For new readers, here’s my bio. Explore the full archive of 72 Seasons of Tea across three series: Zen-Taoist Living, Conversations Mostly from Kyoto, Poetry & Roots.

If you enjoy my writings, please consider a paid subscription or donating a cup of tea.

Subscribe now

Dreams: In the Japanese classroom

I am a Malaysian first and foremost. I am also a third-generation Chinese diaspora, with roots in Fujian and Hainan.

Here in Kyoto, as I deepen my studies of Japanese and tea, I find myself meeting more Chinese speakers. The Chinese I had learned since childhood through to high school, set aside during the 20 years I was away from Malaysia, is now becoming familiar once again.

Among the Chinese speakers in my Japanese class, though we come from different parts of East and Southeast Asia, we instinctively understand each other’s jokes, struggles, and dreams — as if tuned to a shared cultural frequency that transcends geographical boundaries.

Taking Japanese studies seriously is no easy endeavor. In a school setting, full completion can take as long as two years, with over 15 hours of class time per week (not including homework, preparation, and review). Even with the advantage of recognizing Chinese characters, adapting to Japanese kanji and the highly contextualized grammar demand a different level of flexibility.

For me as part of the Chinese diaspora, and for others longing to become one, our Confucianist upbringing, the determination beneath our outward lightness, and practical approach to our studies form our shared ground.

Each of us carrying dreams we aspire to reach — dreams of longing, survival, and reimagining what is possible, and even what may feel unattainable, yet still worth striving for.

recently wrote: “Chinese outflow is old and new at once. Old, because the South Seas have seen Chinese movement for centuries. New, because this time the outflow is not proceeding from a weak or broken China. It is proceeding from a strong one.” “Now China is strong. And that changes the meaning of leaving.”

Dreams: In the Japanese tea room

I was intrigued by a post last month on Goals vs Duties by Choong Kien Ying , who writes the newsletter The Possibility of Democratic Choice. What stayed with me was a question he posed to me from our brief discussion.

To paraphrase: “In the Japanese tea room, is it only about being fully present to what is here and now, or does it also include a long-term, lifelong focus on goals?”

My short response was that it depends on the person. Tea can be both about presence and long-term focus, or it can be either, or even neither.

Tea is not black and white, and it can mean different things to different people. It carries the weight of history, culture, and memory. Peel back the deeper layers of tea in the East, and one begins to encounter the philosophical undercurrents of Taoism, Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, Shintoism, and even Western thought - harmonized and expressed in the tea room.

But if I were to pin down just one core aspect of tea that I’m most drawn to, it is this: By being fully present to the here and now, tea becomes a doorway to the lifelong practice of subtraction is addition, that less is more.

The Japanese tea room reflects many Zen doctrines: its ideal is to come closer to nature and the natural way of things, through the practices of simplicity and disciplined removal to uncover what has been there all along.

In The Book of Tea (1906), Kakuzo Okakura wrote: “In the tea room, it is left for each guest in imagination to complete the total effect in relation to himself.” “It was the process, not the deed, which was interesting. It was the completing, not the completion, which was really vital.”

In the dedicated cultivation of an artistic expression, such as tea — some call it the way of tea, many will come to find themselves: what was always there within them, but otherwise invisible.

That is why many of us, myself included, are drawn to tea (or to the creative, ambiguous vastness of the arts) after something drastic stops us in our usual tracks — an illness, or a crisis. In the loss of certainty, we are compelled to confront the illusion of the self we once took for granted.

A crisis cuts through black and white. When we look deeply, the empty space gives way to a more nuanced, layered way of seeing — and the invisible, unspoken, and forgotten parts of ourselves begin to re-emerge beneath the surface of things.

Tea, with its focus on the present moment, becomes a doorway to understanding at a very fundamental level what at first seems simple. And what seems simple is often the result of doing something deeply difficult.

Because in our restlessness and the distraction of noise, we can easily lose sight of the goals we once held for ourselves — almost forgetting how to dream.

Dreams: From the book Zhuangzi

📒 Explore the essay Taoism and Tea: Applications of Eastern Philosophy in Times of Crisis. Co-authored with , awarded 2nd Prize in the Philosophy and Beyond Contest.

I like Taoism because it overturns conventional assumptions. Instead, it invites us to consider the infinite vastness beyond the limits of what we think we (can) know.

In the absence of certainty, we are called to keep broadening our horizons.

It is about breaking illusions through a holistic, embodied way of understanding. One that may include reading, introspection, encounters with others and the living world — from struggling to the very act of living itself.

