As the sleek shinkansen bullet train
glided noiselessly into the station, I watched a strange ritual begin.
During the brief stop, the conductor in the last carriage began talking
to himself. He proceeded to perform a series of tasks, commenting aloud
on each one and vigorously gesticulating at various bits of the train
all the while.
So what was he up to? You could say he’s practicing mindfulness. The Japanese call it
shisa kanko
(literally ‘checking and calling’), an error-prevention drill that
railway employees here have been using for more than 100 years.
Conductors point at the things they need to check and then name them out
loud as they do them, a dialogue with themselves to ensure nothing gets
overlooked.
And it seems to work. A 1994 study by Japan’s Railway
Technical Research Institute, cited in The Japan Times, showed that
when asked to perform a simple task workers typically make 2.38 mistakes
per 100 actions. When using shisa kanko
, this number reduced to just 0.38% – a massive 85% drop.
Mindfulness is moment-to-moment awareness.
This
may seem a long way from mindfulness, which in recent years has become
synonymous with what the Japanese call zazen – meditating cross-legged
on a cushion. But according to Jon Kabat-Zinn, Professor of Medicine
emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, where he
founded its renowned
Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic
in 1979,
mindfulness is “not really about sitting in the full lotus…
pretending you’re a statue in the British Museum. Simply put,
mindfulness is moment-to-moment awareness.”
And this
present-moment awareness has been deeply ingrained into the Japanese
psyche for centuries. You don’t hear people talk about it, but it
manifests itself in myriad ways.
Tea ceremony, haiku and cherry-blossom viewing,
for instance, all share a heightened appreciation of the moment. In tea
ceremony, participants take time to notice the design of the cup before
drinking and appreciate the decoration of the tea room, which reflects
the foliage and blooms of the month. But beyond that, the ceremony
celebrates the fact that this moment with this person in this place will
never happen again.
This moment with this person in this place will never happen again.
Haiku
poetry, a Japanese literary tradition dating back to the 17th Century,
elevated this celebration of the present moment to a world-renowned art
form. Haiku poets attempt to capture the moment’s essence in just 17
syllables, using evocative images from nature to convey a Zen-like sense
of sudden enlightenment. The most famous one is Matsuo Basho’s frog
haiku, which translated from Japanese reads:
An old ponda frog jumpsthe sound of water
And
nowhere is this celebration of the moment more evident than in
cherry-blossom viewing, which sweeps the nation like a fever every
spring. Why such excitement? Precisely because the blossoms are so
fleeting, lasting only a week or so. “Transience forms the Japanese
sense of beauty,” said Zen priest and garden designer Shunmyo Masuno.
Transience is celebrated in dozens of
lesser-known practices too, such as moon viewing. You can’t help but
admire a country that sets aside a special evening in September for
contemplating the full moon. Or that holds lavish festivals to give
thanks for the work done by inanimate objects, including everything from
old kitchen knives to
calligraphy brushes and even
used sewing needles.
Transience forms the Japanese sense of beauty.
And
there are the growing ranks of Moss Girls. Inspired in part by Hisako
Fujii’s best-selling book, Mosses, My Dear Friends, moss-viewing has
become increasingly trendy, especially with young women, who go on
guided tours to Japan’s lush moss-carpeted forests. This goes way beyond
just stopping to smell the roses: Moss Girls get down on hands and
knees with a loupe to contemplate the lovely lichens.
And while to
the less mindful among us moss may seem insignificantly small, no Zen
garden is complete without its moss-covered rock or stone lanterns. It’s
the living embodiment of
wabi-sabi – the spirit of humble, rustic impermanence that defines Japanese aesthetics.
But
there’s more to Japanese mindfulness than gazing at bugs and blooms.
Countless practical applications govern virtually every aspect of daily
life, all designed to help you ‘be in the now’. At school, days begin
and end with a short ceremony, where greetings are exchanged and the
day’s events are announced. Before and after each class, students and
teacher stand, bow and thank each other. And before starting the lesson,
students are asked to close their eyes to focus their concentration.
Similarly, construction workers engage in
collective stretches to limber up for the day’s work. In the office, a
colleague will tell you '
Otsukaresama', (literally ‘you’re tired’), as a way of saying thanks for the work you’ve done. At meetings, hand someone your
meishi (business card) and they'll examine it carefully and make a comment, never dreaming of just sticking it in their pocket.
These
practices are a way of what Kabat-Zinn calls ‘purposefully paying
attention to things we ordinarily never give a moment’s thought to’.
They help keep you conscious of where you are and what you are doing
throughout the day, rather than stumbling from one hour to the next on
autopilot, focused only on going-home time.
Like so much of
Japanese culture, the roots of all these customs lie in Zen.
“Mindfulness has been part of the Buddhist tradition for centuries,”
said Takafumi Kawakami, priest at Kyoto’s Shunko-in temple. In the
Kamakura Era (1185-1333), Zen became popular among the samurai class and
had a formative influence on the arts, including tea ceremony,
flower-arranging and landscape gardening. In the Edo Era (1603-1868), a
time of peace, Zen found its way into the education of common people.
For its practitioners, Zen is an attitude that
permeates every action: bathing, cooking, cleaning, working. “Every
activity and behaviour in daily life is a practice [of Zen],” said Eriko
Kuwagaki of Shinshoji Temple in Fukuyama, Hiroshima Prefecture.
A delightful old Zen story, collected in Paul Reps’ 1957 anthology of Zen texts,
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones,
illustrates this point. After studying to be a Zen teacher for many
years, Teno went to visit Nan-in, an old Zen master. It was raining
heavily and, as is customary, Teno left his clogs and umbrella in the
entrance before entering Nan-in’s house.
Every activity and behaviour in daily life is a practice [of Zen].
After
greeting each other, Nan-in asked Teno: “Did you leave your umbrella to
the left or right of your clogs?” Unable to answer, Teno realised he
was still a long way from attaining Zen, and went away to study for six
more years.
Most of us might not want to take things quite so far.
Nevertheless, Nan-in’s question remains relevant, as more and more
researchers are discovering that present-moment awareness not only
boosts stress resilience and well-being, but also lowers levels of
anxiety and depression.
Leah Weiss, a senior teacher at Stanford
University’s Compassion Cultivation Program, is one of a growing number
of experts who advocate ‘mindfulness in action’. This is something to be
practiced throughout the day, rather than just for 10 minutes’
meditation. Weiss described it as “becoming mindfully aware of your
thoughts, feelings, and surroundings even while you’re engaged in some
other activity.”
So how can we put a little more mindfulness into
our lives? Start with something simple, like a bit of pointing and
calling before you leave home in the morning. Lights off? Check. Windows
closed? Check. Money? Check. Phone? Check. You’ll never forget your
keys again.
Then maybe you’ll have time to stop and notice the moss.
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