Mirrors, Mortality, and the Teachers Who Refuse to Let Us Look Away
It took fourteen years for my aHUS diagnosis.
Fourteen years of not knowing what caused me to lose my native kidneys.
A heart attack.
Twelve years on dialysis.
Two kidney transplants that each lasted a year—one of them a gift from my father.
I was twenty-five when he gave me his kidney.
I was twenty-six when I lost it.
The doctors had no idea why it failed.
What followed were years riddled with guilt and depression. Years of not having language for what I was carrying. Years of trying not to feel anything at all. Therapy would come later. Practice would come later. At first, there was just avoidance.
When I lost my dad’s kidney, I avoided him.
I couldn’t face what it meant. I couldn’t mourn the loss. I didn’t want to feel the pain—mine or his. I was bitter. Angry at the world. Angry at everyone. But mostly, I was angry at myself.
There was no grace.
No love for myself.
And when love is absent, something else moves in.
For me, it was guilt.
Guilt is a virus. It spreads quietly, like a pandemic, eating away at you until everything is poisoned. In Buddhism, the “poisons” aren’t literal toxins—they’re mental states. Anger and ignorance were eating me for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and probably a snack.
Life is always offering teachable moments. I’ve noticed that when my rhythm is steady—when I’m moving with my life instead of against it—the Living Dharma whispers. It whispers even through struggle. Even through pain.
But back then, I was still avoiding.
In some areas of my life, I was showing up. I was hyper-focused on work, trying to be the best designer I could be. I poured everything I had into that. But I was still ignoring what made me uncomfortable. Still running from the parts of my life that hurt the most.
Around that time, I began studying with my first teacher, Sato Sensei.
Sitting was brutal at first.
Zazen meant sitting with everything I wanted to escape—hurt, shame, anger, guilt. There was nowhere to hide. But slowly, subtle shifts began to happen. Awareness started to open just enough to let in a little air.
Zazen didn’t make the guilt disappear. What it did was quiet it enough for me to see that other things were happening in my life at the same time. That there was more than just suffering. That presence was still available, even while everything hurt.
I was still finding my way then.
I think I’m always finding my way.
Never arriving. Just flowing with the current of my life, learning how to return when I drift.
My awareness now comes back a little faster than it used to. Not because I’m better—but because I’ve practiced returning.
My current teacher, Koshin Sensei, calls what we carry the bag of shit—the bag filled with shame, anger, guilt, and old stories. Back then, I was dragging that bag everywhere. Zazen gave me a refuge where I could put it down for a moment. A chance to breathe fresh air without being suffocated by the stench of my own unexamined pain.
The bag didn’t disappear. It’s still here.
But Zazen offered clarity. And clarity changes how you carry things. When you pick the bag back up, you hold it more steadily. With less violence. With less collapse.
In time—when I was ready—I stopped ignoring how losing my dad’s kidney made me feel. I stopped running from the grief. From the anger. From the shame.
Sato Sensei showed me how to hold it all with compassionate hands instead of judgmental ones.
I stopped avoiding my father.
I learned that sitting wasn’t enough on its own. Sitting showed me that I needed help—therapy, language, tools—to work with what was coming up off the cushion. Practice helped me see that showing up for my life meant showing up for all of it.
Every day experiences became mirrors.
Teachers appeared everywhere.
Illness. Community. Loss. Practice.
All of them asking the same question:
Can you stay?
That’s the work.
That’s the practice.
Not fixing.
Not transcending.
Just showing up—again and again—with a little more clarity, a little more compassion, and a little less running.
