Dedicated to my Wife - Nancy Buss Bahari, May She Rest In Peace.

 “Alignment begins where the noise ends — in the quiet place where the heart listens to what the universe has been whispering all along.”

Walking in Alignment: Listening to the Quiet Truth Within

By Shamsul Bahari

There are moments in life when the outer world becomes noisy—duties, expectations, exhibitions, friendships, finances, the thousand small things of daily living. And yet, beneath all this movement, there is a quieter place where something far more ancient is happening.

It is the realm of alignment—that subtle inner axis where the heart, mind, body, and destiny sit in harmony, if only for a breath at a time. I have lived long enough to know that alignment is not something one forces. It is something one listens for. Something one recognizes like a faint call, a whisper in the unseen, coming not from outside but from deep within, where the soul keeps its own counsel.

After seventy-seven years of walking this earth, I have come to accept that my greatest task—perhaps my only real task—has always been to know myself. Not the façade, not the personality, not the old stories, but the Self behind all masks. This, to me, is the Art of Living.

I have lived by the Malay saying, “Alang-alang celup pekasam, biar sampai ke pangkal lengan.”
If you commit your hand to brine, dip it all the way to the elbow.

The Buddha said the same in his own way:
Hold the Dharma like you would a burning coal—firmly, fully—until it leaves nothing but ashes of understanding.

Life is not to be lived halfway.

Over the years, I have learned that good and evil are simply two sides of the same coin, turning endlessly in our hands. To understand this is to stop fighting shadows. To live with mindfulness is to walk through the village like the old night-soil carrier—steady, balanced, not spilling a drop despite the weight, the smell, or the judgments of those who pass by.

It took near-death experiences to truly anchor this understanding.
I remember lying in a small room in Corte Madera, California, my lungs collapsing under a pleurisy attack. I could feel the veil thinning, the boundary between breath and no-breath dissolving. In that moment, I did what a Muslim does: Innalillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’un. I surrendered.

And in surrender, a strange clarity emerged.
I saw the impermanence of this body.
I saw the emptiness at the core of my being—empty not of meaning but of separation.
And I realized that all the roles I had played—father, husband, artist, seeker, friend—were passing clouds in an endless sky.

Perhaps this is why alignment matters so much to me now.
It is not about success or recognition.
It is not about legacy in the worldly sense.
It is about truthfulness—with oneself, with the path, with the Creator who shaped this soul long before the body was given to it.

So when blessings come unexpectedly—as they did recently, in the form of financial relief just when I needed it—I accept them with gratitude, not as rewards, but as reminders.
When friendships heal themselves, like my old friend Ben returning to his true self, I accept that too as a sign that alignment restores what is meant to stay.
And when my art refuses to let me go, pulling me into new exhibitions even when I thought I had retired, I recognize that as part of the design as well.

The universe has never stopped guiding me.
It was I who needed to quiet down to hear it.

I have lived long enough to know that nothing is accidental.
The fact that I listened to Ibn Arabi that morning, that I reached out to an old friend, that the universe provided just when I had emptied my pocket—these are not separate events. They are threads of a single tapestry, woven by a Hand we do not see but always feel.

At this stage of life, I often ask myself what my conclusion will be.
What is the final note of this long symphony?
What legacy do I leave behind?

The answer, increasingly, is simple:
I want to leave behind the truth of who I am.
Not in a grand way. Not in a heroic way. But in a human way. Fully lived, fully seen, fully accepted.

To know oneself is the greatest gift one can offer the world.
And if my journals, sketches, stories, paintings, and these wandering reflections help someone else look inward—then that is enough.

My journey is not over yet, but the path is clearer than ever:
Walk in alignment.
Listen deeply.
Live sincerely.
And remember who you are—not the body, not the mind, not the stories, but the awareness that watches it all.

Gasshō.
Salam.
And may the unseen guide us gently home.

WallahuAlam!

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