time dad, tune into the frequency of restful wonder. Now allow your mind to wander outward from the edges of that image: to the room, to the street outside, to the vast sky beyond the vast sky. Further—past the solar system, past the galaxy’s edge, past everything known—to the edge of the cosmos. And then…
I never stopped making art. I just didn’t always call it that. What I made with you, my loves — in those days we shared — was the most embodied form of relational creation. Art was us — there was no interruption.
Something Luu Li and and I talked about yesterday landed deeply. She said, “Wow Papa, 54 years! I'm so glad you’re starting to do art again.” And I told her — honestly — it’s never left me. But after that, I found myself thinking: when I was homeschooling Luu Li and CT, I wasn’t just not doing art — I was expressing my creativity through my life with them.
Yesterday, I let Cát Tiên cry until she fell asleep. She wiggled her way around her crib, and cried with vigor. I wondered what she was thinking about.
Update, Saturday, 5/2/09 This afternoon, I tried again to let her cry herself to sleep. She started to pull herself up on the crib rails, and then sat up and cried. Because she seemed to be wide awake after 20 minutes, I picked her up and let her stay awake.
Update, Sunday, 5/3/09 We let Cat cry herself to sleep on Saturday night. She slept very well and woke up at 4 AM. We let her cry again, and she fell asleep by herself. At 5:45 AM, she woke again. This time she cried for 20 minutes, then pulled herself up by the window next to the crib. She grabbed one of the blinds and started to chew on it. I picked her up at that point, assuming she wasn't interested in sleep.
Update, Monday, 5/4/09 9:30 AM: Cat is wriggly and irritable. Put her in her crib. She drinks another ounce of her milk (she had already drunk 4 ounces in the morning). She pushes the bottle away, and kicks. I let her lay in bed alone. She cries for 20 minutes. Take her out. She's still rubbing her eyes. I bring her downstairs. Hold her and pace back and forth singing "In Out Deep Slow." Have to hold her arms down. After five minutes of crying and struggling, she closes her eyes and relaxes in my arms. I lay her down. She drinks another ounce of milk while asleep.
At 1:00 PM I put her in her crib downstairs. She was awake, but irritable, and hadn't slept since waking at 10:40 AM. She cried for a half hour. She walked herself around the crib the entire time. Finally, at 1:30 PM, she lay down and fell asleep. She was breathing hard from all her exertion.
It's unclear to me if she's ready to just be left on her own.
Update, Tuesday, 5/5/09 9:30 AM Bà Nội tried to get Cat to sleep, but she fussed and cried. Bà Nội said this was unusual, that she's usually able to put her in the crib and get her to sleep quietly.
I wonder if the last few days of letting her cry herself to sleep have actually led her to anticipate the process of falling asleep with stress.
Bà Nội got her to sleep at 10 AM and she slept for two hours. She woke midway and Bà Nội coaxed her to sleep again. Cát Tiên seems amenable to multiple methods of getting to sleep.
Update, Thursday, 5/7/09 On Wednesday night, Christina said Cat fussed a lot while falling asleep.
She woke around 11 PM. I had to pick her up to help her get back to sleep. At 1 AM, she woke again, and I put her in bed with us since she wouldn't lay still in the crib. She fell asleep. I moved her back to her crib about an hour later.
Thursday afternoon, I played with Cat between 2 and 3 PM. She wouldn't take a bottle while she was busy playing. After an hour, I lay her on the couch, and fed her. She didn't resist and fell asleep promptly. I transferred her to her crib.
Update, Friday, 5/8/09 On Thursday night, Cat fell asleep coming home in the car. She slept until 2 AM, then stayed awake until 3:30 AM. During that time, I took her downstairs and let her play. She wasn't willing to lie still in the crib, and was agitated when I tried to hold her. At 3:30, I held her in a way that she could freely move her arms and feet, but her torso remained stationary next to my stomach. I walked back and forth and sang "No Coming No Going". She quieted down within five minutes, and in another five minutes was fast asleep.
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