A Different Kind of Luxury: Japanese Lessons in Simple Living and Inner Abundance [Paperback]

Andy Couturier (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2010

Raised in the tumult of Japan’s industrial powerhouse, the eleven men and women profiled in this book have all made the transition to sustainable, fulfilling lives. They are today artists, philosophers, and farmers who reside deep in the mountains of rural Japan. Their lives may be simple, yet they are surrounded by the luxuries of nature, art, contemplation, delicious food, and an abundance of time. For example:

• Atsuko Watanabe is an environmentalist and home-schooler who explores Christian mysticism while raising her two daughters in an old farmhouse
• Akira Ito is an ex–petroleum engineer who has become a painter and children’s book illustrator and explores the role of chi (life energy) in the universe through art and music
• Kogan Murata grows rice and crafts elegant bamboo flutes that he plays for alms in the surrounding villages
• Jinko Kaneko is a fine artist and fabric dyer who runs a Himalayan-style curry restaurant in the Japan Alps

By presenting the journeys of these ordinary—yet exceptional—people, Andy Couturier shows how we too can travel a meaningful path of living simply, with respect for our communities and our natural resources. When we leave behind the tremendous burdens of wage labor, debt, stress, and daily busyness, we grow rich in a whole new way. These Japanese are pioneers in a sense; drawing on traditional Eastern spiritual wisdom, they have forged a new style of modernity, and in their success is a lesson for us all: live a life that matters.

Andy Couturier is an essayist, poet, and writing teacher. He lived in Japan for four years where he taught, was a journalist, and worked on environmental causes. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

MA, essayist, poet, writing teacher. Writing in newspapers, magazines and literary journals including Adbusters, Creative Non-Fiction, Japan Times, North American Review, Oakland Tribune, Kyoto Journal, Fiber Arts, Writer, others. Taught writing at California State University, JFK University. Worked with environmentalists in Japan. Student of Buddhist philosophy. Years of rural living. Built own house with hand tools. Sustainable living advocate.

Product Details

• Paperback: 316 pages
• Publisher: Stone Bridge Press; First Edition edition (February 1, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 193333083X
• ISBN-13: 978-1933330839
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 0.9 x 6.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #109,598 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

ANDY COUTURIER is the son of a biographer and a civil rights activist. During his four years of living in Japan, he wrote for the Japan Times; worked with local environmentalists fighting large dam projects, rainforest destruction, and huge electric power plants; taught English; and studied the interconnections between Japanese aesthetics and innovative new forms of writing. In California, he and his partner built their own house using only hand tools, developing a piece of raw land into a functioning rural homestead with solar and hydro-electric power, running hot and cold water, and a Japanese-style bath.

Andy has studied Buddhist meditation and many other Asian philosophical systems, and has traveled extensively in Africa, Southeast Asia, and India. He has been a researcher for Greenpeace and has taught writing for more than a decade. He is the author of Writing Open the Mind: Tapping the Subconscious to Free the Writing and the Writer and has written for Adbusters, the MIT Press, Kyoto Journal, Creative Nonfiction, The North American Review, The Oakland Tribune, and Ikebana International. He directs his own creative writing center, The Opening, at www.theopening.org.

Andy welcomes your thoughts and comments on this book, either by mail to P.O. Box 881, Santa Cruz, CA 95061 or by email to [e-mail].

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Wise and inspirational February 11, 2010

By Suzanne Kamata

Format:Paperback

Around fifteen years ago, when Andy Couturier first conceived of this project, Americans were looking to Japan for ideas on how to run businesses and educate children. In light of the recent economic downturn and an increasing concern for the environment - even among conservatives - it seems that we would have been better off listening to the eleven individuals profiled in this book. These Japanese men and women have learned to live lightly upon the earth, with as little money as possible, and with an abundance of time. Having time allows them to grow their own food, revel in the beauty of nature, pursue creative endeavors, and contemplate the meaning of life and death, and the mysteries of the universe.

Among those introduced are the exuberant Kogan Murata, who derives great joy playing ancient melodies on his bamboo flute. Murata lives with his partner and small son on an amazing $3500/year. They grow their own food ("It is a wonder to grow rice!" Murata exclaims. "Exciting!") and live without modern appliances.

