Chapter 1:
Origins, characteristics and relevance of wabi sabi today

1. There is no singular reference to ‘wabi sabi ’ in the 2018 edition of Japan’s leading dictionary, Kōjien.

2. What we know as the written Japanese kanji characters originated in China. Nearly every one of the 1850 standard characters in use today can be read in at least two different ways, with one reading derived from the original Chinese (known as on’yomi ) and the other an indigenous Japanese reading (known as kun’yomi ). Some characters have more than one of each reading. When two kanji are used together to create a word, the on’yomi is usually used. Rather confusingly, as an exception to this, our central concept of ‘wabi sabi ’ can be written as both and . If you are interested in learning more about the fascinating world of kanji , I highly recommend The Modern Reader’s Japanese-English Character Dictionary or NTC’s New Japanese-English Character Dictionary.

3. The family name of Murata Shukō was Murata, but he is commonly known by the name of Shukō. This is often the case with the names of historical figures.

4. Okakura, The Book of Tea, p.3.

5. From humble beginnings, Chōjirō pioneered the making of raku tea bowls, and established the Raku family in the late sixteenth century, which has become the unique preserver of the raku-yaki pottery tradition. The current Raku Kichizaemon XV, a ceramic artist, is the fifteenth-generation head. Tea bowls fashioned by each generation can be seen at the Raku Museum in Kyōto (raku-yaki.or.jp/e).

6. Nelson (ed.), The Modern Reader’s Japanese-English Character Dictionary , p.141.

7. Occasionally, , a homophone of the verb wabiru , meaning ‘to apologise’, is referenced in discussions related to the spirit of wabi , although the etymological connection is difficult to verify from reputable sources.

8. According to Japan’s leading dictionary Kōjien, wabishii means ‘a feeling of losing energy’ or ‘feeling anxious or sad’, but Japanese people commonly use wabishii to mean ‘wretched’, ‘lonely’ or ‘poor’.

9. For further insight into the aesthetics of wabi , I recommend the excellent essay ’The Wabi Aesthetic Through the Ages’ by Haga Kōshirō, in Hume, Japanese Aesthetics and Culture , p.275.

10. McKinney (trans.), Essays in Idleness and Hōjōki , p.87.

11. Nelson (ed.), The Modern Reader’s Japanese English Character Dictionary , p.323. In the case of the character , it has a kun’yomi reading of ‘sabi’ and an on’yomi reading of ‘jaku’ (meaning ‘tranquillity’), as you will see in Chapter 6 . See note 2 above for more about kun’yomi and on’yomi readings in the Japanese language.

12. Nelson (ed.), The Modern Reader’s Japanese-English Character Dictionary , p.323. When read ‘jaku’ the character means ‘tranquillity’ as explained in note 11, above.

13. Ibid.

14. Tanizaki, In Praise of Shadows , p.19.

15. Matsuo Bashō, whose poetry is frequently cited as an example of literature with an air of sabi , lived the life of a wabibito – a person of wabi . Although not penniless, Bashō chose to wander long distances in nature, carrying with him only the bare minimum needed for survival. These journeys were the inspiration for his famous poetry.

16. Morigami, Wabi sabi yūgen no kokoro , p.19.

17. Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man , p.231.

Chapter 2:
Simplifying and beautifying

1. Source: Statistics Bureau, Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, Government of Japan www.stat.go.jp/english/data/handbook/c0117.html

2. Ibid.

3. According to the Tōkyō Metropolitan Government, the population of Tōkyō in 2015 was 13.491 million, around 11 per cent of the national population. Source: www.metro.tokyo.jp/ENGLISH/ABOUT/HISTORY/history03.htm . Retrieved 8 April 2018.

4. A tatami mat is a Japanese flooring material, traditionally made from straw, often with brocade edging. Each mat is twice as long as it is wide. Tatami mats are used as a measure of room size in Japan (rather than metric square metres or imperial square feet). The area of one tatami mat is known as one jō . And it’s not just inside the home – land is traditionally measured in tsubo , with one tsubo being the equivalent area of two tatami mats. In contemporary Japan, even people living in Western-style homes often have at least one Japanese-style room, known as a washitsu , with a tatami-matted floor.

