Bliss of Tea Meditation
I still don’t know what exactly meditation should be like. Savoring the present moment while having a cup of well-brewed Darjeeling tea…
This is originally my Medium post.
I still don’t know what exactly meditation should be like. Savoring the present moment while having a cup of well-brewed Darjeeling tea seems the closest I can get.
I used to be a coffee addict. There were days when I wasn’t able to get by without coffee. I don’t remember exactly when I started having more tea than coffee. Maybe it all began a decade ago or so, when I was served a cup of properly brewed, good-quality Earl Grey somewhere, according to my dim memory. It was a sheer shock to my senses. I had tasted tea before, of course. But until that day, I had wrong notion about tea, probably caused by earlier memory of an over-soaked, cheap Lipton tea bag.
All of a sudden, tea became my favorite beverage. I even attended tea classes and tried tasting various types of tea. Teas blended with flowers and fruits were the feast for senses. But as days went by, I got fascinated by deep aroma and subtle flavor of straight teas. It took some time for me to love Darjeeling, oolong and finally green tea. And also learned there’s an amazing variety of teas I can explore for the lifetime.
Get the job done with coffee, contemplate life with tea
There’s something about tea. When sipping some tea, you are naturally drawn to its subtle hue and aroma as well as flavor. If tasty coffee is like a sassy black suit, good tea is like a sheer chiffon dress.
While still drinking coffee during the daytime when away from home, I removed my coffee machine a long ago, which teapots have replaced. Coffee makes you sober and help solve problems while tea allows you to savor the moment. Even though it would feel awkward forever to sit down and force me to meditate, the moments of tasting some tea lead me to mindfulness more naturally, like when I practice yoga as I wrote in a previous post. (Tea and yoga are the two pillars of my wellness.)
Have some tea and observe your sensory reactions which slowly take place. Look into the amber hue of brewed Darjeeling or ruby color of Assam. Taste the delightfully astringent flavor of green tea and smell the subtly sweet aroma of oolong. Concentrate on the sensory experience and temporarily forget about all other worldly matters.
Welcome to the world of tea meditation …