Art of Living, and Matthew McConaughey's ideas, compared to Buddhism

 

credit The Art of Livin' site

I recently watched almost all of a special live event, The Art of Livin' (not "Living;" that's an Indian self development organization), primarily hosted by Matthew McConaughey, the Hollywood actor who ventured into self help / life advice.  It was ok, with some significant limitations.  It's still being shown at that link, and probably through a Youtube post, but they say that they'll take it down soon.

It doesn't naturally make much sense to compare it to something like Buddhism, which is usually taken as a conventional major religion, but as I see it Buddhism, at its core, is really practical psychology, or a very early form of "self help / life coaching."  It's a lot to get to, so I'll be skimming over essentially every part, but it all links, and Buddhism informs perspective on the rest.

Event / ideas presented overview

Matthew McConaughey was the main speaker and presenter, covering the most material, with four others supporting him.  I'll not go into too much detail about specifics; this definitely won't be a complete summary.  It was hard to keep track of whether any of the speakers or sessions were making clear or actionable points, even though it all sounded ok if you didn't think it through too much.  Then if you did the scope was always a bit general, often more motivational than actionable.  My memory of it won't do summary justice but let's sample a little.

I'll also not not really address the folksy tone, use of music, signaling graphics (eg. hearts and stars background), laugh track, and other sound track input to help signal audience reactions, and themed background setting to help set tone.  It was set up well.  A Zoom meeting audience interaction theme was more of a symbolic attempt, and a way to charge extra to people who wanted to feel more involved.

McConaughey (what they kept calling him; somehow the one-name form seemed catchy):  apparently this extended ideas from his "Green Lights" self-help / life coaching book.  In theory he was going into greater depth about what red, yellow, and green light type conditions mean, how to evaluate each, and what role those play.  Those are circumstances in your life when the going is easy (green lights), or difficult or relating to impasses (red), and I never caught on to what yellow meant.  

Since the overall main theme was this event selling a longer, later, differently formatted life coaching package (for $400, I think it was) his input was limited and spread around different topics, more about what he would tell you more about later.  He almost did more with building a character / persona than actually communicating anything, playing drums, wearing a wrinkled, buttoned down, and folded sleeves dress shirt, not shaving for days prior to look more natural.  All the hosts but Marie had deep tans for the event; it was as if they were all on a beach vacation.

Tony Robbins:  the biggest name in motivational speaking / life coaching; it was repeated that he's been at it for over 40 years.  His content was ok, well presented, smoothly outlined, just also not so substantial.  His main advice was that fear limits your ability to redefine yourself, to take chances, and achieve optimum life results, absorbing too much focus.  Ok.  

At least his skill in presenting such messages in charismatic, storytelling fashion came across well, even if the content itself didn't say much.  He recommended buying Matthew McConaughey's further help package, including some content (a module?) of his own, and no doubt making a cut from sales.

Dean Graziosi:  apparently a main organizer, a partner of Tony Robbins, and another life coach.  He did a couple of intro segments, and presented a "Find Your Why" themed segment (which may be someone else's framing of similar ideas; the coaching ideas tend to repeat).  He seemed fine, if less charismatic and genuine than Tony Robbins.  

McConaughey was pulling it off slightly better too, but leaned into the manically happy / folksy character a bit too much, adopting presumably organic looking mannerisms like chewing on his fingertip to seem natural, beyond all of them waving their hands a lot.  They're all salesmen, literally admittedly so, so seeming like salesmen may be something that should be forgiven.

Marie Forleo:  I've never heard of her, but her talk was ok.  The core idea was that if you say that you don't eat sugar (cake, soda, whatever) instead of that you can't that it's a psychological trick that makes it stick better (applied to whatever topics).  Sure, maybe.  But then it seems like the kind of person who can drop sugar out of their diet won't be affected by such simple tricks, and for others who would struggle to it also might not help much.

Trent Shelton:  he covered the most typical motivational speaker range, "you can do it!," examine your strengths and weaknesses, don't listen to the doubters, I believe in you, and so should you.  I couldn't finish watching that part, even though it seemed short.  I watched some later after it was over, enabling skipping around; I couldn't sit through 6 or 7 hours of all of it live.  

At the end it cut off abruptly, without any closing or notice it was going to end, presumably so those people who bought in for the full experience could hear more, that ending part.  It seemed like they wanted to communicate that the buy-in had extra value, but couldn't spell that out clearly without it seeming offensive to the free viewers, so it just cut out as a result.  Live viewership had dropped from 300+k to around 50 later on anyway, so only a small proportion caught that.

Strengths of the material and event:  it was free.  For people on the right page the fact that it could be edited to one fourth the length without cutting out a single idea probably wouldn't matter, because they could probably enjoy the experience.  There is a shorter edited version of the event out there somewhere (identified in an email response, since I got on a mailing list to sign up to see it), but I'm not sure if Google search can find it, or how long it would be around.  It will surely go in later related content packages.  

Surely parts of the content must be more useful and seem more creative to others than I'm framing it.  Aspects were very well done, and the advice was fine, it was just much longer than it needed to be.  

The speakers kept saying "write that down!," and in some comment feed notes people said that it seemed worth unpacking more later.  They kept using audience input (as comment streams) to create a feeling of engagement, just stopping short of saying that "we are a community," or maybe drifting over that dividing line just a little here and there.  No doubt the paid package version will add to that.

Weaknesses:  it was as much a long ad for the next packaged advice as actual packaged advice.  One fourth of the content was explaining what was coming, in general terms, and lots only summarized what had been said, and included small talk between hosts, with no significant content.  The folksy tone was stretched a bit thin.  Bongo drums were employed to make it feel informal and organic, points were repeated over and over for emphasis, and the Zoom call audience engagement background context employed was strange.  Periodically a speaker would say something like "I can relate to you, Ann, Bob, and Dave," and with thousands of people in a Zoom call it hardly mattered if those names were on a script or were actually read off small video call labels.  I like the novelty, but the effect was just odd.