5. Kanji are the adopted logographic Chinese characters that are used in the Japanese writing system, alongside the syllabaries hiragana and katakana .

6. You can find Makiko and her work online at www.makikohastings.com .

7. The word maiko , which translates to ‘dancing child’, refers to an apprentice geiko (geiko being the name for a geisha from Kyōto). Geisha are women highly trained in traditional Japanese arts, including singing, dancing and music, who have become a recognised symbol of Japan for many foreigners. Maiko often wear brightly coloured, long-sleeved kimono . Their accompanying obi (sash) is usually tied at their back and extends to their feet.

8. An obi is a sash worn with a kimono .

9. Hagi-yaki ( ), or ‘Hagi ware’, is a type of Japanese pottery originating from the town of Hagi, in Yamaguchi Prefecture.

10. Yanagi, The Unknown Craftsman , p.148.

11. Originally, shibui meant ‘astringent’, such as the flavour of an under-ripe persimmon. Over the years, it has taken on an important aesthetic meaning, and in 1960 was hailed by House Beautiful magazine as ‘the height of Japanese beauty’ (see Gordon (ed.) House Beautiful , August 1960, USA edition).

12. Other important aesthetic principles include miyabi (refined elegance) and suki (originally ‘refinement with a hint of eccentricity, idiosyncrasy or irregularity’).

13. The Heian Period in Japanese history (794–1185) ‘ saw the full assimilation of Chinese culture and the flowering of an elegant courtly culture’. Source: The Kōdansha Bilingual Encyclopedia of Japan , p.100.

14. Source: ‘What is Beauty? Can you afford any of it?’ by Elizabeth Gordon, in Gordon (ed.) House Beautiful , May 1958, USA edition.

15. For a more formal analysis of Japanese aesthetics, I recommend the 1998 essay ‘Japanese aesthetics’, in Japanese Aesthetics and Culture: A Reader (ed. Nancy G. Hume), by distinguished Japan scholar Donald Keene. With extensive reference to poet and essayist Yoshida Kenkō’s Tsurezuregusa (Essays in Idleness ), Keene selected four key themes to suggest the main features of Japanese aesthetic taste as it has evolved over time. These were: suggestion, irregularity, simplicity and perishability. Elements of these are included in the themes I have suggested for the soulful simplification of your home, although the five themes I offer include contemporary design ideas and are intended to be applicable to any home, anywhere. Aside from this, in his 1982 work, Zen and the Fine Arts , the late philosopher Shin’ichi Hisamatsu summarised his own observations into seven characteristics of Zen aesthetics as follows: asymmetry, simplicity, austere sublimity or lofty dryness, naturalness, subtle profundity or deep reserve, freedom from attachment, tranquillity. These have been back-translated into Japanese in various different ways, but the most common words used are: fukinsei ( ), kanso ( ), shibumi ( ), shizen ( ), yūgen ( ), datsuzoku ( ) and seijaku ( ) respectively.

16. Find out more about ‘fog linen work’ at foglinenwork.com .

17. Kondō, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying , p.49.

18. According to architect Matthew Claudel, ‘ma’ ( ), the Japanese word for ‘space’, goes beyond the Western concept of physical space to refer to the natural distance between two or more things existing in a continuity, the natural pause or interval between two or more phenomena occurring continuously and the space delineated by posts and screens in traditional Japanese architecture. Source: Claudel, Ma: Foundations for the Relationship of Space-Time in Japanese Architecture , p.3.

19. Lafcadio Hearn (1850–1904), born to a Greek mother and an Irish father, and also known as Koizumi Yakumo since his naturalization as a Japanese, was a writer and translator best known for his books that introduced Japan to the West.

20. Hearn, Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation , ‘Strangeness and Charm’ chapter (no page number available).

Chapter 3:
Living with nature

1. Source: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/nature . Retrieved 31 March 2018.

2. The definition is listed as (arugamama no sama ). Source: Shinmura (ed.), Kōjien: Dai 5 han , p.1174.

3. This is the poem as I remember it from my youth, but I have been unable to find the source of this particular translation. To explore Matsuo Bashō’s poetry, I highly recommend works by Donald Keene, Makoto Ueda, Nobuyuki Yuasa or Jane Reichhold.

