Ruth Oseki: «Dig up the feelings that lie deep»

Psychologies: How are such different roles and lifestyles distributed within you — a philologist, a writer and a priest? In what way do they interfere, and in what way do they help each other?

Ruth Ozeki: I think it’s a matter of taxonomy, a kind of labeling. I’ll try to explain. My mother is Japanese and my father is white American, so I grew up as a mixed race person. Until very recently, the label for people like me was the word half, half-breed, in Japanese — «haafu». This label became the basis of my self-identification, and when I was little, I kept trying to figure out which half of me was Japanese and which half was American. Maybe there is a line that divides me in half? And how does it go — vertically? Horizontally? Obliquely?

• Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

And what did you come up with?

R. ABOUT.: For the first couple of decades of my life, I had the feeling that the American and Japanese halves did not match well and interfere with each other, but as I got older, I began to feel like a more whole human being, and now there is no more conflict. I am just me, neither Japanese nor American, neither here nor there, neither one nor the other.

I think this can be attributed to my various activities and interests. I wouldn’t call myself a philologist (although, of course, philology is my hobby), but really — for better or for worse — I seem to be both a priest and a writer at the same time, and the two coexist in relative harmony. They are expressions of who I am and what I love, and by and large they help each other. Practicing Zen meditation makes me more observant and patient. The craft of writing helps me to be more involved in the affairs of the world.

When I write, I write. When I sit in zazen, I sit in zazen. In general, one activity does not interfere with another, although, I must admit, from time to time I find myself working on a novel in the midst of meditation.

• Meditation at work? Easy!

Which of your heroines is closer to you personally — a 16-year-old outcast schoolgirl or a 104-year-old Buddhist nun, the feminist she was in the past, or the writer Ruth? What do you get from each of them?

R. ABOUT.: It seems to me that all the characters that appear in our novels, in one way or another, originate in the writer himself, even when they cannot be called biographical. That is, if you think about it, where else would they come from? I often remember that quote from Dickens, from A Christmas Carol: “A little something is wrong with digestion, and they can no longer be trusted. Maybe you are not you at all, but an undigested piece of beef, or an extra drop of mustard, or a slice of cheese, or an undercooked potato! ..” It seems to me that any of my characters can be just a crumb or piece of some undigested problem or unresolved neurosis , who suddenly surfaced on the page of the book as a character.

In general, as a result, each of my characters is close to me. They are all me, to a greater or lesser extent. Like Ruth, I am a rather absent-minded writer, owner of a cat, married to a wonderful man named Oliver. Like Nao, a 16-year-old school outcast, I was once a confused, existential-minded teenager who loves to write and is completely immersed in my own personal drama. Like old Jiko, the Buddhist nun, I was (and am now) a Buddhist and a feminist, and I certainly hope to reach the age of 104 one day!

What other role in this world would you like to live?

R. ABOUT.: Recently, I started teaching a writing course at Smith College, my alma mater, and I enjoy this teaching role to no end. So right now I am very satisfied with all my roles and activities! And if you choose a role for the next life, I would choose to be a musician and composer. And I always really wanted to take care of the elephants in the elephant nursery.

Did you have the task of resurrecting the Japanese female confessional novel as a genre in My Fish Will Live?

R. ABOUT.: When writing, I try very hard not to set myself too many goals, because, as practice shows, goals get in the way, clogging the plot with the thoughts and personal opinions of the author. So no, I had no such goals. My only goal was to tell the story in the most honest way possible, which means not lying about the characters or getting in their way at all.

But I do think that now is a very interesting time to think about the revival of the Japanese «I-novel», or «confessional novel». Our obsession with our own semi-fictitious internet personas, our desire to share our most banal personal information with the world, is what fascinates me.

• I do not like to read

Your novel is devoted to acute problems: infantilism of adults, cruelty of children, lack of deep ties between people, fear of death and fear of life, human indifference to the living world, violence of the state system. Which of them is the most acute for you and which of them, in your opinion, will resonate most strongly in the hearts of readers?

R. ABOUT.: All of them. All of them. All of them. I hope we all come to feel a deep connection to all these pressing issues.

Is faith really the answer to these problems for you?

R. ABOUT.: Well, I guess it depends on what is meant by faith. Believe in yourself? Faith in our humanity and common human values? Belief in some external God or gods? Faith in life as such? I strongly believe in life itself, in the connection that unites all beings, but this is too abstract for practical application and certainly cannot be a solution. So if I had to choose a single, universal solution to our problems, I think, instead of such an abstract category as «faith», I would choose something more practical, like the Golden Rule, which can be expressed both in the affirmative and in negative form: «Do to others as you would like them to do to you», or: «Do not do to others as you would not like to be treated to you.» This is the only rule that exists in one form or another in almost every religion or ethical tradition, and I think it applies to most of the issues you mentioned.

