The Deep Meaning Behind Tea Ceremony's Most Famous Concept
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The Deep Meaning Behind Tea Ceremony's Most Famous Concept
Ichigo Ichie - One moment, one meeting. One chance in a lifetime.
Sado, Japanese tea ceremony, is famous for 一期一会 Ichigo Ichie; One moment, one meeting, AKA one chance in a lifetime. As with many things, though, it took me a long time to realise what this was actually about.
Or, at the very least, my understanding has evolved over time.
As I understand it, Ichigo Ichie is like that most core element of Zen, of appreciating the moment for its fleeting nature. Ichigo Ichie is letting the moment last for as long as it needs to, not trying to prolong it unnecessarily, and focusing on simply being.
But, of course, I found that there was more to it than this simple explanation given to foreign tourists trying tea ceremony for the one and only time in their life.
I’ve always found it ironic how Japan is famous for its minimalistic aesthetic that emphasises extensive areas of blank space, yet Japanese TV shows, websites (cough, Rakuten, cough), pamphlets and the like are almost exclusively regurgitated text spewed over any available space.
Marie Kondo of The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up fame’s YouTube thumbnails in Japanese and then English prove this point immediately, but different languages and cultures, which are the same thing, often portray the same thing in different ways.
This much is obvious as they are serving obviously different audiences, yet
Ichigo Ichie is no different.
The English wikipedia entry for Ichigo Ichie says:
The term reminds people to cherish any gathering that they may take part in, citing the fact that any moment in life cannot be repeated; even when the same group of people get together in the same place again, a particular gathering will never be replicated, and thus each moment is always a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
Whereas the Japanese page also has:
茶会に限らず、広く「あなたとこうして出会っているこの時間は、二度と巡っては来ないたった一度きりのものです。だから、この一瞬を大切に思い、今出来る最高のおもてなしをしましょう」という含意で用いられ
Not only limited to the world of tea ceremony, Ichigo Ichie more broadly describes the notion of ‘this time we are sharing together is a one-time never-to-be-repeated thing. So, I will treat this moment with the respect it deserves, and give service to the best of my ability’.
This is very much related to the world of tea ceremony with the customer-server reference.
But there’s even more to it:
さらに「これからも何度でも会うことはあるだろうが、もしかしたら二度とは会えないかもしれないという覚悟で人には接しなさい」と言う言葉。
‘it’s possible that we will indeed meet again, but we have to interact in the knowledge that it is within the realm of possibility that this is our last ever meeting’.
Does this change how you view Ichigo Ichie? Does this change how you view meeting people?
It does for me.
Ichigo Ichie’s true power lies is in the interactions you don’t want to have. The meetings you wanted to skip but were dragged into. The event you went to out of courtesy to your friend. The people you came across in the supermarket you never wanted to talk to again, let alone see their face.
If we can recall Ichigo Ichie in these situations, it makes things go much more smoothly.
I like to think of Ichigo Ichie being less about meeting people though, and simply being more about moments. That way even when we are alone we can gain from this most insightful of Japanese concepts.
Meeting the world’s best Waidako (Japanese drum) player
I was watching Taskmaster the other night, and one of the tasks was ‘get goosebumps’.
Turns out I should have just listened to Harada Yoshiko’s drumming.
Master Hoshino always says music and dance originated in prayer. Sounds combined with dancing were originally how we paid our respects to the kami, buddha, or whatever you believe (or don’t). Over time, they evolved into what we now call music. Interestingly, one main difference between Noh and Kabuki theatre is that Noh is performed for the kami. Kabuki is performed for an audience of us mere mortals.
Harada-san dedicated her performance to the kami of the Dewa Sanzan, and gave us, and undoubtedly the kami, chills from the outset.
Once crowned the best Wadaiko (Japanese drum) player in the world, Harada-san’s performance was intense to say the least, and it also happened to be one of those chance encounters.
I’m really sorry about missing Mountains of Wisdom last week. The truth is, I was busy on the mountains doing yamabushi things like this. I also had a chance encounter with Fujita Issho (Zen monk to the left in the photo), the second head director of the Soto Zen Buddhism International Center in San Francisco.
It’s not every day that these things happen, so when they do, you have to cherish them!
On The Blog This Week
This week, my most popular post was Expectations Kill Reality. Extraordinarily extraordinary was also popular.
Plus:
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Ka kite ano.
Tim.
Translation my own.