Excerpted from a workshop at the 5th Whole World is a Single Flower Conference held at Providence Zen Center in October 1999.

This is the workshop on Zen and psychotherapy. First of all, be aware
that this is about Zen and psychotherapy, it’s not about Zen and
psychology. There is a difference. I’m not approaching this from a
perspective of human psychology. I would like to look at the process of
psychotherapy and its relationship to Zen. The question is how Zen
impacts the process of looking at and working with your karma. Zen and
psychotherapy are both about this process, so in a sense they are not
very different. If you are a Zen student, everything you do is Zen. So,
we can look at this question from two perspectives: how does a Zen
practitioner who is a therapist use their Zen practice in their
therapy? And, as a psychotherapy client, how do you use your practice
to deepen your psychotherapy?

As a therapist, you have to stay present and in the moment. You need to
be able to get out of the way to let the process happen. I think the
most important perspective which relates Zen to psychotherapy is to
view the person you’re working with as the Buddha himself. That implies
not sticking someone into some narrow classification, but looking to
see who the person really is. You can use diagnosis as a tool, but
always be careful not to box the client into some idea of who she or he
is. When people ask me what my technique is I say, “what I do best is
listen well.” I try to listen deeply for who the person truly is.
Everyone who comes into therapy has some problem or some situation that
they want to talk about. The first thing you do is to find out what
that situation or problem is. The more you explore, the more you find
out what got hurt and what needs to heal for a more natural expression
of true nature. In a sense, psychotherapy is about untying the knot of
karma and finding the more natural self, finding authenticity.

Zen teaches us that attachment to our thinking is the root of our
suffering. Much of our lives we are stuck in and act out of rigid and
repeating patterns of thoughts and feelings. So, to find simple ways to
interrupt these patterns, even for a moment, can be very helpful. Most
people aren’t even aware of what their minds are doing. I usually start
off a session with five minutes of meditation. Sometimes that seems to
be the most important thing that happens during the whole hour,
especially for someone who doesn’t have a regular sitting practice.
Just teaching clients a little meditation and giving them a feeling for
what goes on in their minds can be an incredible eye-opener for them. I
can’t tell you how many people say to me, “I love this five minutes of
meditation we do here.”

As a client, you have to find a way to express yourself and to get to
know yourself better. If you’re a Zen student and you’re a client in
psychotherapy, an important tool you have to find out about yourself is
practice. Mindfulness and breath are wonderful tools for calming the
mind and working with a problem. I often suggest to people I’m working
with to watch their breath as a way of returning to the present. I’ll
suggest that they do walking meditation when they go from their desk at
work to the bathroom or the water cooler. We all have our breath to
return to when we get overwhelmed; just breathe in, just breathe out,
just feel your body for ten breaths. Breath can help contain feelings
which seem out of control. If we can return to the breath, we may not
need to react so fast; there’s some space. That’s also part of what
we’re learning when we’re sitting in the dharma room. Thoughts and
feelings come up but we don’t have to do anything about them–we can
contain them with the breath. The breath can cut the chain of thinking.

Student: I find that the stronger my psychotherapy or analysis got, the
weaker my Zen practice became. The one replaced the other… like it
wasn’t necessary because the therapeutic process was so strong.

Kitzes PSN: OK, I can’t argue with your experience. It seems to me,
though, the more you stay with your practice while in psychotherapy the
deeper the psychotherapy becomes. Practice can give you access to so
much more than just thinking. If you just stay in a “psychotherapeutic
mind set,” you may get attached to your ideas. The process of breathing
and witnessing allows you to see your attachments. This will increase
what you can do within a therapeutic framework. Remember, in Zen
meditation we’re not really trying to explore something, we’re working
with don’t know mind and letting everything be. Psychotherapeutically,
you’re looking to explore something–so, they’re two different things.

Student: I’m in a psychology program that emphasizes not knowing as a
therapist, but what then differentiates good therapy from bad therapy?

KPSN: Keep a don’t know mind and you’ll find out! If you have an idea
about it, you’ll never find out. I remember last week I had a session
with somebody that was terrible–I was off… I just didn’t feel
connected. But, when they came back the next week they raved about what
a great session we had had the previous week. You just don’t know!
There are all sorts of processes going on that I may not be aware of.
This is also true for the client. They may realize something important
that happened in a session many days later.

I don’t think you have to worry too much about whether you’re doing
good therapy. As a therapist, your job is to be present and authentic
and then let the process take care of itself. Give the client that
you’re working with the space to go where they need to go. You may say,
“I think we need to look at this,” but once you start looking at it,
give them enough room to find out what’s true for them. Suzuki Roshi
said, and I’m paraphrasing here, “A really good shepherd gives his
sheep as big a pasture as possible, and then he watches. If you don’t
watch, you’re a lousy shepherd because you will lose your sheep. But if
you pay attention you will let them be and you won’t lose them.” You
don’t try to control the situation, you let the situation teach you.
Thank you very much for your attention and good questions.