Another lesson I took from the koshukai is that I need to slow down. My mind is always full of thngs, and as Christy sensei told me that an active mind manifests as an active body. I sometimes do things so fast that the guests don’t have time to catch their breath or visually rest when they watch me make tea. Especially with koicha, the pace is slower than with usucha to give the ceremony more weight.
This is not a new problem for me. I know that my mind moves very fast, and I talk very fast. When I get nervous, I move and talk even faster. I am getting better though, Christy sensei did find a few places while I was making tea that were restful, but I really need to slow down.
One way I do this is to pay attention to my breathing. Whenever I am nervous or excited, I tend to hold my breath or breathe very shallowly. Taking one or two deep breaths helps to restore oxygen to my system and my brain seems to function better. Continuing to breathe while my body is moving tends to focus my mind, slow down my nervous tics and allows me to be more present.
From the beginning of entering the tea room until the last act of closing the door, your breathing should be even and controlled. This breathing helps to control the pace of the procedure. As you begin the procedure, folding your fukusa, your guests will begin to breathe in unison with you. It is amazing what happens to the harmony in the room when everyone is breathing in unison.
If you have the opposite problem that I do, of being too slow and too deliberate, increasing the pace of your breathing very slightly will help the pace of your tea procedure. Holding your breath while you make tea does not do you any good at all. You must breathe.
On Monday, Mr. Nishiura, incense master, came from Tokyo (via San Francisco) for a chakai at Ryokusuido. The students and I were able to serve him tea and after that he presented us with a game of incense.
As the night fell, the room was lit by candle light. It bathed us all in a flattering glow and Mr. Nishiura began the incense ceremony. Like tea, there are specialized dogu (utensils). Like tea, he brought everything into the room and prepared the things for us to smell the incense. While he was doing that, the guests were passed our own brush, calligraphy set, and answer sheet. We made ink with ink stick and stone. Then we were to write our name on the outside of our answer sheet.
The game we were to play would be to compare two different incenses. He shuffled the incense packets and chose six. There would be three rounds of comparison and we were to mark on our answer sheets with a dash – if they were the same or two dots ●● if they were different. We were to write them from the bottom to the top. The resulting symbol, three lines of dashes and dots referred to a phenomenon of nature, such as fire, thunder earth etc. With this combination, there were 8 possibilities for the answer. Mr. Nishura told us that as we listen to the music of the incense and come upon our answers, the symbols will tell us something about our own nature.
We started to listen to the first incense. It was a heady fragrance and I could barely tell if there was anything at all on the burner. I inhaled with all my lungs as we only had one chance to listen before we passed on to the next one. Mr. Nishura told us not to just smell the incense. That happens with just your nose. But to inhale and listen with our whole body, not just the surface or top notes, but also to the under notes and the whole of the music. We could write down our answers after each set, or wait until the end. And we could change our answers at any time.
I must say that there was a lot going on in that first inhalation. But I really don’t have the words to describe what was going on for me. The second round we had to judge if it was the same or different than the previous round. Not only did we listen to the incense, we had to remember how the first one was and distinguish if it was different from the second one. Being a novice, I didn’t know how subtle the differences could be. I could not distinguish between the first two, nor the second set of two, nor the third set.
When all the sets were done, we passed the answers to Mr. Nishura on a tray, and he scored and recorded the answers on a beautiful sheet of calligraphy (see photo). The correct answer was that the first two sets were alike, the third set different. Mr. Nishura said that to get a high score is not the point. If you have a high score that means you are very sensitive and that you are healthy. To get a low score means that you are happy.
To be an incense master, you must also have beautiful handwriting, too.
Most of Issoan tea classes are in the evening and students often come right from work or right from fighting traffic to get to the school. We usually begin our class with about 10-15 minutes of zazen. Just sitting with the stillness and breathing deeply helps to put some of the dust of the world behind us, center us and get ready for study.
My students often ask me about what is the correct way to meditate. I don’t know very much about Zen meditation but to get students started, I have them sit seiza (if in kimono) or half lotus (thank you, Jordan) or cross legged. Sitting up straight with ears aligned with shoulders, arms comfortably in your lap, left hand on top of right, palm up and thumbs together. We light the incense, ring the bell and empty our minds. Try counting breaths 1 to 10 and back to 1 again, or just letting thoughts come and go and settle down inside.