Early Buddhism can appear goal directed, in the sense that practitioners are taught a path toward enlightenment. In contrast, Taoism does not prescribe a fixed path, but instead reveals who we are as the journey unfolds.

Taoism is multifaceted and can be understood in so many ways, but what stands out to me is that it teaches the humility of acceptance. What we can reasonable see, comprehend, and feel is really just the tip of an iceberg.

And so in the mastery of arts, crafts, or a “purpose”, the real path is actually one of no path.

In Zen (known as Chan Buddhism in China), shaped through the blending of Taoism with Mahayana Buddhism, there is no “pursuit” of enlightenment.

Its world is filled with paradoxical and colorful characters, not only monks, but also lay practitioners and philosophers who embody authenticity in unconventional ways — figures such as Vimalakirti and Zhuang Zhou (generally considered the historical person behind the text, Zhuangzi).

Zen is realized in the ordinary acts of everyday life.

Zhuangzi is known for the Butterfly Dream, a parable exploring the illusion of certainty between dreaming and waking.

A closer reading of Chapter 2 齊物論 Qi Wu Lun, where the passage appears — often regarded as the philosophical core of the Zhuangzi — offers no definitive answer.

Even the title for Chapter 2 resists fixation and has been translated in a number of ways, depending on the translators: Equalizing Assessments of Things (Brook Ziporyn), Discourse on Evening Things Out (Chris Fraser), The Sorting Which Evens Things Out (A.C. Graham), Discussion on Making All Things Equal (Burton Watson).

Our identity is subject to change, since, like everything else, it is caught up in a constant process of transformation. The question of our ‘actual’ identity has no definite answer.

Translation by Chris Fraser (2024): Once Zhuāng Zhōu dreamed of being a butterfly—vividly, vibrantly a butterfly, delightedly doing as it pleased. He wasn’t aware of Zhōu. Suddenly he awoke and was plainly, palpably Zhōu. He doesn’t know whether Zhōu dreamed of being a butterfly or the butterfly dreams of being Zhōu. Yet surely there’s a difference between Zhōu and the butterfly. This is a case of what’s called ‘things transforming’.

Translation by Brook Ziporyn (2009): Once Zhuang Zhou dreamt he was a butterfly, fluttering about joyfully just as a butterfly would. He followed his whims exactly as he liked and knew nothing about Zhuang Zhou. Suddenly he awoke, and there he was, the startled Zhuang Zhou in the flesh. He did not know if Zhou had been dreaming he was a butterfly, or if a butterfly was now dreaming it was Zhou. Surely, Zhou and a butterfly count as two distinct identities! Such is what we call the transformation of one thing into another.

Selected commentaries

Only the great sage, because he is free of attachments, moves directly forward like an oblivious sprouting-forth, one with every transformation. One with every transformation, he roams always in the Singular. So although he may mix and participate in a hundred thousand different harvests, a thousand differences and ten thousand diversities, past and present form a single fully formed maturation, as a course is formed by walking it. — Guo Xiang’s commentary on Chapter 2, Zhuangzi

• The distinction between dreaming and waking is no different from the differentiation, the debate, between life and death. The reason he could flutter about joyfully, following his whims just as he liked, was because these distinctions, and the temporary roles that go with them, are in each moment fixed, not at all because there is no distinction between them. — Guo Xiang, 3-4th century, most influential early editor and commentator of the Zhuangzi; rejects any notion of the Course as creator or source of beings, emphasizing self-generating reality.

• A fully formed mind means any clinging to a one-sided biased viewpoint, limited to one range of emotions or stuck in one set of objects. — Cheng Xuanying: Daoist priest of the early Tang Dynasty; read text through Daoist metaphysics and Tiantai Buddhist ideas.

• When no fixed identities are established, all things can find their function. When no particular merits are dwelt in, all ways can be traveled securely. When no one name is made manifest, all realities are safe from loss. — Wang Fuzhi, Confucian philosopher of the late Ming-early Qing transition.

• The metaphor of dreaming and waking does not mean that life is a dream and death is an awakening. The great awakening from the great dream means that one knows life to be a dream, and thus one does not seek long life, but equally one knows that both life and death are dreams, and so one does not seek the quiescence of death either. — Zhang Binglin: Late Qing and early Republican philosopher and revolutionary, a reform-minded Confucian scholar, strongly influenced by Western philosophy and Yogäcära Buddhism.

To me, the heart of Taoism lies in the spirit of vastness, where boundaries collapse, and so humility becomes necessary.

The book Zhuangzi has been read for over 2,000 years — a living resource with continued reinterpretation across generations, evolving from scattered stories into one of the longest-living philosophical conversations in human history.

