Glossary

Defined terms across psychology and Zen practice.

A working glossary of the terms used throughout the PsyZenLab blog. Each entry gives a 2-3 sentence definition suitable for citation and links to the articles that develop the concept in depth.

Psychology

Anima / Animusanima · animus · anima/animus: Jung's archetypes for the inner opposite-gender image: anima (feminine aspect in a man), animus (masculine aspect in a woman). The quality of one's relationships often reflects the developmental stage of this inner figure.
Archetypearchetype · archetypes · archetypal: A universal psychological pattern (Hero, Mother, Shadow, Trickster, Wise Old Man) that structures human experience and appears across mythologies. In Jung, archetypes are formal tendencies, not fixed images.
Attachment styleattachment style · attachment styles · secure attachment · anxious attachment: A stable pattern of relating to close others developed from early caregiving, typically categorized as secure, anxious, avoidant, or disorganized. Attachment style strongly predicts adult relationship dynamics and response to therapy.
Big FiveFive-Factor Model · OCEAN · FFM: The Big Five (Five-Factor Model) measures personality along five broad dimensions — Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism. Unlike type systems, it treats each dimension as a continuum and has the strongest empirical support of any personality framework.
Cognitive distortioncognitive distortion · cognitive distortions · thinking error: Systematic, repeated errors in thinking that amplify psychological distress — e.g., all-or-nothing thinking, catastrophizing, personalization. Identified by Aaron Beck as the mechanism that keeps depression and anxiety running.
Cognitive function stackcognitive function · cognitive functions · function stack · dominant function: Jung's eight cognitive functions (Ni/Ne, Si/Se, Ti/Te, Fi/Fe) arranged in a four-function hierarchy per type. MBTI letter code is a shorthand; the function stack is the actual model and is what correlates meaningfully with behavior.
Cognitive triadcognitive triad · Beck's triad: Aaron Beck's observation that depression is structured around negative views of self, world, and future. The triad is the target of cognitive therapy: change the structure, not just the mood.
Collective unconsciouscollective unconscious: Jung's hypothesis of a shared psychic substrate holding universal patterns (archetypes) that repeat across cultures and eras. Distinct from the personal unconscious; not a literal "racial memory" though Jung's early language sometimes blurred this.
Defense mechanismdefense mechanism · defense mechanisms · psychological defense: Unconscious psychological strategies that reduce anxiety by distorting reality — e.g., denial, projection, rationalization, sublimation, reaction formation. Originated in Freud's work; elaborated systematically by Anna Freud.
EnneagramEnneagram type · 9 types: A nine-type personality system emphasizing core motivation and fear rather than behavioral preferences. Less empirically supported than Big Five but richer than MBTI on inner dynamics.
Existential vacuumexistential vacuum · noogenic neurosis: Frankl's name for the specifically modern suffering characterized by emptiness, boredom, and purposelessness — what he also called "noogenic neurosis." Distinct from conventional depression because its origin is meaning-deficiency rather than biochemistry or drive-conflict.
Flowflow · flow state · being in the zone: Csíkszentmihályi's term for the state of full absorption in a challenging activity when skill matches difficulty — attention narrows, self-consciousness drops, time distorts. Strongly correlated with well-being and with meditative absorption.
Gestalt therapyGestalt psychotherapy: A humanistic, experiential therapy developed by Fritz and Laura Perls emphasizing present-moment awareness, embodied experience, and contact. Foundational for empty-chair work, two-chair dialogue, and modern experiential methods.
Growth mindsetgrowth mindset · fixed mindset · mindset: Carol Dweck's distinction between believing abilities are static (fixed mindset) vs. believing they develop through effort (growth mindset). Empirical effect sizes in real classrooms are smaller than popular accounts suggest, but the construct is measurable and relevant.
Holland CodeRIASEC · Holland Career Code: John Holland's six vocational interest types — Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, Conventional — represented as a three-letter code (e.g., RIA, SEC). The most empirically validated career interest framework in use.
Individuationindividuation · individuation process: Jung's term for the lifelong process of becoming psychologically whole by integrating unconscious contents (shadow, anima/animus) into consciousness. Not self-improvement; a gradual surrender of ego-center to the Self.
