My Healing Coffee Ritual < The Happy Monk Baking Company

When the morning light brightens the windows and consciousness seeps through my slumber, I think of … coffee. Not in a Homer Simpson way (“Mmmm, coffee”), not enough to make me leap out of bed right away. Coffee’s more of an entry ramp to the new day. And there’s time to enjoy my Java across the morning.

It’s not the caffeine hit I’m after. I don’t need it to wake up. Instead, it’s the ritual I love. Measuring and grinding the beans, boiling the water, setting up the filter, and pouring the water carefully over the grounds. Heating the cup with the boiled water, timing the pour-over. Cleaning and putting the Chemex away so it’s ready for the following day.

Each step is performed in the correct order at the right moment. Step by step, moving forward almost without thought.

Pleasure in the process

I like the steps. I perform each one knowing that I virtually guarantee myself a great coffee experience. In the end, four mugs of Java are in a vacuum-sealed carafe. I spread it out over a couple of hours (if there is time) with music, reading the news, poetry or a novel. Having a conversation with Jennifer.

I make Jen’s coffee, too, just to be precise. She prefers a café latte, which I make with an espresso machine — a bean-to-cup automatic Jura Ena 8 coffee maker, which grinds the beans, steams the milk and dispenses a pretty darned good latte.

Many steps are involved in making the latte, but no more exacting or involved than my pour-over.

What does that say about my personality? you might be wondering. This exacting process must be followed with the utmost devotion? “Everything in its right place, everything,” sings Thom Yorke in the Radiohead song. “Don’t touch me, I’m a real live wire,” David Byrne of the Talking Heads sings.

Everything in its right place

I’m no control freak, believe me. I know that external events have shaped my life far more than any effort on my part to create and follow a plan. Most plans have gone awry almost as soon as they’ve been formulated. I’ve started and restarted plans and most often given up.

But many things that have “just happened to me” have worked out profoundly. I had no plans to acquire specific friendships; for example, they just walked into my life. Falling in love and having remarkable kids … each one appeared randomly and worked out better than I could have planned.

And some things have not worked out so well.

Fear and grief

Nearly 10 years ago, Jennifer got a cancer diagnosis. It was dire! Neither of us had imagined this; the uncertainty it unleashed was almost too much to bear. The fear and grief were enormous. It was hard to see anything beyond the cancer. It disrupted every plan we had.

The doctor said, “Get your affairs in order; go to Hawaii. That’s what I’d do.”

And we did that. 1 When we returned, someone suggested Jennifer see a Buddhist monk in Vancouver who worked with cancer patients. Such are the things that open up for you in these times.

The monk in the track suit

Ironically, he lived in Shaughnessy, one of Vancouver’s most affluent neighbourhoods. No monkish asceticism, no life of poverty here. Instead, old money, grand mansions, and tree-lined drives. We were greeted at the door by a young man wearing a t-shirt and jeans and shown to a room off the entrance hall. He returned a few moments later with another man in a tracksuit.

The man in the tracksuit was John, the monk we had come to see. He was a Chinese Buddhist living in Vancouver who wanted to “cure the West of the epidemic of cancer.” John spoke little English. The man in the T-shirt was the translator.

John was tired, he said. He’d just got back from a game of golf. Would we like tea?

The healing tea ceremony

John taught us many things and offered great hope, but the way he made tea was no less remarkable. It was a ceremony, and he revelled in it.

He presented the value of prostration before the Buddha and how to release years of karma. There were 12 ways to follow the Buddha, he said, and taught us the medicine mantra and how to say it. He joked, laughed and scolded us, all while he was making tea.

The tea-making never stopped throughout the visits. John was attuned to our cups, knew when we needed more and went through the entire ceremony many times. He overflowed his teapots and emptied them into cups to warm. He talked continuously and asked questions, only pausing to let the translator speak … all the while refilling our cups and making tea. The tea was made from pieces of compressed tea broken off a large round wafer.

Mantras and prayers

He was purifying us, I imagined, clarifying our bodies and minds with his ceremony and tea. I imagined he silently intoned mantras and prayers, even as he maintained a steady stream of questions, instructions, and jokes with us.

Once, when he might have seen me looking suspicious, he left the room. Fifteen minutes later, he returned in ceremonial religious garments. “Sometimes people need to see these clothes,” he said with a raised eyebrow. “I usually wear my tracksuit on the second visit, but I played golf today.”

One time, John visited our Vancouver apartment and requested tea. He said we should purchase a Buddha and keep it prominent. He told me to silently say the medicine mantra as I made it and keep the cups hot.

10 years later

On one of our last visits, he told Jennifer that she would still be on the planet in 10 years and that she could help him rid the world of cancer if she wanted. Shortly after, he moved back to China. And she is still here.

Jennifer and I believe her survival is thanks to any number of factors. The great oncology team at the BC Cancer Society might be one. The targeted treatment that halted her tumour might be another. And not to forget our life in Pender Island’s rural splendour by the Salish Sea

We have no idea which factor contributed the most.

But John the monk’s work with us was no less critical. Though neither of us has much to do with Buddhism, I still find myself saying the medicine mantra he taught us, looking at the Buddha statues around the house.

And I often think of John and his tea-making ritual when I participate in my morning coffee ritual.

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