It all seemed to add up to targeting people who are easily manipulated, who would "fall for" one cheap and easy emphasis trick after another, like warm smiles, a sunset background effect, overlapping messages that gave it a continuous feel, and really obvious examples to highlight every point.  Maybe all that shared input was from genuine comment streams, or maybe not, and again it kind of doesn't matter.  It's an old speaking engagement trick, like asking an audience to greet the people sitting beside them, which of course they couldn't use in this context.

If the life coaching / motivational range was more substantial I think these packaging issues wouldn't matter; it would still be great advice.  I'll go out and read Green Lights, just to get a deeper take, but I don't think it's going to matter.  There is really solid advice in conventional wisdom, but many of us have experienced more than half of lifetime of exposure to that kind of thing already, so we kind of get it.  

All of us could do more with our lives, or appreciate things more, or re-balance life components, but little enough of all that was presented seemed like real "tools" to do so.  It was fine, the kind of decent advice a well-meaning friend might pass on:  look at things from a different perspective, ease up on doubts from time to time, try to get some space from your own pre-conceptions to see other alternatives or new directions.  It probably sounds like I'm criticizing the examples here for being overly packaged and trite but they were really fine, very well crafted and communicated.

How Buddhism differs, why it's better:

I'll need to cut short what Buddhism really is, and 99% of the teachings and concepts, to make it one more section in a set of several, but let's go there.  This won't include my own background with Buddhism, but I wrote about that sharing some ideas here awhile back.  Buddhism passes on life coaching advice (really!).  The core message is that the main source of our own unhappiness and dissatisfaction isn't external, not that we lack something, or resulting from unique personal weaknesses, or problems, but instead that problems are added to life experience as unhelpful assumptions, and faulty perspective, built into how we interpret reality.

with one of our cats, who I met as a kitten at that temple

Let's step back just a little, to set the ground for how it works:  reality is actually a construct of ideas (mostly), not something external that objectively happens to us.  Matter is real, for sure, and our model for what a human organism is works well (an animal that can think, and so on), but a lot of what we experience is from layers of assumptions and ideas, from framing conventions and societal inputs.

A good example is self-image; what is it that makes someone beautiful, and someone else ugly, and why is it that clothing and image conventions distill down to a lot of clearly defined sets of norms?  Facial symmetry, healthy skin, preferred skin color, height, in-fashion body shape, fitness:  all of these come into play.  But layers of other conventions add to that, about hair style, accessories, and clothing choices.  Just from the last, styles, brands, quality level, cues related to what was spent on the clothes, color choices, and so on build up to an image of "who" someone is.  Expectations come from fashion trends, as much as anything else; the right people can easily identify who is out of touch or perfectly up to date.

Someone's physical demeanor really sets the context for others, their body language, "indexing" what they should expect for level of attractiveness based on the person's self-image, but that starts in on more complicated scope.  Posture tells a story, and speech forms and patterns convey a broad range of different information.  

So where am I going with all this?  The rest of our reality is equally complicated, and equally adopted as assumptions, versus being a series of necessary conscious choices.  Could we "quit doing" most of it?  Sort of, but not exactly.  There is no default neutral clothing style choice, or hair style, fitness level, and so on.  So what does all this mean?

It adds up, in such a way that we end up chasing these details relentlessly, whether we intend to or not.  McConaughey actually said roughly that at one point, but he was talking about finding value in what we pursue, not examining and re-structuring how normal reality is framed.  It's different.  You can stop doing fads, to some extent, like wearing or owning the next trendy thing (eg. using a two year old Andriod phone versus the latest Iphone version), but that would never typically drill down to a conscious awareness of the almost exclusively unconscious levels of worldview, self-image, and perspective building.

this is my son as a novice monk, one related role in the Buddhist religion.

Buddhism explains to us how to access and understand this level of reality.  It's actually quite close to impossible to do so, because listening to six hours worth of four speakers' life advice is a good example of the noise that we would need to filter out to ever even begin.  Cutting deeper than ordinary, surface level perception alone is relatively unthinkable, without taking steps that few people would ever become aware of, never mind put into practice, which would take unreasonable time and effort.  

We literally can't notice it all to think about making more sense of it, based on using typical inputs and approaches.  So what kind of additional tools am I talking about?

Teachings (part of the eight-fold path, one teaching form):  I'm describing an error-theory general sort of range of structure of reality; that's part of what Buddhism is.  I'm not going to make the mapping more complete here, because again I'm only trying to sample 1% of all Buddhism to show what it is, and trying to get to 10% would make the effort less manageable and successful.  The teachings include a model of reality, but it's not about how things really are, but more about limited basic structure and then the assumptions that go wrong, all relating to practical advice about adjusting perspective.

Meditation:  a tough one!  How is it possible to reduce mental noise, the instinctive mental following of all the ideas decades of life have conditioned us to naturally experience?  Meditation helps.  It sort of calms the waves of a noisy mind, building up a bit more resilience and neutral balance.  That only goes so far, and working up to more effective practice takes a lot of doing.  Encountering good advice about forms of practice is all but impossible; I spent time ordained as a Thai Buddhist monk (a bit over two months) and the input I ran across there was quite mixed, some good, some quite unhelpful, but none of it an easy to apply short cut.

Mindfulness:  meditation and teachings alone wouldn't be enough; even adding mindfulness still isn't close to enough.  This is a developed deeper awareness of momentary reality.  What is that all about?  Normally we grasp the ideas we are conditioned to follow, just the next things we are supposed to want, or feel attraction or aversion to, or extreme boredom if none of either is present.  Training to experience momentary reality more clearly helps us see this experience for what it is, to notice the assumptions in play.

One part is seeing the odd relationship of the present moment to the distant past, recent past, immediate future, and distant future.  Usually at least one of these other contexts is soaking up more attention than the actual present moment, in lots of different ways.  

Maybe it's the motivational-speaker input that we can always strive to do better, we can be more, we can unlock our unique potential, stop limiting ourselves, etc.  All that is advice to put more attention on the immediate and distant future, next steps and then where it all leads, which indirectly de-emphasizes the present moment.  Or for many regrets and anxiety tie perspective more to the past, to expecting negative patterns that either have happened before or may happen, even if they never yet have.  There's plenty of risk to watch out for, in many contexts, or baggage to carry, but the present moment absolutely also requires quite a bit of attention, in order to go well.  Appreciating the positive could fall off the list of things to do entirely.