4. Sei (trans. McKinney), The Pillow Book , p.3.

5. In Japanese, the same name can be written in various ways, using different kanji characters, just as there are various spellings of the same name in English, e.g. Clare and Claire. Source: https://st.benesse.ne.jp/ninshin/name/2017 . Retrieved 30 March 2018.

6. Source: www.jref.com/articles/japanese-family-names.31 . Retrieved 30 March 2018.

7. There is also a ‘rainy season’ in Japan known as tsuyu , although this does not qualify as a formal season. It can be anywhere between May and July, depending on location.

8. The wonderful free app ‘72 Seasons’ updates every five days with information about the nature, food and tradition particular to that time in the classical Japanese calendar. www.kurashikata.com/72seasons .

9. Deal, Handbook to Life in Medieval and Early Modern Japan, p.43.

10. There are various translations for the names of each of the seventy-two microseasons. Some of my favourites (and those shared in this book) appear in Liza Dalby’s wonderful memoir of the seasons, ‘East wind melts the ice’. Dalby, East wind melts the ice , p.287.

11. Deal, Handbook to Life in Medieval and Early Modern Japan, p.190.

12. Yamakage, The Essence of Shinto , p.29.

13. Ono, Shinto , p.97.

14. See http://yamabushido.jp/ for further information about Yamabushi training.

15. Source: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4997467 . Retrieved 20 March 2018.

16. Source: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20074458 . Retrieved 20 March 2018.

17. Miyazaki, Shinrin-yoku , p.11.

18. Miyazaki, Shinrin-yoku , p.23.

19. Doi, The Anatomy of Self , p.159.

20. The Meiji Restoration in 1868 restored practical Imperial rule to Japan. Even though there had been ruling emperors before this, their practical powers and influence were limited. The Restoration brought to an end a 250-year period known as sakoku, the foreign-relations policy that saw Japan almost entirely closed off to foreign influence. This led to huge changes in Japan’s political and social structure, and a race to catch up with Western technology.

Chapter 4:
Acceptance and letting go

1. As told to me by Reverend Takafumi Kawakami, Deputy Head Priest of the Shunkō-in Temple in Kyōto.

2. Ostaseski The Five Invitations , p.116.

Chapter 5:
Reframing failure

1. The full interview can be heard at www.disruptingjapan.com/the-myth-of-the-sucessful-startup-failure-hiroshi-nagashima .

2. You can find out more about the House of Light at www.hikarinoyakata.com .

3. ‘Sukiya-zukuri ’ or ‘sukiya style’ is a type of Japanese residential architectural style. Its origins lie in tea room architecture, and it has come to indicate a style of designing that embodies refined, well-cultivated taste. It is characterised by the use of natural materials, based on tea house aesthetics.

4. For further architectural details, see Taschen, Living in Japan , p.88.

Chapter 6:
Nurturing relationships

1. The four principles of the tea ceremony, wa kei sei jaku ( ), harmony, respect, purity and tranquillity, were handed down from Sen no Rikyū, the ‘father of tea’. There are three Sen houses/families of tea in Japan, known as Urasenke, Omotesenke and Mushakōjinosenke. These three separate family lines were established by the three sons of Sen no Rikyū’s grandson Sen Sōtan. Three main words are used in Japanese for what we call ‘the tea ceremony’ in English. Chanoyu ( ), literally ‘hot water for tea’, is the word used to refer to the act of making and serving tea. Sadō and chadō are alternative readings for , ‘the way of tea’. According to tea instructor Bruce Hamana of the Urasenke school, knowing the technical elements of chanoyu alone does not make the tea ceremony a way of understanding ourselves and the world. He told me: ‘Constant discipline and consideration of our guests can help us go beyond our attachment to material things.’ He believes this spiritual element is the essence of ‘the way of tea’, sadō or chadō .

2. Source: www.urasenke.org/characters/index.html . Retrieved 15 January 2018.

3. Reverend Kawakami also explained the second meaning of ‘no self’ in Buddhism, as referring to ‘the way that our self does not have ultimate control over our mind or body’. He shared meditation as an example, where we focus on our breathing, but a moment later our mind starts wandering. In much the same way, he said this ‘no self’ means we cannot stop ourselves getting old.