• «Treat God Meaningfully»

There is a cry for help in your book: “Please teach me the simple American way to love my life so I never have to think about suicide again. I want to find meaning in life for my daughter.» Have you managed to find the meaning of life and learn to love it?

R. ABOUT.: The father who says this is Japanese. He is a man who admires America, and here he is writing to an American psychologist, so his cry for help is sincere and desperate—yet a kind of ironic commentary on the American tendency to oversimplify things. I get the feeling that Americans are constantly looking for the simplest answers to the most difficult questions, even questions like the meaning of life. I suspect that such simplification is not characteristic of Russians. I suspect that Russians are very sensitive to complex nuances, but maybe that’s also a simplification. Simple answers are very seductive, but they are often naive and bear little resemblance to reality. So no, I don’t think I’ve found the meaning of life—I don’t even know if that’s even possible—but I’m learning to accept the uncertainty of that not-knowing and love the mystery itself instead.

• 21 self-talk questions

Do you keep a diary?

R. ABOUT.: Yes, several! I have a journal of notes about the work on the book, and I use it most often. In it I write about how I write. I bring new ideas there and discuss them. I ask questions. I puzzle over the problems that arise and give myself homework. I write down the number of words and pages written in a day. I complain, pour out my despair or joy. My work journal is my best friend because it never gets bored or tired of listening to me and is always there whenever I want to talk. In another diary I write about personal things. It’s a place where I can «think out loud» about the issues that bother me. Well, for example, sometimes, after I traveled or was very busy, I begin to feel some kind of internal disorder. It sometimes feels like I’m drifting away from myself, and when that happens, I turn to my diary and write about this feeling of dislocation, about what’s going on in my life and what could have caused these feelings. The pen serves me to scratch the surface of consciousness and dig out the feelings that lie deep within. Somehow it helps to get rid of the feeling of unsettledness. There is even a kind of catharsis. When I was a 16-year-old schoolgirl, I suffered from depression and at some point it was serious enough that I had to go to the hospital. I recovered and learned to manage my “moods”. At first, I didn’t do it very well: alcohol and tobacco as medicines were not very smart, of course, and the effect could hardly be called permanent. Then I discovered that Zen meditation gave me the tools to deal with complex affective states so that I no longer had to rely on mood and mind-altering substances. Writing is an opportunity for the analytical, rational part of my mind to find an approach to personal, psychological problems. In conjunction with somatic meditation practices, this sometimes gives a kind of insight that is very helpful and can lead to fundamental changes.

• Diary entries are best done in the evening.

Despair and paralyzing fear is described by one of your heroines as the rare fluttering of a large cold fish in the stomach — this is a familiar feeling. Do you have your usual ways to make your fish live? Could you share them?

R. ABOUT.: Actually, like the heroine of the book, I have a lot of fish that seem to live between the ribs and swim back and forth between the stomach and the heart. Some of them are obviously smaller, like fry. Others — it feels like — huge, like whales, and dangerous, like sharks. How to deal with them, how to make them happy? I think the first step is just to get to know your fish, to get to know them better. All of these severe affective states — fear, despair, anxiety, sadness — have associated physiological symptoms, and it is important to be able to recognize these symptoms. It is important to learn to understand how these feelings are felt and where exactly in our body we feel them. But, as a rule, we do exactly the opposite. As a rule, since these sensations are unpleasant, we try to suppress them, or ignore them, or not feel them at all. But I think it’s important instead to feel your feelings, understand at what point they start to beat and swallow air, and then take care of them.

The first thing I do when I notice that my feelings are out of whack is to just pause, take a little break from whatever I’m doing. I close my eyes, take a couple of deep breaths, and as I exhale, relax my shoulders, abs, and face. If I stand, I try to feel the ground under my feet. If I sit, feel the pressure of the stool under me. Then I concentrate my attention within myself, breathing calmly, allowing my consciousness to touch the inhalations and exhalations and the sounds that I hear around me only slightly. After a few minutes, the turbulent waters seem to calm down inside me, and the fish no longer fight. And when the fish finally calmed down, I can again go about my business

In Zen, we call these moments of silence and reflection «taking a step back,» most importantly, you can do it anywhere. Well, unless you’re driving at the time. If you are driving, you can still relax and breathe, but it is better not to close your eyes.

Translation by Ekaterina Ilyina.