On timing, memory, and the connections that never quite leave us.
I often find myself reflecting at the end of the year. While home for the holidays, I watched the poignant film Past Lives with my mother. It introduced me to the Korean idea of in-yun. This idea explains that our relationships are shaped by many past encounters. Some of these encounters might be from different lifetimes. This concept helped me understand why some people come back to my thoughts. It also clarified why certain moments feel much more significant than they should. It shows how some things that never happened can still stay with us.
In-yun means that every meaningful meeting isn’t random. Our connections are influenced by many unseen factors, including past experiences and choices. Some people come into our lives like a quiet whisper we barely notice. You might meet them by chance. This could happen on a train or in a doorway. It often occurs during a time when you weren’t even looking.
Fate and In-Yun
Unlike the idea of fate in the West, in-yun doesn’t guarantee permanence. The people who impact us may not stay in our lives. The concept emphasizes that the meeting itself had a purpose. It only suggests that the meeting itself had a purpose. Even quick encounters carry the weight of many unseen moments that happened before. These moments span different years and lives, even from parts of ourselves we don’t remember anymore.
Rooted in Buddhist ideas and Korean stories, in-yun is often viewed as layered. A brief encounter with someone may hold many layers, while deeper connections add more layers over time. Some relationships become lifelong; others serve a different purpose and aren’t meant to last.
Perhaps this is why certain people stay with us even after they leave. The relationship may end, and the full story might never be told, but the connection doesn’t vanish. Instead, it transforms. It becomes a quiet presence within us. It is a memory that exists not just in the past but also in the present.
Maybe we are not here to hold every connection forever.
Maybe we are here to recognize them—
to honour the in-yun—
and to carry what was given back.
Sometimes, these connections reveal themselves in the smallest traces.
Below are four poems inspired by this idea.
Scraps of You
Like a thread to a needle,
you are woven through my life.
I find scraps of you
on hidden bookshelves in my house.
A moment of silence,
and you appear,
moving through my days—
an undercurrent
hard to trace.
It was yesterday
and an eternity ago,
a memory misplaced
and one that never left.
Some connections arrive briefly, yet carry a weight far greater than their duration.
For a Moment
I saw our reflections
on the passing train.
You were holding my hand,
stepping back from the rail.
The heat was settling
in the late afternoon.
We were catching
the last departure
back to town.
I thought to myself:
You look happy now.
And for a moment in time,
I was.
The idea of in-yun also makes room for what never happened. It includes not just the people we met. It also encompasses the lives we almost lived—the words we didn’t say and the doors we didn’t open. Sometimes those paths feel as real as the ones we chose.
Alternative Lifelines
I wonder where it goes,
all that does not come to be.
All the joys and the wounds
that we never see.
Is it locked up in a drawer
filled to the brim,
of unanswered questions
and forgotten dreams?
Words never spoken
and kisses never kissed,
tied to the silence
of an unwritten wish.
A letter never sent,
an unspoken claim.
Journeys left untaken
down steep roads to the ocean.
Drifting like whispers
in unseen dimensions,
where the shadows of our choices
are lulled softly to sleep.
Floating around,
our alternative lifelines.
And then there are the connections that feel older than memory—familiar without explanation.
Twin Flames
I wonder if we have
walked this earth before.
Travelling through lifetimes
and hidden doors.
Being connected
and torn apart by fate.
Racing across sandstorms
to meet yet again.
Reaching for each other
without knowing why.
Feeling the pull
across oceans of time.
“Traces,” first published in Jacaranda Journal, reflects on what lingers after the moment has passed.
Traces
What is it that remains
beneath the dust of days?
When wildfire sweeps
through fields of wheat,
and winter scorches
spring’s last seed—
in the soil
where it first lay to bleed?
Perhaps there is hope
in the quiet wind
that lulls the river to sleep.
A shard of light,
a fragment left of us,
glimmering
beneath the river deep.
Concluding Thoughts
As the year turns, I’m thinking less about what to carry forward and more about how to carry it. Not every connection needs to be held tightly to be honored. Some ask only to be recognized, then released back into the flow of time. Perhaps stepping into the new year is less about leaving things behind. It is more about walking on with what has quietly shaped us.
Happy New Year! All the best from me to you.
Related post: Poetry About the Passage of Time
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