4. Source: ‘Loneliness Connects Us: Young people exploring and experiencing loneliness and friendship’, 2018 report from Manchester Metropolitan University and 42nd Street, supported by the Coop Foundation. https://mcrmetropolis.uk/wp-content/uploads/Loneliness-Connects-Us.pdf . Retrieved 20 March 2018.

5. Source: https://reliefweb.int/report/world/global-peace-index-2017 . Retrieved 22 March 2018. Japan was in the top ten in the 2017 report (joint 10th), 2015 report (8th) and 2013 report (6th). Retrieved 22 March 2018.

6. Source: www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/lists/most-peaceful-countries/japan . Retrieved 22 March 2018.

7. Pachinko is a kind of pinball arcade game popular in Japan. Each machine fires hundreds of small steel balls in multiple directions, so the collective sound inside an arcade can be deafening, like an incessant crashing and banging of pans.

Chapter 7:
Enjoying the career journey

1. Iwami Ginzan Silver Mine is on the UNESCO World Heritage List (Source: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1246 . Retrieved 9 April 2018), and Ōmori-chō is involved in a UNESCO Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) project (www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news/big_experiment_in_sustainable_development_education_transfor . Retrieved 9 April 2018)

2. In much the same way as the Slow Food movement founded by Carlo Petroni is based on a philosophy of nutritious and tasty food, sustainably and locally grown ‘slow clothing’ a way of thinking about the clothes we buy and wear to ensure they bring meaning, value and joy to every day, while minimising their negative impact in terms of environmental and social challenges

3. ‘Gungendō’ is the lifestyle brand of the Iwami-Ginzan Lifestyle Research Institute, which Tomi co-founded with her husband Daikichi. Find out more at www.gungendo.co.jp .

4. See inside at www.kurasuyado.jp/takyo-abeke .

5. De Mente, NTC’s Dictionary of Japan’s Business Code Words, p.196.

6. Originally called jōjutsu ( ), the name of this martial art changed to jōdō ( ) ‘the way of the staff’ in 1940. It was devised by master swordsman Gonnosuke Katsukichi in the early 1600s. Source: www.britishkendoassociation.com/jodo . Retrieved 11 April 2018.

7. Sen, Nihon no kokoro, tsutaemasu , p.88.

8. Gratton and Scott, The 100-Year Life provides an excellent summary of the latest evidence on this topic.

9. Source: Workforce of the future: the competing forces shaping 2030 (PwC report). Available from https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/services/people-organisation/workforce-of-the-future/workforce-of-the-future-the-competing-forces-shaping-2030-pwc.pdf . Retrieved 2 April, 2018.

10. Ibid.

11. A furoshiki is a type of cloth traditionally used to wrap gifts, food or other goods.

12. can also be read hibi kore kōjitsu .

Chapter 8:
Cherishing the moments

1. Source: UNDP http://hdr.undp.org/en/69206 . Retrieved 6 April 2018.

2. Source: Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Government of Japan www.mhlw.go.jp/file/04-Houdouhappyou-12304250-Roukenkyoku-Koureishashienka/0000177627.pdf . Retrieved 6 April 2018.

3. Source: Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Government of Japan www.mhlw.go.jp/toukei/saikin/hw/life/ckts10/dl/02.pdf . Retrieved 6 April 2018.

4. Source: http://president.jp/articles/-/15634 . Retrieved 6 April 2018.

5. Source: Nagano Prefectural Government www.pref.nagano.lg.jp/kenko-fukushi/kenko/kenko/documents/saisyueiyaku.pdf . Retrieved 6 April 2018.

6. Source: www.reuters.com/brandfeatures/venture-capital/article?id=11480 . Retrieved 26 February 2018.

7. Source: WHO 2017 World Malaria Report www.who.int/malaria/publications/world-malaria-report-2017/report/en . Retrieved 18 February 2018.

8. As designated by the Shūkan Gendai weekly magazine, 9 December 2017 edition.

9. For a step-by-step guide to getting your life organised, try my online course How to be Happy, Calm, Organized and Focused . Details at www.dowhatyouloveforlife.com .

Afterword:
Tying it all together

1. Source: Raku (trans. Faulkner and Andō) Chawanya , p.105.

2. The word most commonly used for happiness in Japan is shiawase , written . However, when it is shown as a single character, , for example on lucky charms at temples, it is read sachi.