Spiritual Unfoldment With John Butler
Aug 13, 2026 · 30 min · 9 segments
John & Phil have a conversation about the film 'Perfect days' about a Tokyo toilet cleaner and find a lot to agree about - and surprisingly 'spiritual' themes. Topics: Ordinary Life as Sacred Practice…
John ButlerHost
Phil ShanklandHost
Outwardly, on the face of it, it's about a Japanese or Chinese, Japanese, I think, toilet cleaner in, uh, is it one of the big cities? Tokyo, I suppose.
Uh, a single man who lives alone, and it showed him, uh, started off asleep and getting up in his little very simple, modest flat, um, collecting his things and going to work, and doing his work, and followed him throughout his day, um, where he went and had his meals and came home at night.
His, uh, his niece, um, obviously called with her family and came to live with him.
I think the gist of it was, though perhaps this is what the aim of the film was, to show us how he retained his composure throughout what could have been a, a rather upsetting time.
So I think that was the, the, the theme of the film and that, uh, to put it in my own sort of language, um, he was a man who tried to live in the present.
Well, I suppose in mod- in modern language, you could say mindfulness, which in my language is more just being present.
[laughs] It's a t- it's a trick question, John, because th- there isn't a plot.
Outwardly, on the face of it, it's about a Japanese or Chinese, Japanese, I think, toilet cleaner in, uh, is it one of the big cities? Tokyo, I suppose.
Uh, a single man who lives alone, and it showed him, uh, started off asleep and getting up in his little very simple, modest flat, um, collecting his things and going to work, and doing his work, and followed him throughout his day, um, where he went and had his meals and came home at night.
His, uh, his niece, um, obviously called with her family and came to live with him.
I think the gist of it was, though perhaps this is what the aim of the film was, to show us how he retained his composure throughout what could have been a, a rather upsetting time.
So I think that was the, the, the theme of the film and that, uh, to put it in my own sort of language, um, he was a man who tried to live in the present.
Well, I suppose in mod- in modern language, you could say mindfulness, which in my language is more just being present.
[laughs] It's a t- it's a trick question, John, because th- there isn't a plot.
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