The Japanese aesthetic developed further with the celebration of imperfection and insufficiency, characteristics resulting from the natural ageing process or darkening effect. Shinto, the indigenous religious tradition of Japan, provides a basis for the appreciation of these qualities, holding to a philosophy of appreciation of life and the world. Sei Shōnagon was a trend-setting court lady of the tenth century who wrote in ‘The Pillow Book’ of her dislike for "a new cloth screen with a colourful and cluttered painting of many cherry blossoms", preferring instead to notice "that one’s elegant Chinese mirror has become a little cloudy". Her taste was not out of place in the ancient Japanese court. In the twelfth century a Buddhist monk, Yoshida Kenkō, exerted his influence on Japanese aesthetic sensibility resulting from his philosophy of life. He asked, "Are we to look at cherry blossoms only in full bloom, the moon only when it is cloudless? ...Branches about to blossom or garden strewn with faded flowers are worthier of our admiration." The incomplete is also praised by Kenkō, "uniformity and completeness are undesirable". Underpinning or complementing these aesthetic ideals, is the valuing of contrast; when imperfection or the impoverished is contrasted with perfection or opulence, each is emphasised and thus better appreciated.