Logotherapylogotherapy: Viktor Frankl's psychotherapy centered on the claim that meaning-seeking is the primary human motivation. Distinct from Freudian pleasure-seeking and Adlerian power-seeking; addresses the 'existential vacuum' that ordinary clinical treatments miss.
Maslow's hierarchy of needshierarchy of needs · Maslow's hierarchy · Maslow's pyramid · needs hierarchy: Maslow's framework of human needs (physiological → safety → love/belonging → esteem → self-actualization). The famous pyramid diagram was never drawn by Maslow himself; he explicitly rejected its rigid step-by-step reading.
MBTIMyers-Briggs Type Indicator · 16 personalities · 16-type: The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is a four-letter personality typology (e.g., INTJ, ENFP) derived from Jung's theory of psychological types. Its four-letter reliability is around 50% on retest, but the underlying cognitive function stacks are more stable and more useful.
Peak experiencepeak experience · peak experiences: Maslow's term for moments of intense clarity, unity, and transcendence that self-actualizing people report regularly. A secularized description of what religious traditions call mystical experience; overlaps substantially with Zen satori.
Personapersona · Jungian persona · social mask: Jung's term for the social mask — the constructed self presented to the outer world. A healthy persona is functional; the pathology is over-identification (treating the mask as the self) or total rejection (pretending there is no mask).
PHQ-9PHQ9 · Patient Health Questionnaire-9: A 9-item depression screening instrument mapped directly to DSM-5 major depressive disorder criteria. Superior to older scales for clinical decision-making because its items correspond to diagnostic criteria rather than general low mood.
Projectionprojection · psychological projection: The unconscious attribution of one's own disowned traits, feelings, or intentions to another person. A major clinical defense mechanism; in Jung, specifically tied to unintegrated shadow contents.
Self (Jungian)Self · Jungian Self · the Self: In Jungian psychology, the Self (capital S) is the total personality — the unifying center that includes both consciousness and unconscious. Distinct from ego (the center of consciousness only). Individuation is the ego's gradual relativization before the Self.
Self-actualizationself-actualization · self actualization · self-actualizing: Maslow's term for the growth orientation present in rare people who are working toward realizing their potential. Not a destination; a mode of functioning observable in about 1% of the population that Maslow studied.
Self-determination theoryself-determination theory · SDT · Deci and Ryan: Deci and Ryan's motivation theory identifying three fundamental psychological needs — autonomy, competence, relatedness — whose satisfaction produces intrinsic motivation and well-being. One of the most empirically supported frameworks in motivation research.
Shadowshadow · the shadow · shadow self: In Jungian psychology, the disowned or unconscious aspects of the personality — traits the ego rejected as incompatible with its self-image. Shadow integration is not about "embracing your dark side" but about reducing projection by taking back what was disowned.
Synchronicitysynchronicity · meaningful coincidence: Jung's principle of meaningful coincidence — events connected by meaning rather than causation. Pairs naturally with Buddhist dependent origination as a non-linear account of connection.
Transcendent functiontranscendent function: Jung's term for the psyche's capacity to hold a tension between opposites long enough for a third, integrating possibility to emerge. The engine of individuation; active imagination is its main technique.
Transferencetransference · countertransference: The patient's redirection of feelings from significant early figures onto the therapist. Originally Freud's discovery that the therapy relationship itself is a vehicle for insight; now a core concept across most depth psychotherapies.
Unconditional positive regardunconditional positive regard · UPR: Carl Rogers' term for the therapist's stance of accepting the client as a person without conditions of worth. Not approval of all behavior; acceptance of the person underneath the behavior, which allows genuine change.
Will to meaningwill to meaning · meaning-seeking: Frankl's claim that the primary human motivation is the search for meaning — that a life matters and one's actions have significance. Its frustration produces the "existential vacuum," a specific modern suffering that is not identical to depression.

Zen & Buddhism

Ānāpānasatianapanasati · ānāpānasati · breath meditation · mindfulness of breathing: The classical Buddhist 16-step mindfulness-of-breathing practice. The most structured entry point to meditation, suitable for temperaments that need stepwise progress rather than open sitting.
