Monday, November 13, 2017

Héctor García and Francesc Miralles. 'Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life' (2016), Part III

Héctor García and Francesc MirallesIkigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life. Translated by Heather Cleary. New York: Penguin, 2016. Originally published as Ikigai: Los secretos de Japón para una vida larga y feliz (Medicinas complementarias). Urano, 2016. Part the Third.


From the previous post, let's continue with Shoma Morita (1874-1938).  Another one of his techniques was to utilize "Naikan meditation."  In thinking about interpersonal relationships, a person would be asked to meditate on questions such as, "what have I" given and received from a specific person in their life, and most importantly, "What problems have I caused" this other person?

"Through these reflections, we stop identifying others as the cause of our problems and deepen our own sense of responsibility." (page 50). Existentialism redux!

The authors also devote chapters to:

Flow (and microflow), pages [55]-86;

Words of Wisdom from people mostly over 110 years of age, pages [89]-99;

Hanging out with 100+ year old people in Ogimi, Okinawa, pages [103]-132;

Blue Zones, radio taiso, yoga, tai chi, imitating clouds, qigong, shiatsu and breathing, pages [135]-161;

Resilence -- "Fall seven times, rise eight," page [165] -- wabi-sabi and tchi-go ichi-e -- "[t]his moment exists only now and won't come again," page 172 -- and building redundancies, pages [165]-179;

And an epilogue ("give thanks," page 185) with notes and further reading ideas. 

Today's Rune: Warrior. 

1 comment:

Charles Gramlich said...

I should definitely think more often about the problems I've caused others