Three Days of Tea Meditation Workshop: Tea, Awareness and Deep Reset

Last week I finished a three-day tea meditation workshop, a course that uses traditional gongfu tea brewing to train awareness. It brings together tea technique, sensory development and the principles of meditation in a very grounded way.

Suyin from Singapore found me because, during a tea gathering, she drank a cup of oolong tea and felt something opening up inside. That moment of clarity made her want to understand tea more deeply. But when she searched online for tea meditation or tea class, she kept running into the same confusion. Most classes focused only on tea knowledge and tea tasting, or they were entirely about meditation and mindfulness with very little connection to tea knowledge itself. What she truly wanted was a learning path that offered both tea and awareness at the same time. So when she found our website, she felt very happy. The kind of tea ceremony and meditation practice she had been searching for was exactly the path I have been walking for years.

Turning a Life Path into a Course

Since she now lives in Portugal, we first talked through video call about her background, her needs and her current state. Many people today search for tea and awareness but end up finding only one side of the spectrum. Therefore I was more than happy to try to share my understanding of the entirety with her.

After understanding Suyin’s schedule and needs, we set the dates for her to come to Taitung. We planned a two-day tea workshop, six hours each day. After the first day, a typhoon arrived and she also felt deeply connected to the learning, so she decided to extend her stay. In the end we completed eighteen hours of practice in three days.

During these three days, we worked from the core principles of awareness to traditional gongfu tea, moving through theory and hands-on practice side by side. We first built the larger framework of awareness, then gradually opened the senses through aroma work, tea tasting and subtle body observation. Talking about awareness can feel abstract, but once it lands in the body or is practiced through a consistent brewing method, it becomes very concrete. Through repetition the once-fuzzy sensations become clear. You begin to notice what your body is doing, what appears in your mind, how you use strength and how each detail changes the cup of tea in front of you.

We also studied how to brew a clean and balanced cup of tea, looking at brewing patterns from both experiential and scientific angles. She learned how to evaluate tea quality and how to check it at home with simple tools. This naturally connected to understanding farming methods. When you know where a tea comes from, you can see its unseen qualities more clearly, even sensing its vitality through flavor, layer and energy.

Awareness with Others: A Clearer Mirror

A very important part of awareness-based tea meditation is learning not only through solo practice but also through interaction with others. For all three days we invited Enan to join us. From the brewing movements to the taste of the tea, so many things reveal themselves. Qualities we usually overlook, such as nervousness, urgency, control or perfectionism, quietly surface at the tea table. We shared what we observed with honesty. This kind of neutral seeing helps each person understand themselves far more clearly.

I was also grateful for my conversations with Suyin. Through her questions and reflections, we both brought our life views into the space. In many ways, these three days were also a deep reflection for my own path.

The Essential is Simple

At the end of the workshop, Suyin said she felt like a cup filled to the brim, full and steady. The rest is now up to her, to digest slowly through her daily tea meditation practice.

Because I have walked this path myself, I deeply understand the confusion people feel when they search for tea, meditation or mindfulness. There is a lot of information online, but true understanding comes only from long-term practice and direct experience. What I share now is the integrated form of many years. When I speak about it, I choose the simplest and most direct way so the person in front of me can feel it clearly. The essential things in life are always simple. It is our thinking that makes everything complicated. Tea meditation is a process of returning to simplicity, returning to the core, returning to what is true in the heart.

A Tea Path that Stabilizes Life

If you are looking for a grounded way to steady your inner world, tea meditation is one such path. What truly helps a person is not only long-term support but also a method they can use on their own no matter where they are. This way of drinking tea with awareness is a self-sustaining tool. Through daily brewing you slowly ground yourself, embrace your true self. The stability you find at the tea table begins to move into the rest of your life.

Awareness allows us to become the directors of our own life again. May we each return to our heart, one quiet cup at a time.

If you are interested in tea meditation, I currently offer in-person classes and intensive workshops in Taitung, Taiwan. The same content is also available in an online format for those abroad or time-constrained. In that case, I send tea and basic tools beforehand so you can learn with the same quality wherever you are. For more information you can contact me directly.