ABSTRACT
Sustainability has been a contemporary vanguard for necessitating ethical questions in design. Thomas Kasulis, a seminal scholar in Asian philosophy, proposes integrity and intimacy as different orientations that exist in most cultures to help us think about different ways of relating, understanding and being-in-the-world. There are various approaches and rich descriptions of mindfulness. A single definition is not possible, just like love, happiness and compassion as states of being-in-the-world are different according to context and person. Mindfulness is a constant practice of being and becoming. Designers are often poorly prepared to engage in community work because their education or apprenticeship is geared towards industry practice to craft solutions in response to a narrowly defined problem. When the neo-liberal agenda emphasizes growth, productivity and accumulation, to which design undoubtedly contributes to, it may sound odd to talk about emptiness and surrender, but this is the teaching of Zen.
