Devotion on Messy Days: What Tea Taught Me About My Humanity
Every morning I wake up before dawn to drink Tea. I pour Her ceremonially in the practice of Cha Dao, or, The Way of Tea, which is essentially an hour-long silent Zen meditation - held only by music, curiosity, and the invitation for the mystical to arrive in the space.
In Tea, as in life, there are days when everything flows and is in rhythm. Those days feel good. Really good. But they don’t necessarily support the growth of our humanity.
I made so many mistakes in Tea today. After waking up, more than an hour later than normal and hitting my snooze several times, I was feeling foul - which is not my norm. Putting global unrest aside, there was no reason for it. I am the kind of annoyingly cheerful-in-the-morning person that most people tell to shut up. But today, not wanting to get up, let alone set up tea, I decided to rise anyway.
I decided to Rise.
My word of the year is Devotion, and so, I lit my candles to call in the Ancestors as well as the one I light for me, and honored my past self, who had a firmer grasp on wisdom than I did this morning when I was throwing my temper tantrum at my word of the year.
My cranky attitude continued while setting up the Chaxi, or, the decor and ambience, which I usually love. Witnessing myself in vivo, I had a laugh. My favorite practice is to not take myself too seriously. To love all the parts of me, even the grumpy ones. And to show up, day by day, anyway, no matter the rain or shine of the weather inside of me.
So I sat. And made flub after flub after flub. The mixture of frustration and laughter also continued, until it didn’t. I settled in, somewhere around the third cup. The Sober Journey with my Plant Medicine of choice, as always, did not disappoint. Tea - She held me quietly until I could join Her.
And I realized — just like in life, there are days of rest and relative ease and there are also days of deep learning and expansion. And the messy days are actually the good stuff.
I was out of sync all the way until the last (6th!) cup. By the end of it, I could feel the cheers of my Ancestors affirming that I was getting it. Spill the Tea. Forget the step. Go back. Revisit. Clean it up. Literally and Metaphorically. Start again. And again. And again. Be in your humanity. Learn. Allow.
Accept what is and dance with that.
And with each moment, a whisper, “Can you deepen your unconditional love for yourself? Can it not matter what you do but that you are showing up, willing to try and adjust?” Over. And over. And over again.
In these times, we are all being called to recalibrate and Rise. Can I find stillness in the chaos? Hold myself through the mess? Allow it to not even matter because I’ve got me, no matter what?
By the end, I restored flow to the riverbed. Not because my mood started to clear, but because I kept pouring water, bowl by bowl, resting into a playful state and seeing (and being) the toddler that makes an absolute mess with unadulterated joy and delights the parent (also me) who expects nothing less and is so happy their child is fully alive.
May we never forget what it really means to be in pure presence, which is unconditional love. To not simply tolerate, but celebrate, the path of our humanity. And to offer that out to others once it is embodied within ourselves.
