Why I Named This Blog “Nagi”

Hello. I’m Ren, the lotus rabbit.

This blog is called Nagi no Aru Kurashi — “A Life with Nagi.”

Nagi is a Japanese word for the moment after a storm at sea, when the wind dies down and the waves grow still.

You may have heard it in words like asanagi, the morning calm, or yūnagi, the evening calm.

I chose this word for a reason.

I’m a nurse.

I once worked on a ward for young children.

Little lives, just beginning,

were already facing illness.

Now, I sit beside many people in their final days.

Lives that have barely begun,

and lives that have traveled a long way.

Beside either one, I was taught the same thing.

That life is never something to take for granted.

That being near the people you love,

and being able to say what you need to say,

is more precious than we know.

So much in life doesn’t go the way we hope.

Things that feel unfair. Things that hurt. Things we can’t change.

Storms come to small children,

and to those who have lived a long life.

As long as we are alive, the storms won’t disappear.

But even a rough sea grows calm in time.

After the storm, there comes a moment when the heart quietly settles.

I believe that.

I grew up in a home where Buddhism was always close by.

There is life in all things.

Everything is connected, and everything changes.

I don’t understand the difficult sutras very well.

But I know that this way of seeing can gently calm a troubled heart.

On this blog,

I write about what I’ve felt beside life,

the small moments in everyday life that made me want to join my hands,

and what they’ve taught me about being alive.

These stories are drawn from many experiences, and changed so that no one can be identified.

Some of them have also become songs.

On days when reading feels like too much, you’re welcome to just listen.

Toward a life without regret.

What matters most is living with gratitude.

And I hope the last words I leave behind are simply, “thank you.”

I’m still on that path, too.

This isn’t a place for finding the right answers.

If, after reading, you think for a moment of someone dear to you, that would make me glad.

Take your time. Read, and listen, at your own pace.

May a quiet nagi come to your heart today.