Need a little Zen boost in your life? May as well go with something portable — and easy to power up. The Enso Clock is a small digital clock designed to give Zen travelers and yoga heads a kinder, gentler way to keep tabs on the outside world. Enso means circle, and it’s a common symbol in Japanese calligraphy, with all sorts of good connotations: strength, elegance, enlightenment and the void. If you like to meditate, the Enso will give you snap-out-of-it cues, but won’t disturb your meditative state like, say, a Darth Vader alarm clock might.

Instead of using boring old minutes and seconds to see how much time has passed, you can watch a ring gradually paint itself around the edge of the display. Likewise, instead of a bracing alarm, the Enso gives you a choice of several soothing chimes — a singing bowl, Tingsha bell, wooden blocks — to wake you from a relaxed state. I bet the Enso would be a big hit at an Army boot camp.

Via Cool Tools