Many interpretations of the Zhuangzi today are shaped by multiple influences, including strong Buddhist perspective, as well as Confucianist lens, often without us even realizing it.

The Zhuangzi is not an easy text to read; yet it is a truly beautiful work. One that continues to feel ambiguous and elusive, perhaps because the Way (道 Dao) is all encompassing. Through it run multiple lineages, from philosophical, literary, to the spiritual.

So what is this thing we call life, if not a continuous, unfolding of change? And how do we hold our dreams within it?

To move forward, perhaps, is also to know when to stop the relentless chasing. To live the dream is, perhaps, to know when to accept our limits, while still reaching for that unattainable dream.

For the Chinese diaspora, is there such thing as a singular dream? Rather, these dreams are not fixed, but continually reimagined across time and space — spanning oceans and generations — shaped by untold pain and struggles, yet always holding in view what matters most: in the midst of change, to keep the dream and to flow with change.

Previous posts

• 1 Year Anniversary on Substack

• Subtraction is Addition | 100th post!

• Zen, Taoism, Confucianism, and More — in Tea

• Xiaoyao | Becoming Yourself — Zhuangzi #1 逍遙遊

• Kyoto Journal #110: Color & Kyoto — White Spaciousness

If you enjoy my writings, please consider a paid subscription or donating a cup of tea.

To support my work

If you enjoy my writings, please consider a paid subscription or donating a cup of tea.

To support my work

Taoism and Tea: Applications of Eastern Philosophy in Times of Crisis

Last year, my joint essay co-written with Yuxuan Francis Liu, won second prize in the Philosophy and Beyond Essay Contest — organized by Romaric Jannel.

Click here to read the full essay

In a world increasingly restless, distracted, and fast losing its sense of direction, I hope you enjoy this essay exploring Taoist philosophy on the way of living — through the two concepts of xiaoyao 逍遥 (at ease with the present) and ziran 自然 (naturalness).

To be engaged with worldly affairs, yet not consumed by them — a way of life at ease with the world, yet untouched by its noise, flowing harmoniously with life.

This essay is also one of the four writings featured in the 2024-25 Photo Essay Collection: My Encounter with Tea in Kyoto.

Thanks to Substack, we are connected through a shared interest in Asian philosophy and ways of life.

• Check out ’s Philosophy and Beyond Substack publication, including his Japanese Philosophy Course and thematic essays exploring philosophy, ethics, and technology.

• See ’s Taoism Reimagined Substack publication, with numerous series on Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Ziran or Naturalness, Tao Te Ching, classical poets, and the Wei-Jin Metaphysics.

If you enjoy my writings, please consider a paid subscription or donating a cup of tea.

To support my work

The ability to look deeply is the root of creativity. To see past the ordinary and mundane and get to what might otherwise be invisible. — Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being (2023)

Read more

Each of us had to share three sentences in Japanese — two lies and only one truth.

The game became more difficult as everyone began pressing with detailed questions, “attacking” from different angles to uncover the truth that could withstand scrutiny.

Genuine expertise feels similar.

A true master understands …

Read more

In less than two weeks, I will stand in a public space and speak entirely in Japanese.
For this speech contest, organized by my Japanese language school, I will present a short, memorized speech on tea and its borderless nature.

Today, as the world becomes louder about division, cross-cultural exchange is no longer optional but a necessity — perhaps now more than ever!

Buy me a cup of tea

Share 72 Seasons of Tea 🍃

And by the end of February, I will sit for a series of final exams in Japanese (listening, speaking, and writing) covering everything we have studied intensively over the past six months, so I can finally move on to the intermediate level to dive deeper into the nuances.

In a Japanese tearoom the other day, I could listen to and follow parts of the discussion among Japanese tea people. While I still struggle to fully understand Japanese and hold complete conversations at events, little by little, I feel relieved to grasp more of what everyone else is saying.

A year ago, this would not have been possible.

Crossing borders: From international education, to development, to exchange

I’ve always have a strong interest in international cross-cultural activities and love a good adventure.

Having moved more than 10 times, I can relate to how it feels like to leave everything familiar behind for a new city, to a new country for a better life.

It takes courage to start again, to face fears and the unknown.

I moved to San Francisco without knowing what job I would have or where I would live, and later went on to work with the University of California, Berkeley.

For my first few weeks in Singapore, I stayed in a hostel located in a red light district (unknowingly), just before I started working at the International Relations Office in the National University of Singapore.

In Washington DC, I’ve stayed in a hostel for almost the entire two weeks while job hunting, to eventually relocating to Jakarta — starting my journey in international development.

Here in Japan, I know of Japanese people who would like to move overseas. At the same time, many foreigners are drawn to life in Japan and are doing their mighty best, to build a life here for the long term.

Sometimes you have to take a step back, maybe even ten steps, to move forward. My goal is clear: I want to stay here longer. - Alone in Japan

Zhuangzi and the Empty Boat

There is this empty boat tied to the dock in front of a Japanese teahouse.

Read more

Read more

In Japan, January is also called Mutsuki (睦月), meaning the month of harmony, a time of reunion. Though Japan-China relations are unsettled today, the two countries share a long arc of over 1,500 years of intertwined culture, history, and philosophical thought.

Three years ago, the book ‘Zen and Japanese Culture’ by D. T. Suzuki was introduced to me by a Zen monk. Revisiting it over this New Year holiday, I was struck by how its words now resonated with me in an entirely new way.

What I once glanced through indistinctly now appears with greater clarity and depth. This time around, the finer details are beginning to reveal themselves, and each resonant insight opens up another layer of appreciation.

The words did not change. The reading did. This is the power of time.

Subscribe now

Buy me a cup of tea

A note on Japanese and Chinese tea cultures

Japanese tea culture is often expressed in two traditions, both deeply influenced by Chinese tea culture and refined into uniquely Japanese sensibilities:

I. Chanoyu (茶の湯), the ceremonial preparation of powdered matcha tea, with its inseparable relationship between tea and Zen overtime.

• Based on known history, tea was introduced to Japan as early as the late Nara period (Tang Dynasty in China), continued through the Heian and early Kamakura periods (Song Dynasty in China), and was later formalized during the Muromachi-Momoyama periods (Yuan and Ming Dynasties in China).

• Its history likely started when Japanese priests and envoys to China brought back tea seeds to Japan in the late 8th century, leading to early tea plantations on the hillsides of Mount Hiei. Tea was prepared in hiki-cha (引き茶) style, not powdered, and often served with sweets, herbal medicine, and ginger.

• While tea was introduced earlier, the first major propagation of tea in Japan is generally credited to Rinzai Zen Monk Eisai (栄西), who brought tea seeds from China and wrote Kissa Yojoki (喫茶養生記), the first Japanese book on tea, highlighting its medicinal and spiritual benefits.

• About half a century later, the ritual of tea was brought to Japan by Dai-o the National Teacher (大應國師).

• When China transitioned from the Song Dynasty to Yuan Dynasty, many monks fled to Japan and Zen temples became centers of Chinese culture. After Japan’s Onin War that left Kyoto in ruins (late Muromachi period), wabi-cha or the Japanese tea ceremony we now associate with emerged as people sought spiritual fulfillment.

II. Senchado (煎茶道), the art of steeped loose leaf tea.

• Developed later during the Edo period after the import of Chinese loose-leaf green teas from the Late Ming Dynasty into Qing Dynasty.

• It models closely on the Chinese literati tea culture, with tea as an intellectual and artistic leisure, and a more informal form of Zen-inspired tea practice.

Below is a synthesis of notes I have re-organized by theme and reflected upon deeply during my re-reading of D. T. Suzuki’s Zen and Japanese Culture - primarily via the lens of chanoyu.

Zen and Japanese Culture by D. T. Suzuki

The principles

The philosophy of Japanese tea ceremony is the philosophy of Emptiness, for sabi or wabi is no other than the aesthetic appreciation of absolute poverty, solitariness, and absolutism (beyond duality). - D. T. Suzuki

D. T. Suzuki wrote:

“What is most valuable is gentleness of spirit.” These are the first words from the 17-Article Constitution compiled in 604 by Prince Shotoku, who promoted governance based on Buddhist and Confucian ideals. In the art of tea, “gentleness of spirit” is spoken of in the same spirit enjoined by Prince Shotoku. Gentleness of spirit or softheartedness is the foundation of our life on earth.

Four principles regulate the Japanese tearoom, representing the four schools of Oriental teaching, grounded in Zen philosophy.

• Harmony (和 wa) - social or ethical [Confucianism]

• Reverence (敬 kei) - social or ethical [Confucianism]

• Purity (清 sei) - both physical and psychological [Taoism and Shintoism]

• Tranquility (寂 jaku) - spiritual or metaphysical [Buddhism and Taoism]

Harmony, the first, may also be regarded as Taoist, because one of its practical teachings is to retain a harmonious relationship with Nature.

