Yagya Mahadevan

What is Ichigyo-Zanmai?

This is one of the simplest yet toughest—and truly transformational concepts I’ve stumbled upon recently. This Zen Buddhist term means single-task focus: complete immersion in whatever you’re doing to express your full presence. 

Simply put:
When you eat, just EAT.
When you work, just WORK.
When you walk, just WALK.

Pronunciation
Ee-chee-gyoh zahn-my
“Ichigyo” → roughly “ee-chee-gyoh” 
“Zanmai” → “zahn-my” 

How different is this from my routine? 

While eating, I’m scrolling my phone, checking social media, replying to messages, planning my next task, remembering to pick up laundry, adding items to the grocery list—you name it. Fifteen minutes later, if asked what I ate, I’d have to think twice. 

Ichigyo-Zanmai means: When I eat, I just focus on eating. Researchers say mindful chewing and focusing while eating, improves digestion and absorption—but is it realistic amid today’s endless distractions to just focus on eating?

The term is new for me, but the idea isn’t. My Guru, Mahatria, has taught the same thing. There are times, when I am working on solving a problem and I see it is 1 pm already and I have not had my lunch yet and feeling hungry. I want to spend the next 10 minutes to logically stop it in a point, so that I can pick it up later. During that 10 minutes, I enter a zone, and I am now not thinking about lunch, ignoring notifications in my phone, and working on the solution completely. I work straight through three hours and feel fulfilled solving it around 4 p.m. In that flow, I become one with the solution. Once the imaginary finishing line was crossed, the abundance was waiting. I was in a Zone, there was nothing that would stop me. “Just BE. Be in the presence.”. Can I then repeat this experience in everything I do, where I can get lost in the thing I do.

How do I change?

When the student is ready, Teacher arrives. That is why Ichigyo-Zanmai clicked for me, because when I stumbled on it, the student in me was ready. To change any part of my life, I want to:

1.  Acknowledge what needs improvement.
2.  Identify the state I want to BE.
3.  Start working toward it.

What was I doing?

During a simple Target run: I check my phone for the grocery list from my wife, see we need gripe water, then open the Target app for gripe water’s location in the store. As I am doing this, I see a message from my friend and I reply to that. At that time, is a LinkedIn notification for a new connection request and then I check who is mutual connection for us and check their profile. I see there is a new job change notification from a friend and I wish them about that.  I see someone in front of me with a Minnesota Vikings jersey and immediately realize it is game time and then open the App to check the game status. Suddenly, I realize, I still haven’t found the gripe water (it’s in baby food, by the way). I could’ve located it manually faster.

Lately I’ve noticed my focus slipping: hearing people talk without truly listening to them. I want to get back to writing again but struggling to focus and prioritize. That’s when Ichigyo-Zanmai found me.

What do I want?

Simple: To live in Ichigyo-Zanmai for as many daily activities as possible.

How do I get there?

Zen is straightforward—when you eat, JUST eat; when you walk, JUST walk. But my mind needed more practical steps. I identified three focus thieves: multitasking, distractions, and unconscious actions.

Multitasking

I used to brag about multitasking. I can be on a Teams meeting listening to the conversation, talk to someone in my office, texting to someone else simultaneously. I called it efficiency. Now I see the madness.

A colleague shared this exercise:
Write A–Z on line 1. Write 1–26 on line 2.
Now, alternate: A then 1, B then 2… to Z and 26. It takes more time to do this than previous steps. Explained the impact of context-switching killing speed. It hit hard.

Browser Tabs

I’d have 12+ tabs open across 7 unrelated topics. I’d jump projects and lose the original thread. Now I keep only one tab—the current one. My mind complains about reopening later, but I’m training it to ignore everything else. For now, one tab builds the habit.

When I had multiple tabs, I have wandered from one to the other and have lost track of what I was working on. 

Meetings

In a meeting now, I’m fully present—Ichigyo-Zanmai. When I get a Text message on my phone, or get pinged by someone for non-related to the meeting I don’t pay attention to that. Sometimes my hand reaches for the phone, but my wallpaper (“Ichigyo-Zanmai”) reminds me to set it down. I am a work in progress and enjoy it when I catch myself before making a mistake.  