It's not just about staying in the present moment, or being aware of where urges are coming from, where attention gets stuck, or self-image concerns; it just keeps going.  When we lie to others we set up a mis-match between what we think and experience and what we communicate, juggling one more factor.  When others lie to us there are plenty of telltale signs of this happening in them, and it can be off-putting when you train to experience it more directly, and see it for what it is.  

Then from there all the layers of current culture's assumptions add a lot of weight to momentary experience.  These include the  boundaries of social contexts, settings, and roles, and all the positive and negative inputs of all sorts of social ties.  

Not that it's all mostly negative; I don't mean that.  It's noisy, whether you experience it relatively directly and openly or not.  Someone could try to stay within a very narrow perspective lane, to not venture out of their own sub-culture group very much, and that really might help turn down the noise level, and eliminate some contradictions.  Or taking time off other people to spend time in nature would be even better, or at least turning away from a smart-phone screen or television a lot of the time, which fragment our attention span into seconds-long experiences of content all competing for our attention.

How Buddhism teaches us which parts are problematic for us:  any guesses?  It's back to meditation.  The parts of reality that are problematic for each of us are going to keep running through our thoughts, like a computer program that gets a bit hung in spots, wasting RAM.  The emotional reaction sticks with us, even though it would be really easy to miss where that negative input is entering in, among all the other noise.  

It might be like a knee problem that is caused by an initial issue starting in the hip or ankle; the apparent "pain point" might naturally seem to be somewhere else than where the real cause is located.  Just sitting and letting your mind re-run what it can't drop could help.  Or I guess dreams can contain messages, and conventional self-awareness still works, but I'm focusing here on extra tools Buddhism adds for us.  When you sit and still your mind some noise won't drop out, and often that's a clue there is a problem within that scope.  Later the calm comes easier, and stays with you better.

The problems are different for everyone; this is an issue that is so self-evident that any motivational speaker is going to mention that, even in shorter segments.  Self-image is all-consuming for some, or baggage from past traumas or negative associations, or the pressure of external goals, which motivational speakers would generally advocate accepting.  Then those speakers could easily say that they've moved beyond over-doing it (as one did in The Art of Livin' content), after relentlessly chasing a dozen different directions and seeing 3 or 4 really work out had bore fruit in their own cases.

None of this is ever laid out in clear steps, or clearly defined, partitioned, functional descriptions.  Why not?  Because Buddhism has picked up an awful lot of noise over the last 2500 years.  Just consider how degraded Christianity has become:  Jesus' core message is clear enough, to treat others well, to be humble and generous, selfless, and so on, but that's often lost for other "core" teachings input.  Literal belief in superstitions, rituals, abstract social roles, archaic church practices, even "prosperity" teachings were all added to that core message later.  

Why would Buddhism be different in this regard?  There are a dozen different ways to make wishes defined in Thai Buddhist practices, and original Buddhism has little to nothing to do with making wishes.  The chanting in religious ceremonies isn't magical in function; that was a way to preserve oral teachings.  "Karma" is surely nothing like modern religious teachings portray it.

A second problem applies equally to life coaching advice and Buddhism:  if the problems and resolutions are different in different cases the presentation can only be so targeted and clear, for a broad audience.

So how do we access valid, functional, clear Buddhist teachings?  To make a long story short, we don't.  It's close enough to impossible.  Someone like Thich Nhat Hanh was a genuine teacher, but there are so few of those kinds of references out there.  I guess we just have to sort, filter, and make due with what's available.  Real life experiences are the main teacher, with the other input just starting points to work with.

Ordinarily a ready answer would be "sangha!," that the fellowship of other Buddhists helps teach us, the community.  Today I'm not so sure that's helpful.  Discussion in Buddhist groups almost always reduces down to each person one-upping the last in relation to having memorized their own school's set of definitions, while rejecting all others.  It's a shame.  It would be nice if the core of the sets of teachings was so uniform and common that it wouldn't matter, but the schools aren't that consistent.  And personal practice only gets so far in every given case, as is true again for Christianity.  Learning the ideas is one thing, then digging down to deeper levels of understanding and adopting them in practice  are two other things.

What about the overlap of all this with the "Art of Livin'" input?  There must be some.  Those speakers weren't passing on bad advice.  Folk wisdom is useful; it sticks around and is constantly reinterpreted for a reason.  It's just not the same kind of thing.  

My grandmother taught me to not hold onto unhelpful ideas, or to adopt the stress and conflict others are inclined to feel; her expression was that it's all like water off a duck's back to her.  To me that's a closer parallel to Buddhism; engage the sets of ideas and opinions that matter to you, that are worth working with, and just leave the rest alone.  It's the opposite of reaching out to that higher potential within you, becoming more prosperous and whatever else, much more deconstructive in nature.  

I forget the codes they kept using in those talks for making more money.  What you might achieve was always framed in positive, friendly, tone-neutral terms, about self-empowerment and expression and such, but parts were clear references to being more wealthy.  Which is fine, but it's mixing messages to slip in other general framing of being more self-actualized with the quite natural appeal of greed.  You can be rich!  Your wealth can finally outrun your desires to buy things, and give you power, status, and security!  It's what people wanted to hear, so the demand was fulfilled, just in indirect terms.  Maybe not the "road map" part, but what better way to serve the purposes of the content creators than to offer a part two, for more money, that promises to really fulfill that, just next time.

Buddhism teaches us that it's a bad goal to try to fulfill all your desires; narrowing or eliminating most is much more promising, or just shifting perspective a little.  It's practical; it could actually work.  Surely Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk aren't falling short for fulfilling every one of their financially oriented desires; they can literally afford to pour money into the pursuit of going to the moon, billions of dollars worth, thousands of millions.  But the rest of the problems wouldn't be lessened for them.

