The way my life has created itself leaves me more apart from my two daughters than physically present. My relationship to this reality has been a challenge. When I arrive back in Japan from a visit to them in Australia, I usually awaken the first day in my apartment with a vague sense of loss and longing. At first I didn't identify it clearly, then…

"OH. I miss my daughters."

Then I remembered a principle my teacher taught me: whenever I am feeling lonely, it is based on a mind that has drifted from the present to imaginary circumstances.

As T. S. Elliot put it: