The Way of Tea.

My body is more tea than water at this point...

I drink it constantly. Never long without it.

Tea has been my ally, medicine, hobby, practice, fascination, and love for years.

I've written about the dharma aspects of tea rituals and tea as a complete path.

Tea is a sacred mirror—a moment of reprieve on your long adventure through life.

As you immerse in ritual, tea reflects back everything about your life. Your posture a reflection of your health. Your mental chatter a reflection of your inner world. You read yourself like a book when you begin to notice what it's like to sit in a tea ceremony. Trauma, excitement, nervous system dysregulation, inner critics, workaholism, shaking legs, boredom, peacefulness, overthinking—it's all right there on the surface, staring back at you from the bowl of tea in your lap.

Above all else, this is what tea taught me:

The mind can get in the way of embodied experience.

To know that and to live it are two different things.

I write romantically about tea because it was the first practice that changed everything. It kept my mind engaged while allowing the mind to walk itself to the conclusion that it needed to get out of the way.

I set my mind to the task of noticing everything happening (mindful awareness) while in tea ceremony.

Touch, taste, smell, rhythm, flow, structure, sensation, thought.

It had a task, it was happy. It tuned in and worked hard.

As the mind began to notice how rich the sensory field was in every moment, it learned to reduce its signal and processing to make space for the flow of sensory information.

It concluded that the best thing it could do was quiet down.

• Dance of steam in air.
• Scintillating textures of ceramic.
• Appropriate attitudes for ritual.
• Intimacy in spacious silence.
• Cravings to escape into distraction.
• Fluidity of ceremonial movements.
• Earthy tastes of tea and leaf.
• Warmth of water in the throat and belly.
• Gentle sound of clinking bowls.
• Communion with nature in resolute simplicity.
• Earth, air, fire, water in elemental harmony.
• Remembering that the present is not something that must be avoided.
• Trail of thought as it drifts from thing to thing.
• Strength of spine and body in seated, meditative posture.
• Smooth flow of breath. Warm exhale, cool inhale.
• Freedom found in form and structure.
• Death and rebirth of the self in each moment. Being and becoming fused in a furious dance.

Thus, the mind slowly quieted, sensations and sensitivity increased, and the world of direct embodied experience opened itself to me in glorious revelation.

Transcendent moments of luminous awareness are not the exclusive domain of psychedelics or meditation. 

The End of Time and the Dawn of Presence are available in every moment. 

You live in the rich, organic aliveness of conscious experience. Rendering fully in every moment, and in every moment renewing itself.

Nothing else—yoga, meditation, nature, drugs, peak experiences, writing, snowboarding, martial arts, fighting, reading—taught me that lesson as effectively, directly, and efficiently as tea.

They all work. Tea is just the practice that worked best for me.

Do I still think? Yes, endlessly. But now, thought arises more beautifully, naturally, organically, and brilliantly as steam, music, rivers, and wind in the grass. Passing through, worth noticing, and then moving on.

Thank you, Camellia sinensis. The most ancient medicine, and my treasured teacher.

I love you.

Cha Dao – The Way of Tea,
EB.

ps: If you'd like to explore the world of tea, it was Global Tea Hut that guided me. Endless gratitude for their selfless stewardship.