Hoshinoya is a modern hot springs resort nestled in the mountains of Karuizawa an hour north of Tokyo. Built like a small, rambling village, it is designed under the premise of “what if Japan had modernized without Western influences?” Instead of relying on flashy technological wizardry, Hoshinoya emphasizes the subtle and sublime stimulation of the senses. It is an ideal antidote to a hyperactive urban lifestyle of overstimulation and stress. The crowning moment of the visit centers on the Meditation Bath.
Its 1am and I’m all alone in the changing room. It's a bit chilly as I slip off my robe, a traditional design meant to take you out of the normal world.
The robe subtly changes your citizenship from harried professional to member of a removed and quieter world.
It all folds nicely and rests inside the wooden box. I lock it.
Now naked, my citizenship changes again. I’m no one except a breathing person. The cool night air frisks my body as I move towards the bath.
I walk out into the ante-chamber, a stone pillar, illuminated from above, sits in the middle of the room. The circle of light around it sanctifies it in some way. It evokes the purifying fountain of the temple and offers bracing cold water.
I take some water in and feel a chill move down my chest.
The door to the bath chamber is heavy glass and takes some effort to push open, one final test to see if you’re worthy of the journey.
The dark space is clad in an unfamiliar green stone, it feels like an ancient catacomb. The room is silent except for the not-quite deafening sound of water splashing. Pillars line the wall to the left and circular shower spaces are off to the right.
What a strange place! The green stone is simultaneously luxuriant and alien…a strange Atlantean realm. I feel somewhat displaced from what is normal.
As is customary, I shower off my body. Cleaning before the real purification begins.
As I pass the pillars, I notice they are not the end-all of the space, but rather line a pool of water submerged a few steps below the floor. The water asks you to step in.
More water pours out of a high place in the wall as a steady stream. The echo reverberates off the green rock. The space evokes a subterranean cave with river running through it.
I step down into the warm, waist-deep water and stand beneath the spray. It pounds my back pleasantly. I’m not at all eager to move.
Oh God. This is what I live for. Hot water hitting a cold body—nothing could be simpler or so satisfying.
I look up and notice at the end of the row of columns is an opening in the wall. It says nothing and asks nothing. It just sits there. Beyond it, I notice a glowing white light.
Interesting! The place is like life. It reveals more the more you participate.
I can’t help but be drawn to the light in front of me. I wade through the waist deep water and come to the opening. Suddenly, I find myself inside a glowing white cube of perfect proportions. The space is square and feels unnatural. The translucent white walls are covered with a grid of white squares. Light suffuses the space and seems to come from nowhere. The high ceiling seems limitless and faraway.
My mind has calmed down and opened. I’m in a space of strange, elemental purity of light and water--a place of perfect light.
I want to sit here forever.
I close my eyes and let my body float in this luminous nowhere. Five minutes pass, then ten. I hear nothing but the sound of my own breathing and the movement of black, shining water.
When I open my eyes, I realize that there is yet another opening—off in the corner. This time even smaller and darker, trying to look innocent.
I realize I have no choice to but go inside.
Meditation bath? Sometimes, meditation is about peace. Other times, it is confrontation.
I wade through the chest-high liquid obsidian to the unlit, quiet square hole in the wall. I slowly walk in and space collapses around me. High and Light have been replaced by Dark and Low. The sound of my breathing echoes off the walls that surround me. Effectively, I am blind as I move through this water.
I feel along the wall of the passage until it disappears. No more wall means yet another opening. I stand chest-deep in warm water in complete darkness until my eyes adjust. The blackness resolves into a small crypt-like room before me. As the space materializes, I realize there is ambient music playing which sounds like the beating of a human heart. The water, lit from below, is eerie and unnatural.
I stop at the edge of the threshold, unable to enter the new room.
It is 2:00 am. It is dark and cold outside.
I am completely alone in this place.
Flashback: Movie Theater, Rural Ohio, Age 9
“What’s in the cave?” asks Luke.
“Only what you take with you.” Yoda replies.
I stare into the room. Only my breath and the echoing heartbeat keep me company. The water is deathly still and the green glow seems unearthly.
I blink to see silently rising out of the glowing water an ancient, hideous demon. Evil drips from it as I freeze and a mythic terror jolts through my body.
I am alone in this crypt at 2am.
“This is only your mind looking back at you,” a wise, faraway voice says.
The rest of me doesn’t care. I can’t tell, but maybe my chest is heaving in the water.
I turn around and quickly move through the dark tunnel back towards the white light.
I sit in the middle of the large white space for a long time. Days later, I still feel like I have been electrocuted.
Part of me, even to this moment, feels like a terrible failure.
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