Some days I am more successful than others, but when I reach a place of aware alertness, I can hear the sound of the kettle singing without getting carried away listening to it. Sometimes my feet fall asleep and I lose all feeling. Sometimes I just can’t stop thinking about things. Sometimes I really feel my breathing deep in my lungs. And sometimes, not very often, I just sit and hear the wind in the pines and nothing else matters.
There are days when I just go into the tea room to sit. Sometimes just for 15 mintues. It is not necessarily zazen meditation, but just as a refuge from modern life. The walls of the tea room are bare of decoration except for the Zen scroll in the alcove. The floor is covered with tatami mats and I can close the door to shut out the sounds from the rest of the house. No email, or telephone. No distractions. In a way, it is like sensory deprivation.
In this silence, though, is where I can hear my heart beat and feel the breath filling my lungs. Getting in touch again with my body, I can listen to what it is telling me. Am I getting enough sleep? My body will tell me. Am I getting enough exercise? My body will tell me.
I also listen for the small voice inside me. During the day, with all of my other activities, the small voice is drowned out. There has to be a quiet time with no other distractions for me to hear this small voice. It is the voice telling me about what it is I need to do. This is the voice that told me that I needed to quit my corporate job. It is voice that told me I had to do something close to my heart to experience more joy in my life. This is the voice that reminds me to pay attention to my family. This is the voice that puts the tragedies in my life into perspective. The voice tells me that there is more to life than making more money, or marking time until retirement. It reminds me that life is to be lived.
There is a point in the preparation of tea when a silk cloth is folded in intricate ways to purify the tea utensils. Folding the fukusa (silk cloth) at the beginning of temae (procedure for making tea) is a chance for the host to calm him/herself, and get his breathing under control. It is also the time when the guests, watching the host fold the fukusa, begin to breathe in unison with the host.
It is amazing what happens to the atmosphere in a room where everyone is breathing in unison. Awareness and attention is focused, tensions begin to fall away, and a feeling of quiet and harmony pervade the room. This simple act of breathing together reminds us that we share many more things in common than differences. Breathing is life. Breathing together in a shared space underlines that we are all in this world together.
In many ways I can say that I live to get through this moment. That is, I cannot imagine what will happen next week, nor remember what I had for breakfast without stopping to think. But usually that is because I am busy, busy, busy with right now that I don’t have time to remember or think. All I want to do is scratch this off my do to list and move on to the next. I’ve got to keep moving, keep moving or I’ll get behind.
Not just living through the moment but fully embracing it is difficult. We have so little time in our lives with our overloaded schedules that it is difficult to carve out time for meditation or spiritual pursuits. There is always dinner, then soccer practice, getting milk for breakfast, taking clothes to the cleaners and...
So by sheer coincidence, when I do have few minutes before the next meeting, or waiting in line at the checkout, or stopped in traffic, how can I cherish this moment? I have a friend, Al Lee, who tells me that I could do it by taking a few deep breaths. By consciously noticing my breathing habits, I find myself taking very shallow breaths or holding it in, especially when I am under stress, in a hurry, angry or nervous.
Taking deep breaths fills my blood with oxygen, which in turn helps my body function more efficiently. Just filling my lungs fully with air brings me out of preoccupation into awareness. So even when I do not have those stolen moments to slow down or meditate, I can take a deep breath and cherish even the moments when I am busy.
In preparation for one meeting in a lifetime,
I swept and dusted the tea room,
unrolled the scroll to hang.
I set the kettle to boil,
scooped tea powder into the container,
rinsed the tea bowl clean.
I filled the cold water jar,
carefully wiped the tea scoop
and arranged a single flower.
When the kettle
began to sing its lament,
I made you a bowl of tea
though you were not there to drink it.
I heard your step
whispering across the tatami,
glimpsed a shadow of your kimono
in the swirls of steam.
I inhaled the fragrance of plum
on a cold winter day
and sat listening to the wind in the pines.
The tea tasted so bitter that day.
living life
at the speed of blur,
take a breath
That seems to be my life right now -- a blur. But I just attended a seminar on breathing. Breathing is something we do without thinking 24,000 times a day. We can go without food or water for a week to 10 days, but you can count the minutes on one hand we can go without breathing.
In this seminar, we learned techniques on how to breathe consciously and with intention to enhance our health, improve mental and athletic performance, improve emotional well being, and deepen spirituality. It's all as simple as learning how to improve our breathing.
Al Lee and Don Campbell have a book coming out this fall about breathing, As I live and breathe. Look for it. In the meantime, check out their website to learn a few breathing techniques to reduce stress in your life.