Tea, Zen, and Emptiness (of duality)

Tea-drinking is quite an innocent deed, and we practice it in our everyday life, especially in the East, but when it is taken up by the Zen-men it turns out to be a momentous event that leads directly up to Buddhahood and its absolute truth.

But the fact is that the Zen masters’ world is not the same as the one in which ordinary-minded, sense-bound people live.

The mountain confronting us is a mountain and not a mountain; the pen I hold in my hand is a pen and not a pen. The Zen-man sees things from this point of view.

Tea-drinking is not just drinking tea; it comes directly from and goes deeply down into the roots of existence. It is the art of cultivating what might be called the inner field of consciousness.

It is the realization of the spirt of poverty devoid of all forms of dichotomy: subject and object, good and evil, right and wrong, honor and disgrace, body and soul, gain and loss, and so on — known in the philosophy of Prajnaparamita (般若波羅蜜多) as Emptiness (sunyata 空).

Connection between Zen and Chan

Zen in Japan is what is known as Chan Buddhism (禪) in China.

Chan is always stimulating and thought-provoking because it goes directly to the root of things regardless of superstructures.

During the Song Dynasty in China, almost all thinkers took themselves to the monasteries to re-examine their philosophy, while denouncing over-intellectualism and ritualization of Buddhism at the time. Chan Buddhism is the outcome of their spiritual adventures.

Strictly speaking, Chan and Zen has no philosophy of its own. Its teaching is concentrated on intuitive experiences. Chan buddhists are sometimes Confucianists (adopting Confucian vocabulary) and sometimes Taoists. And in Japan, Zen buddhists can be all of the above, in addition to being Shintoists with Zen experiences explained by Western philosophy.

Chan acquired its practicalness from Confucianism, with importance placed on the “Four Books” — Great Learning (大學), Doctrine of the Mean (中庸), Confucian Analects (論語), and Work of Mencius (孟子).

The making of Chan Buddhism

Taoism and Confucianism are the two original currents of Chinese thought. Interestingly in Japan, Zen was the agency for encouraging the study of Confucianism.

In China, when Prajnaparamita Sutras from Mahayana Buddhism was first introduced during the second century, thinkers could not grasp the idea of sunyata or kong (空 emptiness), but they found it somewhat similar to the Taoist’ idea of wu (無 nothingness) by Laozi.

Confucian texts themselves were interpreted in the light of Taoism, when Kumarajiva came from India to China in 401 and translated a number of Mahayana sutras.

Read more

Today marks the first full moon of the year. It’s also been two years since I was hospitalized for diabetes. A chronic illness that I am still relying on daily medications and lifestyle changes.

Like my journey with Japanese learning, living with chronic illness is an ongoing journey — not linear,…

Read more

Hello from Kyoto! Writing into 2026~

At the end of last year, I entered this year with a simple intention: to plant seeds with lightness. Taking stock now, I realize that I’ve fulfilled it only halfway.

Planting seeds, yes. With lightness, not so much.

With that in mind, my goal for 2026 is to have less goals so I can focus with an uncrowded heart. After subtracting, writing remains central as I move into this coming year.

Fewer posts, deeper listening.

If you enjoy my writings, please consider a paid subscription or donating a cup of tea.

🤍 Welcome!

Free subscribers will receive:

• Limited free seasonal reflections — flowers, stories behind tea, seasonal kigo 季語, Zen phrases and paintings — along with brief notes from my Japanese learning journey and adventures.

• Occasionally, I will share longer pieces from my series, Conversations Mostly from Kyoto and Poetry & Roots.

• All posts go behind the paywall after 2 weeks.

Paid subscribers will receive:

• Access to the full archive of all posts since the launch of this space in April 2024.

• My 2024-25 photo essay collection.

• A more intimate space for thoughtful discussions.

• A series of thematic essays exploring deeper readings and reflections on what matters, and the space within through people, pages, and places in Kyoto - from gardens to teahouses.

• The warm satisfaction of supporting an independent writer as she fundraises to bring a limited-edition print book to life.

Read more

On returning

November marks the start of the new year in Japanese chado. It is celebrated with robiraki (炉開き), the sunken hearth opening, traditionally around the first Boar’s Day of the lunar calendar, following the Beginning of Winter (立冬).

While beginnings and openings draw the eye, it is the often ove…

Read more

Simplicity —

There is the innocence of simplicity. And also seasoned simplicity, born of experience and shaped overtime.

The first comes easily, perhaps. As natural as a child at play.

But seasoned simplicity takes effort (and patience), when carved through the baggage of time and the weight of experience, becomes far more difficult.

