Huffington Magazine Issue 48 | Page 57

LETTER FROM JAPAN As the Japan Times reported recently, the practice has caught on. “An increasing number of jobseeking students get into a state of depression and commit suicide, so I thought something must be done,” said Shudo Abe, one of a group of Zen priests from the Soto sect who have been organizing similar sessions. According to the National Police Agency, in 2011, 150 people under 30 committed suicide for reasons specifically related to job rejections, which is over two times the number from 2007. Then there’s the Japanese tea ceremony, the heavily-choreographed, nearly 1,000-yearold ritual: “Preparing tea in this ceremony means pouring all one’s attention into the predefined movements. The whole process is not about drinking tea, but is about aesthetics, preparing a bowl of tea from one’s heart.” The essence of the Japanese aesthetic is Ma — space, the pure and essential void between “things,” the emptiness full of possibilities, promise waiting to be fulfilled. And then, of course, there’s haiku: “The water is deep / In the ocean; Drought in the land.” No wonder the Japanese have taken to Twitter much more than HUFFINGTON 05.12.13 they have taken to other social media platforms like Facebook. They are already used to conveying complexity and nuance in a few words. “In finding fulfillment in expressing what’s on your mind for the moment, Twitter is like haiku,” says Rocky Eda of Digital Garage, which works with Twitter There’s a widespread sense that Japan’s idea of itself as a country on the cutting edge of technology is slowly becoming outdated. in Japan. “It is so Japanese.” Like the U.S., Japan is facing huge challenges. But by taking old traditions and adapting them to solve new problems, and taking new innovations and applying a uniquely Japanese twist to them, by going both forward and backward, both outward and inward — juxtapositions that in Japan don’t have to be contradictions — the people of Japan are poised find a new and vibrant balance for the 21st century. Or, as Takahama Kyoshi wrote: “A paulownia leaf / Is falling down with Sunshine on it.”