Anattaanatta · anatman · anātman · non-self: The Buddhist teaching of "non-self" — that what is conventionally called "I" has no fixed, independent core. Not the denial of personhood; the denial of a metaphysically separate, unchanging self behind experience.
Aniccaanicca · anitya · impermanence · 无常: The Buddhist teaching of impermanence — all conditioned phenomena are in continuous change. One of the Three Marks of Existence alongside dukkha and anatta; the insight meditation (vipassanā) path is centrally built on its direct perception.
Bodhibodhi · awakening · 菩提: Sanskrit/Pāli for "awakening" — the direct realization that defines a buddha. Distinct from ordinary peak experience or insight; implies the complete seeing-through of craving and delusion as the roots of dukkha.
Buddha-natureBuddha nature · 佛性: The doctrine that all sentient beings possess the intrinsic capacity for awakening. Not a soul or substance; a non-substantial openness that Zen treats as already present, obscured only by conditioned thinking.
Dependent originationdependent origination · pratītyasamutpāda · pratitya-samutpada · 缘起: The Buddhist teaching that all phenomena arise in dependence on conditions, classically expressed as a twelve-linked chain. Paired with Jung's synchronicity as a non-linear causal framework.
Dharmadharma · dhamma · 法: In Buddhism, dharma carries two primary senses: (1) the Buddha's teaching and the underlying law of reality it describes; (2) any phenomenon, event, or element of experience (plural "dharmas"). Context determines which sense is meant.
Diamond SūtraDiamond Sutra · Vajracchedikā · 金刚经: A key Mahāyāna sūtra in the Prajñāpāramitā corpus, structured as a dialogue between the Buddha and Subhūti. The text Huìnéng awakened upon and the model for Chán/Zen's negating rhetoric.
Dukkhadukkha · suffering · unsatisfactoriness · 苦: Pāli term for the first Noble Truth — often translated "suffering" but more accurately rendered as "unsatisfactoriness" or "dis-ease." Encompasses both obvious pain and the subtle unease of conditioned existence.
Eightfold PathNoble Eightfold Path · 八正道: The Buddha's prescription for ending dukkha: right view, intention, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, concentration. Classically grouped into three trainings — wisdom (prajñā), ethics (sīla), and concentration (samādhi).
Four Noble TruthsFour Aryan Truths: The core of the Buddha's first teaching: (1) existence involves dukkha; (2) dukkha arises from craving; (3) dukkha can cease; (4) the Eightfold Path leads to its cessation. Not metaphysical claims; a medical-style diagnosis and treatment protocol.
Heart SūtraHeart Sutra · Prajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya · 心经: A 260-character Mahāyāna sūtra condensing the Prajñāpāramitā literature. The source of the famous line "form is emptiness, emptiness is form" and a core chanted text across East Asian Buddhist schools.
Huàtóuhuatou · huàtóu · hua-tou · 话头: A "critical phrase" — typically a short kōan question (e.g., "What is Mu?") — held as a sustained felt question rather than investigated intellectually. Developed by Dàhuì Zōnggǎo as a portable kōan method for lay practitioners.
Karmakarma · kamma · 业: Sanskrit for "action" — specifically intentional action that conditions future experience. Not cosmic reward-and-punishment; a descriptive principle that intentional states shape further states, both psychologically and across lifetimes in Buddhist cosmology.
Kenshōkensho · kenshō · 见性: "Seeing one's nature" — the initial breakthrough to direct experience of Buddha-nature in Rinzai Zen. Often described as a glimpse rather than a full realization; post-kenshō practice is where the deeper work begins.
Kinhinkinhin · walking meditation · 经行: Slow walking meditation synchronized with breath, typically practiced between seated periods. Not a break; a distinct practice that integrates mindfulness with body-in-motion and is often more accessible than zazen for some temperaments.
Kōankoan · kōan · koans · kôan: A paradoxical question or anecdote used in Zen training ("What is the sound of one hand clapping?", Zhàozhōu's "Mu"). A kōan is not a riddle to be solved analytically but a device that exhausts conceptual mind until direct insight breaks through.
