The (Slightly Ridiculous) Healing Power of Tea

Stress and anxiety are among the most common reasons for clients to come to counselling or psychotherapy. In my own practice, many clients who come because of stress or anxiety have already tried meditation, mindfulness, and a host of other treatments that are suggested by friends, family, or the internet.

The most common reasons that I hear for why those things (which really do regularly work) have failed is that the client cannot tolerate the process of meditation, or they have tried using guided meditations from YouTube and they find the voice irritating, or that they believe that they are simply too easily distracted to meditate. I can completely understand this point of view, most of the YouTube guided meditations are quite annoying and the mid-roll ads definitely interrupt the flow.

Meditation, and mindfulness, while sometimes overused, can be powerful tools in the treatment of stress, anxiety, and panic disorders, so for me, it seemed important that these options remain on the table for my clients even when they had experienced difficulty with them previously. One of the most important and commonly overlooked things about mindfulness is that almost anything performed in a mindful way can become a meditative experience.

A couple of years ago, while watching a documentary about porcelain, I saw a Japanese Tea Ceremony and I was struck by the care and precision that was required to make something that many of us take for granted. The Japanese Tea Ceremony is heavily influenced by Zen Buddhism and requires each action to be carried out precisely and attentively from the preparation of the pot to the consumption of the tea itself. However, to create a meditative experience from tea (or any other warm drink) in your own home, there are a number of things that have to be worked through. Many clients find this process to be a little ridiculous and it can occasionally result in clients laughing and generally finding the whole process at the very least a little bit strange.

Step by step, I ask that my clients try to think about their ideal warm drink. I ask that each client find their cup or mug. This process can take a few attempts as I ask them to consider every aspect of the mug, from its size and shape to the feel of the surface. Then I ask them how it might be best to hold the mug and what it might be like to hold either the bowl of the mug or the handle. The aim is for the client to attempt to communicate their experience of the ideal mug. Once we have settled on a mug, we can move on to the process of making the drink, in this case, tea.

I ask that the client thinks about how they make their ideal cup of tea. Do they use a pot? Do they use loose-leaf or bag tea? What kind of tea would they use? How much milk? Do they need sugar, if so, how much? Slowly, we work through the process of making the ideal cup of tea. At this point, between sessions, I begin to ask the client to practice making their tea and having it in their mug. I ask that they try to follow their own formula for the ideal tea in the ideal cup and that they attempt to take time to enjoy the tea. As the client gets used to taking this time, I invite them to examine the experience of both the preparation and the consumption of the tea more closely. I ask them to try to communicate their experience of the tea and what they think might help them to immerse themselves more fully in the process.

This point is usually where the client begins to question again the purpose of the tea (sometimes even my sanity). By asking the client to share with me their experience of tea, the aim is to help them to establish a connection with the feelings and bodily sensations that accompany drinking their tea. The purpose of the tea is to provide a focus for all of their senses. Touch, taste, smell, sight, and even the sound of the kettle boiling all play a part in the experience of tea, however, there is also another sense that is triggered by the tea.

T his sense is what Peter Levine calls the felt sense, it is the sense that connects us to our internal feelings. By using all of these senses to explore their experience of tea, the client practices remaining in the present moment, connected to both themselves and to the environment around them in a peaceful, mindful way. Many clients, at least initially struggle with this exercise, and that is OK, because, like all things mindful, it does take practice and a certain amount of being kind to themselves.

This exercise isn't a guarantee of a stress and anxiety free life. This may or may not work for any given client, but it costs very little to make a cup of tea, and if it does work for some people who have struggled with stress or anxiety, then that's great. For those people that it doesn't work for, maybe painting, sketching, or fixing a car might work better for them, but at least they might have managed an uninterrupted cup of tea.

Stephen MacGarry | Click here to contact me and find out more about my practice.