Didn't those motivational speakers seem truly happy though?  Maybe.  It's also possible that they're good actors, or that they love fulfilling that role, being a performer and life guide.  It's not as if they've all not performed as those characters in hundreds of public speaking engagements.  Check out Matthew McConaughey in any related public speech, like a university graduation ceremony.  He seems personable, comfortable, folksy, wise; essentially exactly the same persona, one that overlaps with his movie characters.  And that is probably one side of his real personality; why wouldn't it be?  Plenty of people are like that, some of the time.  Some are happier than average, as people go, and others might just be better at maintaining that context.

Which range of life coaching or practical psychology is more practical?

I don't think it's a practical alternative to put a few dozen hours into studying and practicing Buddhism, instead of seeking out life coaching input.  Even ramped up to the few hundred hours level of study and practice finding good references is just too problematic.  New Age interpretations of Buddhism are plagued by superficial levels of evaluation, emphasis on Asian imagery and ceremonial forms instead of applying the core themes.  Most guru types are best avoided.  Ordinary psychology might be a much more reliable reference, if that wasn't also problematic for lots of other reasons, too deep in theory, and also contaminated by varying pop interpretations.

For people who just need some kind of positive input and reinforcement this Art of Livin' approach is fine.  3 or 400 dollars is workable for many people who need that affirmation and range of good advice.  They would see it all as 100% positive, in spite of the limitations, because that's how our ordinary binary processing and filtering ends up framing things, as good or bad.  Maybe "good" is the right judgment, for many.  Or they could just read related books, and watch TED talks, and whatever else is out there that's relatively free instead.  

Any of that wouldn't be packaged and sold in the same way, lacking the heavy layering of reassurances, the repetition of ideas, folksy communication styles, bright and easy smiles, simulated group consensus and shared experience, and so on.  It's all nice, I guess.  Unless the parts that are supposed to be "behind the curtain" seem completely obvious, then it's one part good advice and also partly a carefully packaged grift.  I liked how well they supported that part, so to an extent it was entertaining seeing how well it was done.  If this was changed around to the form of a seminar on how to sell people on material with relatively limited substantial content it might be very worthwhile.

Best case, long term, how do practice outcomes differ?

This is a more interesting way to look at it; assuming both work well (which is a big "if"), how do results differ?

These life coach speakers are offering a range of different advice, from small tips to adjust a very limited practice (stand up straight), to perspective variations (how do your choices and goals seem looking back from the end of your life, hypothetically?), to trying to empower courage to make a lot of brand new starts.  In theory maybe it could lead to radical success, to someone being able to completely redefine themselves, to start a new career, to pursue a successful relationship, etc.  

If there isn't a practical toolset to really do that, beyond a motivational push to take chances, and be positive, then perhaps it's not fair to say that almost anything can be achieved based on following this advice.  But again at the core it seems geared towards selling people on them being able to make more money.  You have to listen closely to the list of goals they promote, and notice how coded phrases are what really seem to resonate with the audience (be prosperous, experience security, etc.).

Buddhism isn't geared towards people gaining wealth, or really even as centered on acceptance of having limited financial success, to dropping all material focus, to the extent one might imagine.  It's just about something else.  The end goal is to reshape perspective and worldview framing so that the experience of owning things, being defined by external imagery, and not really trying to gain power, wealth, or status, so becoming rich doesn't match up.  

A limited personal account of perspective transition

I can't describe what the shift has been like, since I started trying to embrace the ideas and practice a long time ago, 30 years back.  Gradually it took, to some extent.  I don't worry too much about money, even though I kind of have to now because we just moved from Bangkok to Honolulu, and I don't have a job in place that covers this cost of living appropriately.  Even then it's easy to place the stress; I take it for what it's worth.  

Stopping personal spending was unnecessary because I left that habit behind long ago; I own enough, unless a special need comes up, and I'm not always considering what snack or drink to have next, or which dinner foods to consume.  I keep it basic, which is healthier anyway.  Really it's all the rest that factors in more, subtle ways in which viewing the world and acting within it play out. 

To be clear I'm no Buddhism exemplar; the point here is to pass on what limited perspective shift and practice look like.  That's what just generally failed to be summarized clearly, how my worldview and self-definition have changed, not describing some variation of enlightenment.  Let's keep trying.

I feel comfortable in my own skin, I think.  It's not so difficult to notice which themes and moments I should be focusing on and enjoying, and which parts are noise, which is why I'm focused mostly on sharing this time with my kids, for the last 14 years, and supporting their life experience.  That works a lot better than chasing my own hobbies and aspirations, or really it is that, where I place my own meaning.  I keep tea interest as a way to write and connect beyond that, in part because it stays limited well.  For people who collect pu'er maybe not, as I also do (tea that ages to improve), but I buy a limited amount every year, of limited quantity, and don't worry about it too much beyond that.

My kids feel that support as a main life input, and react by feeling peace and connection in their own lives, and we all thrive more as a result.  To be clear I'm not proposing that supporting offspring is a highest possible value.  Not having kids is fine, and if someone had children but focuses on career instead, or two parents do, and a nanny raises the kids, then that could be fine, a very effective solution.

Before having kids experience of nature was more of a connection for me, a way to truly be in the moment, and experience external beauty and novelty, and physical demands.  Related to the last point I run now, a good way to compress a lot of that input into limited time.  I'm still failing in bringing it across as a distinct perspective and worldview, right?  The broad themes would vary by person, and the noise that drops out is hard to describe.  I don't worry about who I'm supposed to be, or how others see me, or getting to some specific status or wealth level, which drops out about half of the issues they raised in the initial Art of Livin' selling points.

Again I'm not necessarily recommending that people look into and take up Buddhism.  I feel it is appropriate to shift theme here and say a little about what I would recommend though, to close on that.

Doing your best within your own life scope using current perspective and tools is fine; ordinary introspection is really effective.  Taking a walk is a great meditation practice, probably a much better starting point than seated meditation.  Just turn the music off, and keep your phone in your pocket.  Notice what stresses you, and emphasize things that really mean more in your life, the connections to others, not so much what you might buy from Amazon, or which phone to get next.

