Divine Tea Drinking: How you can use this everyday drink for mindful meditation
Millions of us drink tea every day. You probably don’t pay much attention when you drink your cup of tea. But a simple cup of tea can be used as simple mindful mediation which will restore spiritual harmony.
Tea has been around for thousands of years. Although it is now grown in many parts of the world all teas, black, green and white, come from the same plant: Camellia Sinensis. Tea has a divine origin in Chinese legend. One story says that five thousand years ago the Divine Healer Emperor of China, Shen Nong was drinking a cup of boiled water when a blossom fell into his cup. He declared that it must have come from heaven and thus tea was born.
The second story says that the Buddhist monk Budhidharma was meditating but became frustrated that he kept dozing off. So he cut off his eyelids to try and keep awake. The Gods were so pleased at his devotion that they turned those eyelids into tea plants.
In the West we have been drinking tea for a much shorter time than in the East. British tea planters only began actively importing tea to England in the 1830s. Recently, tea has become recognised by scientists for its medicinal qualities, something the Chinese have known for at least two thousand years, using it to treat both physical and medicinal illnesses.
The divine ceremony
Because of the divine origins of tea in Buddhist and Taoist traditions the Japanese and Chinese have always practised tea ceremonies as an important sacred ritual. The Japanese have their chado or ‘way of tea’ and the Chinese have the gong fu or ‘mastery’ ceremony.
Traditionally rooms were set aside specially for tea drinking. In some parts of Japan special pavilions were built. These were built according to the rules of yin and yang and the five elements of water, fire, wood, earth, and metal. To reach the tearoom, you would need to step across a little pond or river which symbolically marked the border showing that you were crossing from the ordinary and the spiritual world. In the divine world of the tea room, you would then drink tea as a form of zen meditation. Every step of the ceremony and every utensil was ordered in a way to balance the five elements, from the fire which heats the water used in the tea, the metal of the kettle and the earth of the pot to the wooden scoop or spoon. Tea comes out of the balance of these five elements and so is perfectly in harmony, the divine product of the universe.
Tea as spiritual meditation
However you don’t need to have a special tea room to create and benefit from your own tea ritual. You simply need to set change the way you drink tea. By doing this you can create what the Buddhists call a mindful ritual every day, living life with less stress and more spiritual awareness.
A tea ritual differs from normal tea drinking because it is a very stylised almost artistic experience. A ritual has an order to it which lifts it up from the ordinary. This comes out of the Buddhist notion that any activity can lead to enlightenment, even something as simple as drinking. Drinking tea with focus and contemplation is a highly mindful experience. Your awareness is taken out of the everyday world and you focus in entirely on the experience of the tea.
In a tea ritual ‘I’ changes to become ‘we’. As you drink the tea mindfully, your sense of self begins to merge with the space around you. Everything in a tea ceremony is designed to please the senses – from the smell and taste of the tea to the colour and warmth of the liquid and the beauty of the teapot, cups and other utensils used in tea making. Each ordinary action within the ritual is done with as much beauty as possible. Focussing on this beauty is a way of getting the participant to act with purpose and self-discipline, and causes like any other ritual, you to look into yourself and discover a way of being which is in harmony with the universe.
The sensory experience draws you into the moment of drinking and as in other forms of meditation, time is stilled, you begin to relax, your breath deepens and your awareness is heightened by the aesthetic pleasures of the moment. Your brain waves may slow into an alpha or trance rhythm. When people take part in a tea ceremony they sometimes comment that the taste of the tea becomes so heightened that it can taste almost as potent as alcohol. This is the effect of being mindful.
If you are drinking tea with other people, then the experience of a tea ritual causes ‘I’ and ‘you’ to become ‘we’. Sharing a mindful experience in this way is a powerful ritual. As you sit together and slowly taste, smell and appreciate the beauty of the tea, a powerful non-verbal communication space is set up between everyone taking part. You are in this space together, experiencing life in a very different way than everyone outside the space. The shared experience brings a bond between everyone involved in the ritual. This is why in ancient Japan political leaders used the tea ceremony as a sacred ritual to strengthen communication between allies and win over enemies. In fact tea rooms were the only place where warring samurai left their swords outside the door and drank together.