Distraction

I am not multitasking different things here but I was doing something as a means of distraction or diversion.

I have heard the story in Mahabarata where Guru Dronacharya ties a toy bird to a tree branch. Then asks each of the 5 brothers to aim their bow and arrow. Before taking a shot, asks them to and tell him what they see. Everyone except Arjuna see the tree, leaf, branches, nest, fruit etc. Guru tells them to move on and not take a shot. Arjuna is the only one that says that he is not able to see anything but the bird. Guru Dronacharya asks Arjuna to take the shot and of course he hits the target. The one who sees nothing else other than the one I am focusing on, is the one that can hit it.

When I am biking in Peloton, I used to check messages and social media when I am in recovery phase. Now I keep my phone on DND, I’m fully immersed.  No, there is no incremental calories burnt because of me not looking at the phone or increased output because of focusing on biking, the quality of the biking and the result and how my body feels is the difference. It is a much immersive moment where I am losing myself in the biking.

An Indian actor said  Even if I clean toilets, the toilet I clean will be the BEST. Of course, his acting was nothing but the best and outclassed many others – so, how did he do it. Starts from smaller things – There is no way for me to clean the toilet and make it the best one – when I have to constantly check my messages and look at short videos, talk to someone, think about going on a vacation – I am sure when my focus is not cleaning the toilet – I cannot be the best at it. he’d make even toilet-cleaning the BEST if that’s the task. 

Unconscious actions

This surprised me most: habits formed without awareness, like muscle memory.

After parking, during my 3-minute walk to the office (post 12-minute drive), my hand grabs the phone to checking notifications, messages, social media. Nothing urgent happens in 12 minutes, yet it clutters my mind for the day and influences how I start my day. I am now just walking from the parking to the office, seeing the snow, greeting people around. 

Even when watching TV comedy shows, I reach for WhatsApp or social media. I justified it as “insignificant,” but I realized – Attitudes do not care where you shape them. Ultimately they shape my life. I don’t want to train my mind that distraction is okay when it is small things. Whatever I’m doing I will be fully focused on that activity.  

So, what am I doing now?

In addition to being focused, not multitasking, being conscious of distractions, I started creating focused block of times where I focus for 30 / 60 minutes on the work in hand without any distractions. I take a break after that time. I use “Focus” App to be able to start and handle timer. During these blocks, its me and the work in hand – nothing can come in between. These are not just the blocks for work stuff but also I am typing this in a focus block to be able to get it done without distraction.

Next thing, I did is cutting down on distractions that are not significant for me. I have decided to stay away from Facebook, Instagram, Reddit during week days and have a limit of only 30 minutes on weekends for this. Yes, there is focused time for things and dont want to be on it all during the day. 

Daily meditation is non-negotiable now and is part of my daily routine. At the end of the day, I spend introspecting my day to run through the day to determine where I need to change overall as a person and more specifically where I let myself slip. 

Undivided attention

This has brought in rigor and helped me in managing things better. I want to provide undivided attention to everything I do – the Teams meeting I am in, the in- person meeting I am having, walk with my kid around the block, biking, eating and everything – Undivided attention. 

So, in the last 6 weeks of hearing about it – am I living by Ichigyo-Zanmai already? Oh, not even close – (read the first line of this blog). I am just scratching the surface now, but I am enjoying myself and the quality of things I do and, most importantly, enjoying the new me.

As I finish this, my mind goes to another of Mahatria’s examples – a man asks the enlightened monk – “what were you doing before enlightened”. Monk replied “I used to cut woods from tree and draw water from the well”. Ok, said the man and then asked – “what are you doing now that you are enlightened” – Monk replied “I am cutting woods from tree and drawing water from the well”. The confused man immediately asked – “So, there is nothing different that you are doing”. The monk smiling said – “The quality of what I do and the result it produces is the change”. I am enjoying the quality of what I do and the results it produces and enjoying the change. 

So, my one word to live by all of 2026 – “Ichigyo-Zanmai”