Life in any monastery is far too broad a subject to generalize, as every monastery – even those sharing the same religious foundation – is unique in its own way. Zen monasteries are rooted in Buddhism, yet their specific practices and rules are often shaped by the roshi.
The word roshi is a Japanese term meaning “old teacher” or “venerable master.” In Zen monasteries, the roshi is the master who breathes life into the practice. A monastery without a living master is deprived of its essence. Even if the monks continue to follow the rituals and disciplines, the absence of a true master can render those practices little more than empty routines – a barren expenditure of time.
Satori
A central emphasis within the Zen tradition is satori, a term commonly translated as “sudden enlightenment” or “awakening.” In this context, satori refers to a moment of direct insight in which a person catches a glimpse of their “original face before birth.”
Such an awakening typically elevates awareness into a state in which consciousness becomes aware of itself. The experience cannot truly be captured in words and has little to do with emotions, feelings, or thoughts. Rather, these become spontaneous expressions of the awakened state, while the state itself remains entirely independent of them.
Depending on its intensity – or depth – a satori experience may bring profound states of bliss. In some cases, practitioners report becoming so absorbed in this realization that ordinary desires lose their grip. Within Zen literature and tradition, there are also accounts of masters whose final awakening was associated with a complete letting go of attachment to life itself.
Zen monasteries typically maintain strict disciplines and structures that help practitioners develop a strong foundation, one that can prevent them from becoming overwhelmed by the more extreme aspects of awakening experiences.
Within Zen, sudden awakening is not regarded as the final goal in itself, but rather as the beginning of a long and demanding journey. Just as awareness may momentarily reach the summit, it can just as easily descend again. For this reason, Zen places great importance on continued practice, integration, and maturation after an awakening experience.
In nearly every account, those who experience satori describe a profound sense of bliss, freedom, and clarity. Reality appears complete exactly as it is. Everything feels utterly perfect, and there seems to be no possibility that it could be otherwise.
Yet this state eventually fades, and the person returns to their ordinary state of consciousness.
It is common for someone who has experienced satori and then returned to everyday awareness to long for that blissful state once again. Ironically, this longing can become a new obstacle. The person begins to suffer, comparing ordinary experience to the memory of awakening, and may even develop resentment toward the world for no longer reflecting that profound clarity and joy.
In such cases, satori can become the very opposite of what is often imagined as a transformative spiritual breakthrough. Rather than bringing lasting freedom, attachment to the experience itself can create a new form of suffering. This is one of the reasons why Zen emphasizes not the experience of awakening alone, but the ability to embody and integrate that insight within the realities of everyday life.
The uncompromising disciplines practiced in a Zen monastery over many years serve merely as a compass and a walking staff – tools that help a practitioner reach satori. But once that first awakening has occurred, the real journey begins.
The true journey lies in learning how to return to that summit of awareness through one’s own direct understanding and effort. The initial experience of satori may have been made possible through the support of the monastery and the guidance of the roshi. Yet once a person has discovered the path, they must learn to walk it alone, without losing their way.
If one remains dependent on anything external in order to enter that state of consciousness – whether a place, a teacher, a ritual, or a particular set of conditions – then one is still bound by the world. The maturation of Zen practice is not simply the experience of awakening, but the cultivation of a freedom that is no longer dependent on circumstances.
When a person becomes capable of remaining centered within themselves regardless of circumstances, only then can they truly be considered a roshi. A person whose awareness remains unmoved like a mountain in samadhi – a deep meditative state – even in the midst of a storm, is someone who has mastered every path leading to the summit.
A single moment of satori does not make someone a Buddha.
What makes a person a Buddha is the complete absence of unconsciousness toward oneself. A Buddha remains centered in awareness even while sleeping. Only then does one attain Nirvana, or liberation.
Liberation consists in no longer being ruled by the forces of nature and circumstance. Nothing can pull you away from your own center.
What pulls a person away from themselves are their ambitions, desires, passions, and dualistic judgments. As long as these unconscious tendencies govern the mind, one’s awareness remains scattered and dependent on external conditions. The path of Zen ultimately points toward a state in which awareness rests firmly within itself – free, unmoved, and whole.
Clarity and Methods
At this point, the mind often reaches the wrong conclusion when hearing such teachings. It may seem as though a person like the Buddha is indifferent, inactive, or lazy.