The second takes unlearning and relearning, forgetting and subtracting, reshaping again and yet again — a lifelong return to what is essential.

Simplicity grows elusive when life gets busier, with drown out noise, endless obligations, to-dos today, must-dos tomorrow, each day fuller and filled to the brim.

Simplicity, slipping away just when you think you have grasped it.

Simplicity, as an adult, is far harder. But certainly not impossible.

The second simplicity — our seemingly impossible act — emerges in the emptying. And in our return to it, shines with depth, like water mirroring the sky.

将来の計画

In class on Friday, we had to write a paragraph about our plans for the future (将来の計画 Shiyourai no keikaku) and verbally present it using the different relevant Japanese expressions we have just learned.

Expressions that apply only to instances “within our control”. And I find that even the slightest shift in Japanese words can carry a world of layered nuance.

First thought

たくさん日本語の本を読もうと思います (to omo imasu)。I think I will read a lot of Japanese books.

= A newly decided intention, used when announcing a plan right now.

Ongoing thought

たくさん日本語の本を読もうと思っています (to omotte imasu)。I am thinking of reading a lot of Japanese books.

= Implying that I have been thinking about this plan for sometime, an ongoing thought or opinion.

Fully decided thought

たくさん日本語の本を読むつもりです (tsumori desu)。I plan to read a lot of Japanese books.

= A firm plan, even more deliberate than the above. Conveying a stronger intention.

I find learning Japanese helpful in embracing a return to the beginner’s mind, to not feel embarrass when I speak in broken phrases, to stumble without shame when I make mistakes, and to be okay with being vulnerable.

Each mistake then becomes my teacher. After all, the desire to communicate matters far more than the need to be polished, no matter my language ability.

Writing in Japanese also meant simplicity, conveying my thoughts in sentences far simpler than I would in English.

And when I wrote my future plans in increments of 5, 10, 20 years, it did help in clarifying my thoughts and intention, boiling things down to the essence.

Learning a second language as an adult is, in many ways, a practice of returning to simplicity — deconstructing and reconstructing the world in new ways.

It asks me to set aside the fluency and familiarity of my familiar languages and to start again as a beginner, breaking down old-patterned ways of seeing and thinking and then rebuilding them.

Simplicity, this way, becomes a way of re-engaging the world with fresh eyes and an open mind — seeing, sensing, thinking — attuned to what is essential.

Simplicity found in Japan

...a delicate and slow process of removal to uncover the original taste of each ingredient - revealing a subtle simplicity mirroring the seasons and the soul of Japan.

72 Seasons of Tea 🍃

Subscribe now

Share 72 Seasons of Tea 🍃

There are more than ten of us in the pre-intermediate level with students from the US, France, and over half of us who are also Chinese speakers, which makes kanji a little easier to manage (occasionally, some of us slip up with Chinese words by mistake,…

Read more

Coming soon for paid subscribers!《茶禅人生 My Encounter with Tea in Kyoto》, my debut eBook featuring a curated collection of unpublished essays and photography. It traces my journey since a sudden hospitalization: crossing a threshold to learn to see tea’s subtle interweaving…

Read more

For we must weep before we can laugh. Out of sadness comes the awakening and out of the awakening comes the laughter. - Lin Yutang (1895-1976)

Our world is full of beauty, progress, and innovation. On the other hand, we continue to live with poverty, inequality, and pollution.

News headlines these days are not for the faint of heart. Yet beneath all these noise, they reflect deeper issues. These are crisis of trust. When speed and technology amplify chaos, social cohesion is in need of greater renewal.

Underlying these all, our individual psychological well-being becomes ever more important in distressing and uncertain times. This calls for clarity and inner freedom, the wild and fearless spirit I resonate with in Zen and its Taoist origin (historically paired with tea as a meditative aid).

Yes, we must speak up. And yet, we need to stop waiting for permission to truly live. Steve Jobs who had practiced Zen said, “You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear".

For what is the purpose of saving the world when we don’t even enjoy it now?

The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. 
- Edward O. Wilson, American biologist and naturalist

Zen in Japan & Ch’an in China

Read more

72 Seasons of Tea | Instagram | LinkedIn | About

Hōunsai Sōshitsu XV

Today, I woke up to news of the passing of Hōunsai Sōshitsu XV (鵬雲斎大宗匠) — the Grand Master of Urasenke Chanoyu, peace advocate, and dynamic cultural ambassador.

Devoted to “tea diplomacy”, he once served tea to Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana in Kyoto. As Peace Ambassador for the UN and UNESCO, he carried the guiding principle: Peacefulness through a Bowl of Matcha.