Makyōmakyo · makyō · Zen sickness · 魔境: Literally "diabolic phenomena" — the perceptual, emotional, and somatic disturbances that arise during intensive practice. The Zen tradition treats makyō as a predictable, non-pathological phase that must be neither clung to nor fled.
Mettāmetta · mettā · loving-kindness · loving kindness: Pāli for "loving-kindness" or benevolent friendliness — the first of the four brahmavihāras. Practiced as a systematic meditation extending well-wishing from self to loved ones, neutral others, difficult people, and all beings.
MuWú · 无: Zhàozhōu's answer "Mu" (無, "no" / "nothing") to the question "Does a dog have Buddha-nature?" — the first case of the Mumonkan and the most foundational kōan in the tradition. Not a denial; a direct cut through conceptual framing.
Papañcapapanca · papañca · proliferation · 戏论: Pāli for "mental proliferation" — the runaway conceptual elaboration that converts a neutral perception into anxious narrative. Buddhist analogue of what cognitive therapy calls distortion cascades.
Prajñāprajna · prajñā · wisdom · 般若: Sanskrit for the "wisdom" that directly sees emptiness — not intellectual understanding but immediate insight into the non-substantial nature of phenomena. Pairs with compassion (karuṇā) as the two wings of Mahāyāna awakening.
Rōshiroshi · rōshi · 老师: Japanese honorific for a senior Zen teacher, literally "old teacher." Not a formal rank in all schools; in Rinzai often implies transmission, in Sōtō varies by lineage and context.
Samādhisamadhi · samādhi · concentration · meditative absorption: "Concentration" or "absorption" — the meditative stabilization of attention. One of the three classical trainings alongside wisdom and ethics; the basis on which insight practice develops.
Samusamu · work practice · 作务: Manual labor as meditation practice — cooking, cleaning, gardening performed with full presence. Dōgen: "Washing the rice is enlightenment." Samu is treated as equivalent to zazen, not subordinate to it.
Satorisatori · 悟: Japanese for "awakening" or "enlightenment" — specifically the sudden, immediate realization in Rinzai Zen. Often used interchangeably with kenshō, though some teachers reserve satori for a deeper or more lasting realization.
Shikantazashikantaza · just sitting · 只管打坐: "Just sitting" — the Sōtō Zen practice of sitting with no object, no goal, and no technique applied. Dōgen's central method; the practice is the realization rather than a means to it.
Śūnyatāsunyata · śūnyatā · emptiness · 空: "Emptiness" — the Mahāyāna teaching that all phenomena lack inherent, independent existence. Not nihilism; a positive insight that things exist only relationally, the ground of compassion and of wisdom in the Prajñāpāramitā literature.
Upādānaupadana · upādāna · clinging · 取: Sanskrit/Pāli for "clinging" or "grasping" — the ninth link in dependent origination, classically subdivided into clinging to sensuality, views, rules-and-rituals, and self-doctrine. Maps closely onto the attachment/avoidance patterns Western psychology studies.
Wabi-sabiwabi-sabi · wabi sabi: Japanese aesthetic principle honoring impermanence, imperfection, and incompleteness. Wabi is austere beauty; sabi is the patina of age. Distinct from Western aesthetic appreciation of symmetry and perfection.
Wú wéiwu-wei · wu wei · non-action · 无为: Taoist term for "non-action" or "effortless action" — acting in accordance with natural rhythm rather than imposing will. Not passivity; a skilled responsiveness that informed Chán's style and rhetoric.
Zazenzazen · 坐禅 · seated meditation: Seated Zen meditation — the core formal practice of the tradition. Posture, breath, and mental orientation combine into a single integrated practice; different schools apply different objects (breath count, kōan, shikantaza).
Zen (Chán)Zen · Chán · Chan Buddhism · Zen Buddhism: A Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition originating in Tang-dynasty China as Chán, transmitted to Japan as Zen. Emphasizes direct pointing at the mind, sudden awakening, and realization outside conceptual elaboration.