I think if anyone wants to dig deeper looking externally instead works well now, versus this inside-out approach.  Placing social media use and its impact on your life is important.  One might really consider what this liberal and conservative divide is all about, and what is separating people into those two groups (in the US, at least).  I don't mean which parts of "your side" is clearly superior, and the other's completely foolish; consider why it either evolved naturally or was externally reinforced for people to be separated into two broad groups.  Who does it benefit?  Then from there unpacking internal biases can help, sorting through what inputs seem to add stress, then trying to moderate that influence.

One last point is perfect to close on; it can get lost that life experience doesn't always have to be about what we want at any given time, what we experience, and own, our image status, and what upsets us.  It's possible to put emphasis on helping other people, or at least also valuing their experience of reality.  This happens naturally when parenting, which is nice, but then it's easy to slip into trying to condition your children to be however you think they should be, or else take an opposing hands-off approach, and then deal with where that leads.  In every interaction with other people there is opportunity to appreciate and enjoy how they experience the current circumstances, or in negative contexts to genuinely empathize.

Just being open to how others see and experience reality is more liberating than it would seem; we can end up trapped in the noise we create, endlessly caught up in cravings and aversions.  Life can be nice when things are more still too, sometimes, but it helps a lot if your mind is quieter.  Good luck appreciating that quietude with young kids around, but at least then a range of different inputs can still shift you off ego-based obsessions.

appreciating shave-ice, and good company

Free tea tasting in Kapiolani Park (Honolulu)

 

The tea tasting I just held went well, in Kapiolani Park, in Honolulu.  Many thanks to all who participated!  Seven people attended, beyond myself, and my kids stopped by while they played with a volleyball in the park.  We tried most of the teas I had planned to share, swapping out one Thai sheng version for another, and adding some of a black tea I hadn't listed.  Here was that original planned list, in the main Reddit post notification:

Shui Xian oolong, 2022 version, Fujian roasted, twisted style oolong, from a Bangkok Chinatown shop

Shu pu'er, 2017 Menghai version from Moychay

Sheng pu'er, 2018 Yiwu "Lucky Bee" from Tea Mania

Sheng pu'er, 2022 Thai wild forest origin version from a Moychay local production initiative

Sheng pu'er, aged, to be determined, probably a 1980 Thai version from Wawee Tea

I added a Wawee Tea compressed black tea (shai hong), the last tea I've reviewed here, and tried Wawee Tea's sheng pu'er instead of the Moychay version mentioned.  There was no particular reason for the change, there's just something catchy about the Wawee sheng I thought they might relate to.  I'll break down reception of the teas separately, but wanted to overview how it went first, and cover some "lessons learned" thoughts first.

As usual it started late; always the way, but there was a Hawaiian band performance and dancing in a pavilion right beside me to catch.  Using a picnic table in the park was no problem, it just wasn't in the shade, and I ended up a bit sun-scorched as a result, as some guests may have.  All the other details came together, buying some extra cups locally (more spare gear is still back in Bangkok), hot water, etc.  It proved easy to manage, because two people showed up first, then two more, then two left and two joined, so it stayed small.  

The guests joining weren't tea enthusiasts, and had mixed background with tea, but that worked really well, because staying on introductory discussion wasn't too boring for some who had been through all that.  The guests were very pleasant; it can be hard to appreciate how a positive, smooth discussion flow evolves because of everyone's input, but it was like that.  Most people in Hawaii are nice, somehow.  It might seem early to say that, or based on limited exposure, but this stay of 3 months spread over the last 8 or so comes after going to grad school at UH Manoa here, which involved very few negative experiences

That one point brings me to the main thing I think could've potentially went better; I probably talked too much, going on and on about tea background.  People joining might've felt more engaged if they had more space for their own input.  We didn't really get into the tasting notes theme much, sticking with basics, why some teas are compressed, how aging works out, basics of brewing, on main types production inputs, oxidation versus fermentation, storage conditions for aging tea, etc.

Kalani, my daughter, joined at one point to pour tea; that was nice.  My kids have practiced a good bit at home with chrysanthemum, a pleasant and mild tisane, since their mother doesn't let them drink much tea.  I made all the tea with a small gaiwan, which is a Chinese term for a lidded cup.  For a very small group, 5 or less, that still works ok, but it would've went better using a 200+ ml gaiwan (which I have a number of back in Bangkok), instead of having people drink 30 ml or so at a time (a fluid ounce, here), hardly any.  I didn't even include a sharing pitcher in the gear that I used (gong dao bei / cha hai / fairness cup), so slight variations in infusion strength experienced on each round could've come up.

that assistant at a different local park

It went well enough that there's not much to list out for what could've went better, so I'll move back to reception, what guests seemed to make of it.

the tasting set-up and space beforehand

Diamondhead!  none of the pictures do justice to the feel of that space.

a cool stand of trees we were in the midst of

Reception / impressions of the teas

We started with a modest quality Wuyi Yancha (Wuyishan area "rock tea"),  Shui Xian oolong, which only either the first two or first five people tried (easy to lose track).  It's a decent representation of the general range, without notable flaws, and significant roast input, but complexity, intensity, refinement, and depth all could be better.  The basic taste is good for that tea, for inexpensive blended Chinatown versions.  That one isn't really over-roasted or thin, not off in any way, with good sweetness and some nice flavor range.  They seemed to like it.

Shu pu'er isn't for everyone, and that earthiness from the wet piling fermentation, a taste a lot like peat (or even dirt, sometimes), appealed to some and not as much to others.  The novelty seemed well-received.  That's actually a pretty good version, a well-settled Menghai version, from Moychay, and I think that helped, it being better than the rough-edged and limited quality Honolulu Chinatown version that I just had with breakfast.

Sheng pu'er is where things get interesting, because the bitterness either would appeal to people or not so much at all.  And this is also where getting mired in too much background context discussion probably limited more interesting talk about what the people joining made of the experience, what they noticed for flavor inputs, how feel or astringency aspects worked out, and how it worked overall.  I really love that Thai sheng version, but it took me years of exposure and acclimation to like that range of teas as much as I do now.  None of what we tried is really "factory sheng," anything like typical Dayi / Taetea or Xiaguan versions, which are often made from more chopped material, that is often slightly lower in quality, a bit challenging and in need of aging transition input.