In reality, the opposite is true.
Liberation from the mind does not mean abandoning it or forgetting its contents. Rather, it means freeing oneself from attachment to those contents. It means releasing the attachment to the very idea of “being somebody” – the identification from which ambitions, cravings, and countless desires arise.
Attachments rigidify the mind. They confine it within fixed patterns and limitations.
A Buddha, on the other hand, is flexible and without fixed identity. He can assume any form and reflect any color. Because he is attached to none of them, he is free to express all of them.
The experience of satori can itself become a source of enormous ego.
A person may begin to think:
„I have seen what lies beyond life and death – you have not. I have been there, to those heights, and you have not.“
In this way, even an awakening experience can become another form of attachment, another identity for the mind to cling to.
In some rare cases, however, the realization is so profound that it dissolves even the sense of spiritual achievement itself. The Sixth Zen Patriarch, Huineng, is often presented as an example of such depth. In this state, distinctions lose their meaning:
„There is no life and no death. No high and no low. No teacher and no student. Who am I to teach others?“
Although enlightenment is often described as identical in its essential nature, its depth of realization may vary greatly from person to person. The deeper the realization, the more completely the boundaries created by the mind fall away. As this happens, what many traditions describe as the mystical dimension of existence reveals itself more fully within consciousness.
The primary practices used in Zen monasteries as means of approaching satori are kōan study and shikantaza.
A kōan is typically a short story or dialogue involving a master and a student, two masters, or sometimes two students. These stories often conclude in a way that appears completely nonsensical to the rational mind, yet they carry the subtle fragrance of something hidden beneath the words – namely, satori itself.
Rather than providing logical answers, kōans are designed to exhaust the analytical mind and direct attention toward a deeper, more immediate mode of seeing. They point not to a conclusion, but to a direct realization that cannot be reached through reasoning alone.
The following three kōans are among the most famous in the Zen tradition:
“A monk asked Master Zhaozhou, ‘Does a dog have Buddha-nature or not?’
Zhaozhou replied, ‘Mu!’”
In this case, Mu is not simply a negation of the question. Rather, it is a negation of the very framework of affirmation and denial itself. The purpose of the kōan is not to provide an answer, but to dissolve the assumptions hidden within the question.
A kōan is typically assigned by the roshi according to the nature and temperament of the individual student. Different kōans are used for different people, and it is the roshi who clearly sees which method is appropriate for whom.
When this particular kōan is given, the student is often instructed to discover the answer to a single question:
„What is Mu?“
The student begins searching for a rational answer, a philosophical answer, or perhaps a creative one. Yet each time, the roshi sends them back to continue investigating.
Eventually, the search reaches a point where intellectual solutions are exhausted. According to Zen tradition, only when the student becomes the answer itself does the roshi acknowledge that a genuine awakening, or satori, has occurred.
From that point forward, the guidance given to the student changes in nature. The focus is no longer on attaining awakening, but on learning how to live from it. The instructions that follow are often regarded as deeply personal and, in many traditions, are shared only between teacher and student. They belong to a different stage of the journey and differ fundamentally from the methods used to bring about the initial breakthrough.
The second kōan is remarkably simple. It consists of a single question:
“What was your original face before you were born?”
A student given this kōan, as with any other, is expected to live with it completely – to wake with it, fall asleep with it, meditate upon it, and gradually become one with it.
The purpose of a kōan is not to encourage the search for an answer, but to encourage the practitioner to remain with the question itself and enter ever more deeply into it. Rather than solving the question through thought, one is invited to inhabit it fully.
Seeking an intellectual answer is an outside-in approach. The practitioner attempts to solve the kōan using knowledge, concepts, and experiences gathered from the external world. Zen, however, points in the opposite direction. The kōan is designed to exhaust the mind’s habitual tendency to seek answers through analysis, gradually directing attention toward a more immediate and direct form of seeing.
As the student enters ever more deeply into the question, however, there comes a point where the question itself leads directly to the answer – to the truth. This is what might be called an inside-out realization.
According to the Zen tradition, this is the only kind of answer a roshi will truly accept, and it is not something that can be faked.
Some students possess extraordinary intelligence and creativity. They may construct answers that appear profound and, from the outside, seem indistinguishable from genuine realization. Yet an experienced master is rarely deceived.
