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We're pretty sure that if we knew the real answer to your question, it would spring from some higher plane of consciousness right now. But here goes -- Zen Buddhism is a branch of Mahayana Buddhism that emphasizes meditation, self-contemplation, and intuition over traditional forms of worship. It's practiced primarily in China, Japan, and Vietnam. A form of Buddhism that focused on both unity and self-denial, Zen Buddhism spread from China to Japan in 1200 AD. Enlightenment was defined as a "gateless gate."
Rather than subscribing to the Western notion of achieving a reward at the end of a long struggle, an enlightened Zen practitioner simply sees everything as it is, as it's always been. Zen Buddhism delights in koans -- puzzling or paradoxical statements or stories that are meant to aid meditation and spiritual self-discovery. Zen accents the idea of intuitive knowledge, questioning perceived assumptions of logic in words, sentences, and ideas. We'll leave you with a classic Zen koan: Two monks were arguing about a flag. One said: "The flag is moving." The other said: "The wind is moving." The Sixth Patriarch Hui Neng happened to
be passing by. He told them: "Not the wind, not the flag; mind is moving."
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