The Yiwu we tried later on is better, in a limited sense, more interesting and complex for showing off how some years of age changes things, and in a good place for an optimum for not being a challenging tea to begin with.  Again I didn't prompt discussion enough to get clear feedback about how the two differed per guests' take, but maybe it was a lot to process for them, for going through one type range after another.  They would've needed to either talk through background a lot (as we did), or focus in on experiential range, but covering both could've been a lot.

The aged sheng pu'er version wasn't as positive as I'd hoped, the Wawee 1980 version.  A tea needs to have the right starting point to age well across so many decades, and most versions, even many sheng pu'er versions, would just fade, and slightly odd age-input tastes like mustiness or storage-area flavors could stand out more than positive transitions from an originally very intense tea character.  It was like that; interesting, not really including much for off notes, but clearly quite faded.  I explained how you need a Menghai-type character to begin with to have the potential for very long term aging (if 43 years is seen as that; the pu'er world is so focused on novel experiences and one-upmanship that for some that could just seem like normal range).  It was still interesting, and generally positive, just not including the depth that I'd hoped for, those incense spice or aged furniture notes, evolving positively over rounds.

I wanted to add more on what people seemed to connect with most, but it already seems implied.  All the range of these teas was unfamiliar, for the most part, so the learning and initial experience seemed interesting to them.

That leads to another context theme:  what teas would be more ideal for an introductory tasting than these, what would I have guests try if I had access to everything out there, instead of what I usually drink?  I've only brought a dozen or so tea versions with me for my stay here, of 2 or 3 months.  A visa processing errand will bring me back to Bangkok, either for a week or two or potentially for longer, depending on how job hunt issues work out.  That job search isn't clicking yet; I've had no luck in getting IT services / data center quality assurance / ISO process implementation / internal auditor work to transfer to openings here, but I'm still optimistic.

I usually recommend that people should start on light rolled oolongs, like Fujian Tie Guan Yin (with Taiwanese alternatives often a little better, with careful sourcing).  Or else flavorful, complex, approachable Chinese black teas, like Dian Hong (Yunnan black tea, which is really a broad range).  The one compressed shai hong, a Thai version, isn't too far from Dian Hong range, but it's less flavorful, less sweet, and not in quite as positive a range as more fully oxidized, oven-dried versions in a similar range.  

that Thai shai hong cake; like pu'er, but a little redder

Rolled oolongs I recommend because they're really approachable, pleasant with no acclimation, and easy to brew, in addition to being good at different quality levels.  Light versions can be sweet and floral, and with more oxidation cacao and fruit tones, or whatever else, can enter in.  Lots of sheng is astringent and bitter instead, really rough-edged in lower quality versions, but even the versions I love are surely better with lots of prior exposure.  Shu is fine for a starting point, I think, but then half of everyone would dislike that earthy range.  The roasted oolong we tried, Shui Xian, isn't bad for early exploration, and the roasted flavors range might be familiar to coffee drinkers.  Other versions have more depth and refinement to offer, but starting out with plain and basic examples seems fine.

Lessons learned for a future outing (I probably will do another later)

I think I'll improve as a host if I don't get too caught up in being busy with preparation details and mind how much personal perspective sharing everyone is able to offer.  The most open and outgoing guests, people with the opposite personality type I normally exhibit, in group settings where I'm not essentially presenting, would find openings to share, but that could leave out some others.  I don't think I "talked over" people much (maybe a little?), but I could've been more aware. 

There isn't much I would change.  To try out a different theme it would be interesting to split the difference between describing background (about the teas) and personal experience, what everyone made of it all, especially focused in on people who were less inclined to share thoughts, to give them their own space to share.  It would be nice to switch up tea range but I only have so much with me; I could support another tasting with different versions, but most of the range would be similar.  

I have two more really old sheng versions, samples, from the 70s and 80s as I remember, and either one of those may be much more ideal to show off the potential of that range.  Or both could be quite limited in different ways, maybe really musty from wetter storage input, too heavy on one odd flavor, or from that time period fermentation can transition them to mostly tasting like charcoal.  All of that is why that one aged tea seeming a bit faded by age isn't so bad; it all has to come together for the most positive aspect range to really shine, which is true in different senses across most tea categories and types.

I'd like to close with thanks to the people joining; meeting them all was great.  The mix of people at any given tasting is as much an important part as the teas, the gear and other details, or the host, and it all came together just fine.

that general area, from visiting friends' condo with a view of there

this zoo parking lot view shows just how close it all is to the ocean

Kailua, a more remote beach on the east side of Oahu (later that day)

the view in the other direction, later with some clouds moving through

Wawee Tea compressed Thai shai hong (Yunnan style sun-dried black tea)

 

these images are from trying it back in Bangkok

This is a tea I received just prior to leaving Thailand, that I'm only now getting around to writing about, nearly a month after first tasting it.  It's good.  This particular style of tea has aging potential, so in a sense the experienced aspects are subdued, or maybe not even optimized, related to processing leaving potential for positive future change.  It will work well to say more about that along with the tasting notes.

The producer FB page is here and main website is here.  I've been writing about other versions, mostly sheng, so this post isn't really about introducing them or that other range.  This tea is sold out, a post there said, pretty early on after it was pressed, so it's as well to contact them directly if interested in versions, to see what is still around, or order what is about to be listed.  This production area is in the north, in the general Chiang Rai area, which I've written quite a bit about over the last year and a half.

Review:

First infusion:  brewed a bit long to skip the part about saying the next round will tell more.  There's a tartness to this I may not have noticed as much before.  At one time I really disliked tartness in black  red teas, but like some other flavor range I've come to accept it better with more exposure, and inclusion in positive and balanced versions that it worked out ok in.  

Overall this tea is nice.  Tartness isn't an optimum flavor range inclusion for me, but the rest balances ok with it, and decent sweetness and good complexity compensate.  One part hints towards a malty range, not like dry and aggressive Assam, but covering a bit of the flavor in those.  I suppose there's a faint touch of cocoa in this, and a little of the mineral edge that's distinctive in Ceylon, that one profile range that really marks those out.  There's some fruit; I'll describe it better across more rounds.

