Zen Meditation and Zazen: What It Is and How It Differs From Secular Mindfulness

What zazen is

Zazen ("seated meditation") is typically the primary practice of the Zen Buddhist tradition. [1] Its meaning and method vary from school to school. [1] Zen has counterparts known as Chan in China and Seon in Korea. [1] In Zen, zazen is a religious discipline connected to Buddhist teaching about awakening. It is not presented as a health treatment, and this page does not promise awakening or healing.

Origin and context

The Chinese term for seated meditation, zuòchán, appears in early Chinese Buddhist sources. [1] The translator Kumārajīva (344 to 413) translated a work called a manual on the samādhi of sitting meditation. [1] East Asian Buddhism went on to develop many methods, among them zazen and the huatou, a short phrase used as a focus of attention. [2] Repeating a huatou is a common method in Chinese Chan and Korean Seon. [1]

Two Japanese schools, two emphases

• Rinzai: zazen is usually combined with the study of koans, short teaching stories or questions used in training. [1]
• Sōtō: makes less or no use of koans and prefers shikantaza, often translated "just sitting," where the mind has no intentional focus on any specific object. [1] Zazen is considered the heart of Sōtō practice. [1]

Seating also differs: Sōtō practitioners sit facing a wall or curtain. [1] Many Zen communities use more than one method, depending on the teacher and students. [1] Methods can include following the breath, mentally repeating a phrase, or open awareness. [1]

A set of beginner lectures by the teacher Hakuun Yasutani lists five kinds of zazen. They include bompu, concentration developed to aid well-being, and daijo, zazen aimed at insight into true nature. [1] So some Zen teachers themselves distinguish practice for well-being from practice aimed at insight.

How Zen differs from secular mindfulness programs

• Aim. Zen practice is part of a religious path. Health programs such as MBSR and MBCT are described by their developers as drawing on contemplative traditions together with science, medicine, psychology and education. [3]
• Setting. Zen is usually learned in a community with a teacher and an ethical framework. A secular course is time-limited and teaches skills for stress or relapse prevention.
• History. One scholar describes mindfulness as having been decoupled from its religious background as it spread in Western contexts. [4]

Neither is "better." They answer different questions. For how health care adopted these ideas see secular and religious meditation and Jon Kabat-Zinn and the mindfulness movement.

What research shows

Research on zazen itself is small and mostly measures physiology, not health outcomes.

1. Heart rhythm

   Preclinical

   In 11 Zen practitioners (6 Rinzai, 5 Sōtō) doing slow abdominal breathing, heart rate variability increased within a low-frequency range. [5] More experienced practitioners had frequent heart rhythm irregularities, and the authors said it is not known whether these reflect cardiopathology. [5]

2. Brain activity

   Preclinical

   In 15 experienced Zen meditators, EEG during zazen differed from no-task rest; the authors describe zazen as an open monitoring meditation. [6]

3. Stress, anxiety, depression

   Promising but limited for programs; insufficient for zazen

   Mindfulness-based programs (not zazen) had moderate evidence for anxiety in a review of 47 trials. [7]

EEG patterns are not health outcomes, and these studies used small groups of experienced practitioners. For a practice-level look at open monitoring see open monitoring meditation.