I had not met him, yet ‘Tea Life, Tea Mind is the very first book on the Japanese tea ceremony I ever read, recommended by Dairik Amae. It became an anchor for me in the raw, shocking, disorienting days just after my health diagnosis last year.

His book left a big impression on me.

Tea Life, Tea Mind

These are my loose notes and reflections from reading Hōunsai Sōshitsu XV’s book:

1. Value of learning through our body — Whatever learned through the body would remain for a lifetime. The Way is wherever people discipline themselves through training.

   1. It is not to be found in books. It is through direct experience with our own bodies, and not only our intellects, that we can attain this state (page 57).

   2. Tea, like cleaning, is not a skill to memorize but one acquired slowly by the body and the spirit.

2. Peace through sharing a bowl of tea — The simple act of making a delicious bowl of tea, serving tea with our whole heart, and receiving it with gratitude is the basis for a way of life called Chado.

3. Lean in to the singular transient beauty of nature — Bring to the guest the whole life that lies within each flower. The individual beauty that all flowers possess naturally. Arrange flowers as they are in the field.

4. 無賓主 Muhinshu (nothingness, guest, host) — The idea of no guest and no host, signifying the importance of respecting our mutual humanity with no differences between one another. The most wonderful thing for people who follow Chado is the oneness of host and guest created through meeting heart to heart and sharing a bowl of tea.

5. The place of practice lies in the pure and honest spirit of Wabi (frugality, simplicity, humility) — Tea is nought but this: First you heat the water, then you make the tea. Then you drink it properly. That is all you need to know. Despite how simple tea-making sounds like, the difficulty lies in the path to the attainment of simplicity. There’s no shortcut to arrive to such path.

   1. Silently purify yourself as you go through the procedures of making tea. Listen and acquire a sensitivity to the sounds of water poured from a bamboo water ladle into a tea bowl or kettle. In this pure sound is the realm of non attachment.

   2. To enter this realm is one reason we practice over and over again the same procedures in making tea. Making and drinking tea involves no right and no wrong. It is a simple, open, honest meeting of minds, beyond wisdom, experience and point of view.

   3. At the center of life based on harmony, respect, purity, tranquility 和敬清寂 is that inner peace that results from accepting one’s limits and finding satisfaction within the incomplete. With this peace, dissatisfaction and anxiety vanish, replaced by self possession and composure.

6. Tea as a connection to nature, others, and ourselves — In offering a bowl of tea to Buddha and then presenting to our guests and finally drinking it ourselves, tea and zen become one, helping us to enrich our lives and to feel gratitude and respect for others (page 62).

7. Our spirit should flow through all of nature — Embodying the spirit of 風流 (Furyu; wind & flow) with mountains, streams, flowers, passing of the seasons, we make a bowl of tea. Furyu can be found in the simple acts of anyone’s daily life.

   1. Take a bowl of green tea in your hands and drinking it, you feel one with nature, and there is peace.

8. 一期一会 Ichigo Ichie — Unrepeatable nature of each and every moment. This is a lesson on acceptance to embrace this very moment with our pure heart and spirit.

"Closing my eyes, I find green mountains and pure water within my own heart. Silently sitting alone and drinking tea, I feel these become a part of me." - Tea Life, Tea Mind by Sōshitsu Sen XV

72 Seasons of Tea | Instagram | LinkedIn | About

Tea in peace and turmoil

A cup of tea reminds us of what endures beyond human conflict. Nature in its simplicity, in her quiet ways, unconcerned with boundaries or blame. A reminder of what we have forgotten: how to be at peace, rather than at war.

There’s a lot of worry and sadness in the world right now. Southeast Asia is facing one of its most serious armed escalations in decades. Fueled by political feuds and internal agendas, Thailand and Cambodia have plunged into a military border conflict — civilians caught in a crossfire, not of their choosing.

The two countries have long disputed territory around ancient temples along their border. China, a major arms supplier to both and a key investor in Cambodia, has called for restraint, even as its weapons shape the fight. Malaysia, as ASEAN Chair in 2025, is pushing for a ceasefire and mediation — well aware that ASEAN must act, or risk fading into irrelevance.

As for the rest of us? We watch, as yet another headline breaks. One more crisis in a world too full of them. A world growing numb.

Looking back, tea culture flourished not only in the peace of China’s Tang Dynasty and Japan’s Edo period, but also amid the turbulence of Japan’s Sengoku period - with tea serving both as a symbol of power and refuge for inward retreat.