The roshi will often respond by presenting additional questions, many of them in the form of further kōans. These follow-up inquiries quickly reveal whether the student’s understanding is authentic or merely conceptual.
If the answer truly arose from satori, the student will respond to subsequent questions with the same effortless clarity from which the original insight emerged. The response will not come from memory, reasoning, or philosophical speculation, but from direct seeing.
The third kōan is:
“When two hands clap, a sound is heard. What is the sound of one hand clapping?”
The other principal method used in Zen monasteries for approaching satori is shikantaza, often translated as “just sitting” or resting in pure awareness.
It is considered one of the purest forms of meditation and, for many people, one of the most challenging.
Shikantaza is concentration without an object. This is precisely what makes it difficult. Most people are accustomed to the idea that concentration requires something separate from themselves to focus upon – a physical object, an idea, a mental image, a sensation, or even the breath.
In shikantaza, there is no object to hold onto.
Awareness simply rests in itself.
For this reason, many Zen teachers insist that the practice cannot truly be explained. At a certain point, there is simply a „knack“ to it – something that must be discovered directly rather than understood intellectually.
Traditionally, this method is often given to students whose temperament is naturally inclined toward stillness and simplicity. Others, especially those driven by a strong desire to seek, discover, or attain something, may be given a kōan instead.
The kōan then becomes a wall against which the mind repeatedly collides. Every attempt to break through using logic, knowledge, or cleverness eventually fails, until the search itself is exhausted and a different kind of seeing becomes possible.
Illusion and Dangers
From time to time, Zen masters conduct teishō – formal talks or lectures through which they explain fundamental aspects of human nature. The purpose is not merely to provide information, but to inspire students to deepen their commitment and intensity in whatever practice has been assigned to them, whether kōan study, shikantaza, or another method.
In many cases, students leave the monastery fairly quickly and abandon the path altogether.
Others reach a point of profound frustration and exhaustion, where it simply becomes easier to stop searching for anything “spiritual” and return to living life as they always have.
In addition to teishō, students periodically participate in dokusan – a private interview with the roshi. This is a rare opportunity for the student to sit face-to-face with the master and speak with them directly.
Dokusan is generally a time for the student to present their current understanding, ask for guidance, or demonstrate their response to a kōan. It is also the occasion when a student who believes they have experienced awakening may attempt to demonstrate that realization to the master.
Students may also discuss practical matters related to monastery life, express concerns, or share difficulties and successes in their practice. Casual conversation unrelated to Zen, however, is generally discouraged. The roshi always has the authority to end the interview at any moment, as many other students are waiting for their turn.
These private meetings are highly valued because they provide an opportunity to test one’s understanding and determine whether apparent progress is genuine or merely self-deception.
Students often convince themselves that they have attained some form of enlightenment simply because they have experienced a vision or unusual mental state. In Tibetan traditions, such visionary experiences – understood as altered states rather than hallucinations – are often studied and valued because they may relate to more mystical dimensions of practice. In Zen, however, such experiences are generally regarded as distractions and are known as makyō – illusory phenomena arising from the deeper layers of the mind.
Makyō can be understood as thoughts, tendencies, and unconscious contents taking on vivid experiential forms. They reveal aspects of the practitioner’s own mind. Yet because Zen is concerned with going beyond attachment to the mind altogether, it places little importance on visions of any kind.
For a yogi or tantric practitioner, such experiences may be viewed as gateways to what is often called the supernatural. By „supernatural,“ we mean aspects of existence that may be real yet remain hidden from ordinary perception and intellectual understanding.
Zen approaches the matter differently.
From the perspective of Zen, there is ultimately no essential difference between God and a pile of manure. One person may see spirits, perceive auras, or make prophecies, while another spends the day planting potatoes.
What is the difference?
From the standpoint of Zen, none exists in itself.
Difference exists only within the divisions created by the mind.
Intensity
Monasteries also hold sesshin, periods of intensive practice dedicated entirely to Zen training. They can be compared to training camps in sports, where all attention, energy, and effort are directed toward a single objective.
Sesshin are, to put it mildly, exceptionally demanding.
They may last anywhere from several days to one or even two months. During these periods, the daily schedule becomes highly disciplined and rigorous. Practitioners often rise as early as three o’clock in the morning to begin their zazen practice, whether that involves working with a kōan, practicing shikantaza, or engaging in another method assigned by the roshi.