Second infusion:  I more or less flash-brewed this round, to get a feel for the opposite extreme, brewed very light.  Color is still intense, the deep red, and feel and base of flavors is normal, but the higher end / forward flavor range is quite thin, as one might expect.  It's funny how it has so much feel and base complexity, but also doesn't taste like much, more lacking aromatic range than the mineral tones that come across through tongue-based sensation.  It even includes a good bit of mouthfeel, not really dry or heavy, but it coats your mouth well, and links to an aftertaste experience.  Maybe this is a good black tea for a sheng drinker.  I'll do more of a flavor list review letting this infuse for a bit over 10 seconds next time.

Third infusion:  that flavor list then:  tartness, warm mineral tones, that bit of malt, dried fruit range, along the line of tamarind, but not clearly defined.  In a sense this isn't matching what I led into about it being subtle, but I mean that the sweetest, most aromatic, warm-toned, chocolate, cocoa, and warm floral range that fully oxidized and oven-dried versions doesn't come through.  

With shai hong, which tend to be oxidized a bit less, it seems like backing off that complete expression of black tea range, the full oxidation input, allows for sweetness and depth to increase over a few years, but at a cost, related to drinking it this young.  This tea was produced a year ago, but just pressed recently, in the last two months.

Fourth infusion:  it's improving across rounds; that's nice.  Slight dryness eases up, and tartness, with more warmth, depth, and complexity evolving.  Range towards cocoa / cacao is increasing, but it will never fully develop as a main theme, per trying this plenty of times already.  Complexity is positive in this; there's a lot going on, just not all of it, or maybe even most of it, across the forward flavor range.  It has depth.  It's not the sweetest kind of black tea, but I really do think an impression of that would increase within a couple more years of storage.  That might mostly be because some other aspect range settles, more that that it actually tastes much sweeter, but what we really pick up is a final balance, how it all comes together.  Add a touch of salt to any tea, just less than you can readily identify, and a lot of the balance changes, it doesn't just taste slightly salty.  But don't take my word for that, try it.

Fifth infusion:  more of the same; this isn't really going to keep changing across rounds, as sheng versions tend to.  It's fine, pleasant to enjoy now, but it will probably be more interesting, and come across as more pleasant and complex, after it ages for a couple of years.  I'd expect that increase in positive character to even back out fairly quickly, as aging some other types goes, and that after 4 or 5 more years it would just fade, not changing so much and improving.  But then this is fairly tightly compressed, so maybe that time-frame will extend as a result, and this will only be at it's early peak in that 4 or 5 years, and after a decade it will just taper off, versus that long.  I bought it to drink though, to have some black tea around, so if there's any left after 2 or 3 more years there won't be much.

Conclusion:

This may seem to imply that this tea needs to age transition more than I see as necessary.  It will improve, I think, but it's nice now, just not in the sweetest and most aromatic form, compared to fully oxidized oven dried versions.  Sweetness is fine but I think the effect of that will increase, maybe as much from other range changing and the overall profile shifting.  

I really do like extra sweet, sweet potato, roasted yam, and cacao flavor intensive Dian Hong just a little more, but this will move to a space closer to my main preferences over a few years (I think), if it sticks around.  I wouldn't have brought it to Honolulu this time if I had planned to just set it aside; I'll drink some, maybe a good bit, or even most of this.

I had considered doing a comparison tasting with an aged shai hong version (there's one set aside and getting to on the older side at home), or trying it with more conventional black tea, but those ranges might be familiar to many, and I'm out of the habit of reviewing entirely lately.  I can write a separate review of a sample from Wawee Tea later and refer back to this.

the corner I write in now is worst-case for degree of clutter

the view outside, Waikiki

jungle hiking recently; conflicting approaches to posing

happy Easter!

a modest egg decorating session

back in Honolulu

Hanauma Bay

 

shave ice at the north shore

I'm reunited with my kids, back for a second round of setting up a new life in the US.  That same main detail is still elusive, getting a new job to work out, but the rest goes well.

Reverse culture shock wasn't a concern this time; I've last spent two months living here while setting up this life within the last half year or so.  My kids are finishing their first complete school year here, living in the local apartment that we rented back in September.  The expense has been taxing but that was expected, and savings and working remotely at my Bangkok job has balanced it out well enough.

What is the story then?  Different story lines weave together, but a clear main thread is still missing.  It feels a bit like living an immigrant's life, struggling with finances and other forms of acceptance, in particular applying work history to current circumstances.  My wife is now working two jobs, as an entry level cook in Italian and Japanese ramen restaurants, but full time work at local minimum wages doesn't help that much, and her working hours aren't even close to full time.  I get it why people might work these kinds of jobs for some years and then move on, trying to find a better balance elsewhere.  I lived in a ski resort for a number of years and that was a main theme there too.

It's important to take comfort and satisfaction in the small victories.  The main point has been gaining exposure to this culture for our kids, and related to education being better here than in Bangkok.  In the higher tier international schools in Bangkok that would be less true, that there had been a gap, but with tuition and fees there running over $30k per year, per student, it costs less to set up an apartment here for two kids, even including covering a higher cost of living.  This same concern comes up everywhere in the US, that different kinds of conditions and future potential is available for a very small category of people.  Expensive private schools are options here too, and surely many of the best placed locals went to them.

Other small victories:  my son has a positive social network now, and has moved through a struggle to catch up in classes to doing ok in most them, with two exceptions that still need a good bit of work.  My daughter has moved past gaps in math and English learning into a normal range, at a learning pace that could put her on the higher side of that range by the end of the school year, or given the short timing maybe only at the center.  Socially she's fine, already a star.  

I just attended my daughter's first volleyball game, in a local park league, which I guess could be the start of many rewarding athletic experiences.  It didn't feel like it; her team was so bad, and I was pleasantly surprised that they won one of three games, and were competitive.  That was not at all about the theme of placing for a trophy, or standing out as a star player, so if they had fun and showed some improvement that was fine, what they were there for.  We bought her a volleyball since, and it has been nice walking over to a nearby park and practicing, and less helpful doing the same in a tiny yard here, where we've hit it over a small wall at our apartment complex a couple of times.

