How do your travels enrich your everyday life?
I’ve spent part of my journey to Japan on the Amami island into the primaeval forests, to get by in today’s hyper-prompt world — disconnection, all of the on-ness. The remote location and its people opened me up to new points of view on how to approach life.
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I am an optimist. I am not naive that the next few decades will bring many fundamental changes to the way we live. At the same time, I see individuals and certain societies capable of change, and I consider that the narratives we make for ourselves set the course for how we think and live.
The wilderness and peacefulness of the island and rural Japan seemed like a unique place to get me back to the present. Besides, the modern Japanese citizens today are often as much in need of their ancient cultural wisdom as western citizens.
Despite its popularity among the Japanese, the mysterious isle, not far from Okinawa, is lesser-known in the international tourist circuit. Combined with its remoteness, it poses a challenge for the English-speaking traveller. Although, in my experience, they provide English-Japanese support by contacting the service. Still a challenge if you want to explore the island by yourself.
Surrounded by all this omnipresent natural world noise, I felt incredibly vigilant and dialled into my senses. How could I not? Giant cicadas were making an unusual noise, birds singing, hermit crabs at the beach, and being mindful of the snakes that could rarely be seen at the roadside. It was not a time to tune out.
It was here on the untouched planet by humans that I discovered the meaning of ichigo ichie — appreciating the fleeting nature of everyday moments. It describes a cultural concept of valuing the unrepeatable nature of a moment. The term has been translated as for this time only and once in a lifetime.
I knew I wouldn’t be back again as it’s a very remote location. So we tend to elevate the experience best.
The origins of the ichigo ichie are rooted in the Japanese tea ceremony — an elaborated ceremonial ritual in which Japanese tea masters prepare and present Matcha (powdered green tea) to guests. The origins of are back in the XVI century when the tea master Zen Buddhist Sen No Rikyu coined the term to indicate that both the host and the guest ceremony must recognize this is one time and never replicated again.
For centuries teahouse guests have been given great respect to their hosts by treating the Japanese tea ceremony like it was the only time it could ever happen. Even if the same group and location come together later, the experience will still be different.
Later, when I landed in Fukuoka, I experienced the tea ceremony coincidently when I visited the Shofukuji Zen temple. The temple is the first Zen temple constructed in Japan, according to the local sources I spoke with in the temple. When I experienced a genuinely zen ceremony, I connected the new word I had learned in Amami.
One of the core teachings is that all moments are transient and everything is impermanent. It means you should give value to every moment in your life, especially all the time you spend with everyone you meet. Living this way helps me stay present and appreciate each new day. If I feel unbalanced, I take a different route to keep the core and feel more in tune with my core values, so I keep myself vigilant about my steps.
Slow travel is always deep learning once you encounter places and immerse in different ways of living, communities and cultures. This travel added a few points which I aimed to incorporate into my life once back home:
1- Bringing the outdoors inside
I loved the experience of living in a ryokan. The smell of the tatami mats helped me feel present when I was indoors — a constant reminder that nature was just outside the door. So bringing the natural aroma of nature inside through hoods can energize or relax you depending on the time of the day.
2 — A simple gesture
Bring something meaningful with you that makes someone, your group of friends or coworkers, joyful. You increase the positivity around and also goes back to you.
3 — Mastering a skill
Quick or easy shortcuts have risen in our busy society, encouraging people to do anything with lots of steps. But one way to forge at the moment is to be involved in something with detail and deep attention, learning how to master the skill. In that way, the focus is on the process. One of the inspiring moments I encountered was during the matcha ceremony mentioned above. The practice applies to what we want to master in our life.
Those were learnings I have started to incorporate more after back home. I began to interact with a different perspective on the moment’s meaning and what makes it meaningful. How do your travels inspire you in your day-to-day?