While living on the fringes of Japanese society, many of these people are nevertheless engaged in community life and the world at large. Atsuko Watanabe, for instance, famously convinced her fellow villagers to separate their garbage into over 40 categories. She is also an anti-nuclear activist.

At best, this book will convince readers to make changes for the better in their own lives. At the very least, anyone who dips into these pages will meet some fascinating people.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Journey into some beautiful minds December 3, 2010

By Anjor Bhaskar

Format:Paperback

Andy's book is about exploring a feeling that is there in everyone - 'A desire to be free'. It's there in nearly everyone - very strong in some, to a lesser extent in others. But surely most people, at some point of time in their lives, have said to themselves 'I don't want to be part of this system. I don't want to live a drab routine life. I don't want to follow the usual pattern, go to school, go to university, get a high paying job and struggle all through life to make it big in our profession, retire and then die. There is something wrong with this system which intrinsically thrives on exploitation - of nature and of the poor. I want to break away from this system and live an independant life'. Most of us, however, dismiss this feeling as blasphemous. Some believe it may be possible but are weighed down by too many constraints in our lives.

This book is about those who not only dreamed but also fulfilled their dreams. About people who wanted to do a lot of things, and did all of them. About those who are governed only by their heart and not by the economic system. About those who, in their own little ways, make a big difference to the world by showing that there is tremendous beauty and excitement in simplicity. About people who have their own measures of success in their lives rather than measures imposed on them from society.

It's beautifully written. Especially for someone like me who is constantly toying with the idea of breaking free, living a life of self sustainance and yet of adventure, excitement, love and 'inner abundance'. While reading the book I felt that I was going through minds, very much like my own, only much more advanced than mine. Minds of people who had not only toyed with these ideas, but also experimented with them, had some failures as well, but in the end emerged successfully. Andy has a tasteful style of writing whereby the reader can sense everything that he senses when he meets these people. The reader actually travels through the mind of both, Andy and the person at the same time. In the end, you would feel like you have 12 amazing new friends who will always be there to guide and inspire you in your journey through life.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Prodding, Yet Refreshing June 30, 2010

By Bob Sanchez

Format:Paperback

Andy Couturier's "A Different Kind of Luxury" is a journey into the depths of Japan's countryside through eleven unique individuals who have chosen a simpler way of life. Couturier's 11 are not hermits who are completely out of touch with the modern world; rather, most of them are very connected to their communities and all participated in mainstream society at some point in the past.

The narrative pokes at the trappings of modern big-city culture, but the tone is refreshing because Couturier shapes his subjects' commentary so that it even-handedly rejects those trappings rather than railing against them in a purely negative way.

And, to be fair, not everyone in the book hates all things modern and convenient. Potter San Oizumi decides which "contradictions" he can live with and which he cannot, going on the offensive when something modern "threatens the kiseki (miracle) of life itself." Bamboo flute player Kogan Murata and painter Akira Ito indulge in beer and whiskey, and an overlying theme of the book is that having and enjoying STUFF is not a bad thing; chasing after STUFF at the expense of time and fellowship is.

Couturier is a good storyteller, painting pictures of the lush Japanese countryside and knowing when to sit back and let his friends speak about the way they live. He captures poignant moments and important ideas with descriptive sentences that enliven the imagination, and then drills them home with short, declarative sentences. My favorites:

"And again, the tactile nature of the actual work contributes powerfully to the effect. The strong but smooth paper backing and the heavy, black ceramic scroll posts around which it is wrapped both underscore for me its most striking aspect, the fact that this work exists only one place in the world. I hold it in my hand."

"I imagine [collector] Gufu [Watanabe] in the tumble and crash and noise and dirt of India sitting down on some broken piece of mortar on the street, hunched over, with his bad posture and too-thin body spending hours making precise drawings of a brass pitcher used for water at a cafe. And I smile. His journals, like his store of knowledge, are uselessly ornate. The feeling is good."

"A Different Kind of Luxury" should make its readers evaluate the way that they appreciate time. Couturier celebrates "this unlikely and gorgeous day" along with Oizumi, he marvels at community activist Atsuko Watanabe's lack of "self-importance" in her doings, and he plants rice "slothfully" with Murata. It is difficult to imagine closing the cover on this book without gaining a new sense of time and what is valuable in this life.