Tea Here Now embracing the spirit of tea

"In the world of tea each movement in the making of tea has nobility and meaningfulness. The mundane, trivial acts of setting a fire, boiling some water, and making a bowl of tea are lifted to the level of an art form.... In the way of tea this type of transformation is not restricted just to the making or serving of tea, but it can spill over into all of one's daily actions and transform the entire day."

Brother Joseph Keenan

How many processes in life invite us to pause, look within and around, enjoy, and give thanks? Tea has been the occasion for celebrating marriage, for honoring the aging process, for acknowledging the changing of the seasons, and for joining in fellowship and peace. Enjoying tea is one of these ordinary and yet extraordinary activities that everyone can participate in. Whether it is experienced formally, as in the Japanese tea ceremony, chanoyu, or informally, when a friend drops over unannounced, tea is a way to share one's time, thoughts, and heart with another person.

What are your experiences with tea? Warm memories from childhood of tea time shared with a grandparent or an aunt, quiet times at home on a wintry night, a relieving break from a hard day's work, cooling off a hot summer afternoon with ice-cold tea, or simply the memorable occasions with friends glad to be together and share life? Whatever it is that draws us to tea, we can acknowledge that tea is a remarkable vehicle for bringing balance and wholeness, ritual and ceremony into our lives.

Cultivating the Tea Lifestyle

Everything about tea inspires careful attention, from the methods of cultivation to the moment when we inhale the "breath of tea," with its unique and exotic aroma. As health practitioners and daily tea drinkers, we know how tea has benefited and improved our own lives. We feel we are missing something when we don't stop for our everyday ritual of tea drinking. We miss both the simple earthiness and grounding that the vegetative tea drink bestows on us and the simple connection to the natural five elements of life that are found in tea: water (to make the tea), fire (heat), air (wind that feeds fire), earth (leaf), and metal (pot). The tea experience offers a harmonious balance of forces in an immediate way that brings a quality to life we don't want to do without.

Why tea here now? Tea embodies solitude and time for quieting the mind; a time for slowness, introspection, and contemplation; a time to look within and get to know oneself and one's world; a time for remembering all of the Zen monks, Taoist sages, and tea masters who have guided our way to "being" rather then "doing."

Tea encapsulates hospitality, sociability, and the opening of our hearts and homes to share a cup of tea with a friend or an unexpected guest. Tea relaxes us and loosens our tongue, allowing our natural generosity and good nature to come forth.

Finally, tea symbolizes sensitivity, inviting us to become aware of all our senses. It draws us in to notice its aroma, the sounds and touch of water, and the magnificent color of its liquor. As we learn to awaken our senses and to understand the spirit of tea at its essence, we can fully experience the wholeness and interconnectedness of all life.

The Spirit of Tea

In the teapot, something close to alchemy happens — like the fanciful being in Aladdin's lamp, an enigmatic tea genie is born in a watery infusion and dances before our eyes. The spirit of tea would likely be described very differently by different people. It is culture in a teacup, a manifestation of the spirit, lifestyle, folk habits, temperament, and customs of each unique culture that developed a tea tradition. It is the teacup or bowl itself, an appreciation of beauty in many forms, an evolution of vessels that best express the grace, lightness, and delicacy of the beverage.

Tea is an infusion of heated water poured over delicate leaves and left to steep until the leaves release the fragrance, color, and flavor of their essential oils, polyphenols, and nutritive components. When we drink tea, we are savoring a new medium — the essence of the water and the leaves, a liquid both different and greater.

Metaphorically speaking, tea is also an infusion we can take into life. Through the ritual of tea drinking, we can be instilled with qualities that soak us with their essential flavor and leave us with an expanded sense of ourselves. What is worthwhile to infuse? Through tea awareness, we begin to learn the fine art of discrimination. Some experiences are useful and beneficial, and others are useless and even potentially toxic (much like the waste products our bodies regularly eliminate). Through tea drinking, we can use our senses to tell us what to keep and what to let go of. We check in with ourselves to see how we feel before we take our tea and then after. We use our energy level as a yardstick to measure the derived benefit and ask ourselves, "Do we have more or less energy from the tea-drinking experience?" Having more energy might translate as feeling calmer, more alert, clear-headed, and sensitive. A loss or deficit might appear as tiredness, fatigue, weakness, or depression. If you sense you have more energy, especially if this is an experience that repeats itself, then this is a state worth infusing. If you lose energy, then this is an experience to avoid or limit.

Once we know what essential qualities are worth infusing, then we regard them with tenderness and delicateness. Here we metaphorically chew and swallow our experience, breaking it down like a food and absorbing it into our bloodstream of our being. When we assimilate this experience, it becomes a part of us, we merge with it, and it merges with us. Now this quality is ours, and we have ownership of it. Then comes the last part of the infusion process, manifesting what we own.

Manifesting Tea

Manifesting means bringing these qualities into everyday life and sharing them with others — for example, transferring the calm you feel after taking a break for tea and putting it into the stress of a difficult decision-making process at work, which will in turn enable you to offer peaceful, thoughtful insights and creative solutions. It means drawing on the sensitivity you derive from the tea aesthetic and listening with awareness to your spouse and children when you return home from a long day at work. It means using the respect...