My entry into tea began with Chado or Chanoyu, the Japanese tea ceremony that uses matcha, or powdered green tea. There is another form of tea tradition in Japan called Senchado, which uses loose-leaf tea.

Both Chado and Senchado have roots in Chinese tea culture. While their forms differ, true tea point to the same direction - a return to simplicity. So, I’d like to stretch our time horizon back to two formative periods in the history of tea and Zen*.

• Tang Dynasty to Edo Period: From Monk Eisai to Layman Baisaō

• Zen, Tea & Painting: Baisaō x Itō Jakuchū

• Zen, Tea & Poetry: Han Shan x Baisaō

My gratitude to Pau Valverde Molina and for their book and resource recommendations, which have enriched my own research - and to for prompting a deeper look into the Itō Jakuchū connection.

*Zen in Japan traces its roots to Ch’an Buddhism in China, shaped by the integration of Taoist and Mahayana Buddhist thought. At its core, Ch’an is a philosophy of life as a way to regulate one’s heart-mind and nurture one’s original nature (治心養性).

Tang Dynasty (618–907) to Edo Period (1603–1868): From Monk Eisai to Layman Baisaō

Read more

72 Seasons of Tea | Instagram | LinkedIn | About

Read more

In Zen Buddhism, the phrase 月落不離天 (the moon falls but does not leave the sky) suggests that even when things change or disappear, their true essence remains.

The moon does not leave the sky. The water flows into the sea.

So how do we see beyond surface-level changes and recognize that nothing is ever truly lost?

Compounding

All the benefits in life come from compound interest - relationships, money, habits - anything of importance. - Naval Ravikant, American entrepreneur and investor

Habits and experiences compound. So do our health, relationships, finances, knowledge, skills, beliefs. And time definitely does.

In mid-life, we are forced to confront the power of compounding. Revealing what has gone right and all that we have done wrong.

Health starts to decline. Relationships fail. Work identity falters. Stumbling into dead ends and detours.

You thought you have it all figured out. But then life throws you surprises, making you question everything held true up until this point.

So what do we do and how do we go about life at this juncture?

How do we avoid further reckless slamming of the brakes?

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear. - Tao Te Ching

Cleaning

Our state of stress compounds too. This is where the power of cleaning matters.

• In Japan, cleanliness is godliness. Shintoism associates evil with dirtiness, good with cleanliness. Before entering Shinto shrines, one must perform temizu, a cleansing ritual of hands and mouth, with a bamboo ladle at the chozu-ya.

• In Bhutan, to celebrate the Lunar New Year, every corner of the homes and temples are cleaned to welcome Guru Rinpoche or “Lotus-born”, a revered figure in Tibetan Buddhism.

• In the Japanese Way of Tea, cleaning tea instruments is vital. Fukusa cloth 袱紗 is folded 5 times with specific ratio, not for the physical cleaning of the chawan tea bowl but for the spiritual cleansing of one’s mind - to remind us once again the essence of 和敬清寂 harmony, respect, purity, and tranquility.

• In Chinese tea, the concept of 醒茶 or waking up the tea is important through 温杯 warming up of tea pot, 茶海 pitcher, tea cups before brewing the tea leaves. The intention is not solely for physical cleaning but to prepare oneself.

Both Japanese Way of Tea and Chinese tea practices bear close connection with Taoism, especially through the concept of yin yang 陰陽 of balance and harmony of the opposites. Fukusa is folded and opened multiple times. Curled closed tea leaves are opened (and cleaned) after being warmed with hot water.

Clean the dust, purify the mind. Tea, similar to the daily airing of our rooms by opening windows, sweeping and dusting, we want our mental energies to flow, rather than being obstructed by pains, sorrows, worries, struggles - stuck in attachments.

In Buddhism, cleaning is significant. Clearing the mind is the essence. The Buddha does not care if the temple is clean or dirty. It’s in the act of dusting that we can begin to accept ourselves, create space, to welcome in stability and greater centeredness.

Meditation, tea, time in nature are just some of the many ways to alleviating stress which we can deploy simultaneously. Seth Gillihan, Clinical Psychologist, shared that we hold the power to change ourselves:

1. Prioritize presence by reconnecting the body with mind, rather than leaving them divided

2. Ease, still our thoughts and the endless stories we tell ourselves

3. Tackle the root causes with presence and ease.

Breathing in, I take in all the good and the bad happening to me. Breathing out, I let the past make way for this very moment, to welcome the opportunity for a new life.

Breathing in, I am. Breathing out, here.

Photos by me. 72 Seasons of Tea | Instagram | LinkedIn | About

Share 72 Seasons of Tea

Subscribe now