It may sound like I could be more positive about all this, as if experiencing small victories and ongoing challenges seems a little bittersweet.  There's one part of my life that I've always focused on, enjoying the time and experiences with my kids, and that goes so well, better than I could hope for.  I'm very proud of them, not just for ticking off accomplishments and rankings, but for being the kind of individuals you would want to spend time with.  That's the part I enjoy every day, even every hour to the extent that I can.  

I talk with them about their lives, their experiences and their perspectives, and it seems to go well.  This is absolutely the right place to be a two culture kid; people are open and welcoming.  It's crazy how there are hardly any completely white people in my daughter's school, as if that's the only background and set of genetics that would stand out.  I suppose having wealth would; I take it that the next school over is where standards of living and income are higher, and at a guess the private school theme here probably starts right away, at the pre-school level.  I asked my son if he knows any completely white kids and I think he knows two, with at least one of them from Europe.

Along with talking about small victories it would be fair to mention that small challenges add up, not to an extent that seems oppressive, at least at less than one month in, but those drain positivity and energy.  Cockroaches have a real foothold in our apartment now; it will be an ongoing challenge to win a war against them.  We are poor, and that changes things.  My son gets it, for being older, but I have to constantly explain to my daughter why we can't go on a trip to LA and Disneyland as her best friend just did, that we have to watch spending on small toys, or even food.  It took a lot of work to set up assistance based health care here, and we lost that plan due to not re-enrolling for not responding to mail in a timely way, now just six months after setting that up.  There are steps forward and steps backward.

Running has been nice here, the one thing that I enjoyed developing during that two month gap in being around my wife and kids.  A route around Diamondhead is perfect (that one iconic ancient volcano), not too difficult, but with decent hills mixing it up, not so short or long at just under 8 km in length (5 miles or so).  I'm not pushing it for running frequency, or extending intensity or distance, just trying to keep up with it.

view from the top of Diamondhead, showing part of where I run

My kids are learning to swim in the ocean better.  They took swim lessons for most of both their childhoods, so that part isn't about being able to swim, but applying it to the ocean context.  It can be scary having waves added to pool experience, or fish swimming below you, or rocks and coral around.  We did a fantastic outing at Hanauma Bay, a popular snorkeling spot, and my daughter felt a bit cautious about that new environment but both spent a lot of time exploring it.  The amazing fish were what one would expect, like swimming in a really well stocked aquarium, with a meter plus long eel as a highlight.

it's quiet early in the morning

In a sense I feel as if this is their birthright.  Eye and I met in Honolulu, during grad school, so this place brought us together.  Exploring the sea and trails was an influential part of our earlier experiences together.  Our kids are named Hawaiian names as a result, which I guess could be taken as cultural appropriation just as easily as a tribute, both with the same middle name referencing a family friend here, which means the sea. 

They've spent their whole lives learning and practicing swimming, only a bit isolated from some forms of natural environments due to limitations on what they were exposed to.  For us visiting many Thai beach areas we went on only one snorkeling outing with them, one year ago now.  There it's always the case that while most beaches are fine you really need to go to a next island over, by boat, to experience that sort of clear water natural environment, no matter where you happen to be.  We did that with them, that once, taking a guided tour out to very isolated and beautiful spots, and Eye and I did a second time when they weren't with us.  Here in Hawaii tropical fish are 30 feet off shore no matter where you are; it's already a remote island.  Then the extra beautiful spots you might visit are really something.

snorkeling outside of Rayong a year ago

My wife swam laps in a pool for exercise when pregnant with our son; his earliest swimming experiences precede his own birth.  My daughter was comfortable in the water before she actually learned to swim, so comfortable that it made me nervous, because she would paddle around before she had the competency to keep herself safe.

Our kids never had the background I did granting them an early life connection with nature, beyond our house in Bangkok having gardens (my mother in law's house, to be clear), and having cats.  They didn't hike much at all, and were barely ever in the sea, and never explored mountains as I did in my 20s and 30s.  It was never a big regret for me, since we were living the life that circumstances granted us, along with pursuing the interests of my city-dweller wife, but it was something else to get to that just never came up.  So now we get to it.

Bishop Museum; worth checking out

art!

As far as American culture goes I have less to say about that this time.  There isn't the same pronounced liberal and conservative divide here; people still fall somewhere on that scale, but make less of that.  Local Hawaiian culture is both liberal and conservative in its own way, and they don't want mainland influence, two political parties, or mainstream media telling them how to interpret all that.  The problems of late-stage capitalism will all come here, with that process already starting, but there is no reason to rush it.

We just had an outing experience that summed up a divide here that I think explains part of the resentment towards "white people" and long term visitors in general.  We took a bus through one small local town to get to another, where we planned to have dinner.  The more local town looked much older and shabbier, although to me the local eating places looked interesting, probably with some really nice food themes to check out, although we would've been out of place.  

In the more upscale transplant town it all looked new, like a high end strip-mall, with mostly white faces around, with people clearly wearing money, even dressed quite casually.  I stopped by a grocery store to see if they had tempeh (fermented pressed soy beans), and they did, but at a cost of double or more that of meat, so I didn't end up buying it.  And checked out a Target, to buy Cool-Whip to go with a pumpkin pie I cooked, a store so large it took time to walk from one section to another.

Does any of this actually impact the locals?  That's hard to place.  From a distance high demand and limited availability drives up land pricing and housing costs, but to some extent that must be more relevant in places like that second town and Honolulu, since locals probably aren't flipping home ownership so much.  General cost of living is high, but I expect having more people demand goods here gets it to drop, and corporate stores certainly seem to drive down the price of goods by streamlining problematic supply chains.  Maybe negative feelings, that resentment, isn't about clear cause and effect chains, but instead the sum of a complicated history with the rest of the US, and an aversion to the current cultural aspects that even many mainland liberals and conservatives dislike being a part of.

It feels like a time of transition, for me personally, and maybe to some extent for US culture.  It can't stay like this, can it?  I hope to be checking back in soon with a positive update.

my normal run, just a little off typical pacing

missing Myra and the other cats back in Bangkok, and Mama Nid