Make your own tea ritual
I suggest that you make time for a tea ritual on a daily basis. The ritual below is based on the Chinese gong fu ritual laid out in the book called the Tea Classic or Cha Jing which was written in the 8th century by Lu Yu. In this way of tea making there is a focus on both taste and beauty. The idea is to produce tea which feeds the body and soul at the same time.
The tea which is produced in the gong fu tea making method tastes very different from other teas because it pays great attention to the temperature of the tea and the quantity of tea used and well as the quality of both the tea and the water. Tea masters understand that everything the tea comes into contact with will affect the chemistry of the tea and therefore both the taste and the effects on your body. In the East green or oolong teas are used in tea ceremonies. These also are better for you than the black teas we drink more of in the West but you can make a ritual with any form of tea you like to drink by adapting the basic principles of the ritual.
BOX _ The Tea Ritual
Keep your surroundings beautiful
Tea ceremonies have traditionally been a time to sit and almost meditate, taking a moment away from the stresses of the day to relax and nurture the soul. In the same way as you choose to put a clean tablecloth on your table before making dinner for your friends, make everything beautiful when you drink a cup of tea.
Use tea drinking as a place to breathe and relax even if you only have a short break time during the day. Lay out the cups. Choose a beautiful teapot. Clear a space and put fresh flowers out. Play some music. Listen to nature. Go outside and sit in the sun on a comfortable chair.
Let your tea drinking become a few minutes of ceremony. Every time we relax and breathe more deeply, even if only to breathe in the aroma of the freshly made tea we contribute to our health and wellbeing.
Preparation
Water
First of all empty your kettle out and fill it with fresh cold water. Avoid hard water and hot water. The ideal water for making tea contains minerals but doesn’t have a bad taste or smell. That’s why many tea masters will ideally choose spring water to make the tea. Distilled water though isn’t a good idea either as it will lack many of the minerals which give flavour to the tea.
You will notice if you ever drink tea in different countries how different the teas taste. This is often down to the local water so if you want to replicate this flavour, choose your water as carefully as your tea.
Temperature
If you take tea making seriously, you need to get the temperature right. Not all teas need boiling water. In fact boiling water may harm the flavour of more delicate teas such as white tea. When the temperature is correct for the tea the essential oils of the tea will come out in the flavour. If you buy a good tea, the seller should tell you exactly what brewing time and what temperature you should use to get the optimum flavour of the tea.
Choosing the teapot
Take a teapot. Choose your tea pot wisely so that you can see the colour of the tea in the pot. The tea should look as well as taste beautiful. The Chinese like to use a small teapot made of clay. The minerals in the different types of clay which are used affect the taste of the tea.
Exactly the right amount of tea
Warm your pot. Also ideally warm your cup. The ideal pot and cups allow you to notice the appearance, smell and different features of the tea. Sometimes glass pots are used for flower teas so the drinker can watch the leaves open as the tea brews.
Put some tea leaves into your pot. In Chinese tradition this is called the moment when the black dragon (the tea) enters the palace (the pot). As you can see tea is regarded with respect for its beauty and power. The amount varies depending on the tea. Again a good tea producer will give advice on this when you buy. As an example, for Oolong tea you might use around 1/10th tea, 9/10ths water. The teapot does not need to be full.
In tea ceremonies a wooden spoon is used to measure out the exact amount of tea from its container so as not to harm and break up the tea.
Washing tea
Some Chinese teas benefit from being rinsed first. Measure out the tea into the pot and then rinse the leaves with hot water. Pour the water quickly on to the tealeaves traditionally until the pot overflows and the excess is caught in a tea bowl). Let it steep for a couple of minutes and then discard the tea while keeping the leaves..
Now make the second brew. With good quality teas you can make several brewings out of one set of leaves thought this varies according to the type of tea.
Drink mindfully
Before you take your first sips, stop and smell the aroma of the tea just as you would if you were drinking a good glass of wine. In tea ceremonies small cups are used because the tea is treated as a delicacy rather than something you gulp down to satisfy thirst. You may not always have the time, but where possible treat tea drinking as a ritual, sipping little sips (traditionally 3 at a time) to fully appreciate the rich taste.