The hall in which monks gather for meditation is known as the zendo – the Zen meditation hall. It serves as the central space of practice, where hours of silent sitting, concentration, and self-inquiry unfold day after day throughout the sesshin.
Depending on the monastery, practitioners may sit facing a wall or facing one another. The eyes remain open, with the gaze directed slightly downward and resting softly without focusing on any particular object. Closing the eyes often leads to drowsiness, which is why it is discouraged in most Zen traditions.
The sitting posture is generally a matter of individual capability and preference – quarter lotus, half lotus, full lotus, or traditional kneeling postures may all be used. What matters most is that the spine remains upright and stable.
Then the practice begins within the profound silence of the zendo.
Some struggle with their kōan.
Others attempt to observe the mind.
Some try to let go of it altogether.
Others simply struggle to stay awake.
During these periods of zazen, one of the senior monks slowly and quietly walks among the seated practitioners carrying a flat wooden stick known as the kyōsaku. These senior monks have been entrusted with this responsibility by the roshi and serve as guides for newer practitioners.
When a student becomes drowsy or excessively relaxed, the senior monk may stop beside them, bow, and strike them across the shoulder with the kyōsaku.
The strike is usually firm and is not intended as punishment. Rather, it serves as a means of restoring alertness, energy, and presence.
The student then bows in gratitude to the senior monk and continues their practice.
Of course, many students find the training psychologically overwhelming and eventually leave the monastery. Others begin struggling with the impulsive thoughts and emotional reactions that arise after receiving a strike from the kyōsaku
During dokusan (the private interview with the master), a student may request that a marker be placed beside their seat in the zendo, indicating that they do not wish to receive kyōsaku strikes. In most cases, such requests are respected, as it is considered better to slow a student’s progress than to discourage them from practice altogether.
After a single period of zazen, a practitioner may leave with sore shoulders and a stiff back from repeated strikes of the kyōsaku. Traditionally, the kyōsaku is often used more frequently with advanced practitioners. The more serious and dedicated a student becomes, the more is expected of them. When their intensity begins to fade during meditation, senior monks may encourage them to renew their effort and attention.
As a practitioner draws closer to a breakthrough, the roshi and senior monks often challenge them to summon even greater intensity and sincerity in their practice.
Students may also request a strike themselves. By raising a hand, a practitioner signals that they would like assistance in restoring alertness or concentration. The senior monk approaches, bows, receives a bow in return, and then delivers a strike across the shoulder.
To an outside observer unfamiliar with the context, this practice may appear harsh, perhaps even resembling punishment or self-mortification. Within the tradition, however, the kyōsaku is generally understood as an aid to practice rather than a form of punishment. It is intended as a means of encouraging wakefulness, determination, and the full development of one’s potential.
No one is forced to remain in a Zen monastery. The very choice to stay implies a willingness to engage wholeheartedly with the demands of the training and the search for truth.
As one’s commitment deepens, it becomes easier to understand why these demanding methods exist. Long hours of zazen eventually bring pain to the legs, knees, and back. Early mornings, prolonged concentration, rigorous schedules, the occasional use of the kyōsaku, and the challenges posed by the roshi during dokusan can all become extraordinarily difficult.
For many people, one of the greatest challenges is that Zen training often offers little of the encouragement and reward that people are accustomed to receiving for their efforts. The habitual desire for recognition, achievement, and validation is repeatedly exposed and challenged.
Those who remain are often those for whom the search has become a matter of profound importance.
Those who entered simply out of curiosity, or in search of an unusual experience, frequently discover that the reality of monastery life is far more demanding than they imagined.
Ultimately, however, everything depends upon the individual.
All of these apparent hardships are experienced as hardships largely because the mind resists them. From the perspective of Zen, the same circumstances can be experienced in an entirely different way. A shift in awareness can transform what appears burdensome into something deeply meaningful – even joyful.
Life in a Zen monastery is difficult so long as one experiences oneself as a struggling student seeking something beyond the present moment. Yet according to the tradition, there comes a point when nothing external has changed – the same schedule remains, the same meditation hall, the same discipline, the same practice – yet everything is experienced differently.
Then, what once seemed difficult becomes effortless, and what once seemed ordinary reveals itself as complete.
Author: Vasil Stoyanov
