17/06/2026
A discourse on character. I have been fixated on the idea of well-expressed character for the last few months after a discussion on the subject with my sensei. If I am on the path of tea, what kind of character do I have? And if I am continuing to expand into the path of tea on this lifelong commitment, what kind of character do I need? What even defines character? This has not been easy to confront, as it exposes and reveals many flaws.
Two years ago, a magnificent 600kg dragon named Black Swan entered my life. This fiery thoroughbred arrived exactly the moment I entered a form of character confrontation, annihilation and purification. He was, inasmuch as my tea practice, a mirror of profound inner reconciliation.
A huge pillar of my chanoyu practice and its forms, principles and philosophies go beyond the general samurai Way, and are formed upon the art of horsemanship.
The horse reveals whether you are internally unified or fragmented. Character shows if you are the kind of person the horse can trust. The horse is diagnostic, it is the laboratory, and it is the refining function itself.
These principles and expressions mirror the way of tea. Tea has an unfailing mechanism of reckoning one’s character. This comes from its embedded principles, the very integrity it requires of you, and the simple fact that really good tea is only prepared as a result of one’s development, in all layers.
Tea also requires it as the foundation of relating, since tea is shared, served and received. Preparation, serving, and receiving require presence, timing, observation, and relational integrity. These can’t be performed, they can only be honestly embodied or the expression is distorted. Tea reveals the degree to which the qualities required by the form have been developed within the practitioner. Like the horse, tea returns your state back to you.
Read the full discourse on my Substack - link in bio.
