Are you having a hard time channeling your inner Zen? Peace and tranquility may feel in short supply these days, but gardening elevates mental health and provides a great escape from relentless news cycles and the stressful state of the world. While any chance to get your hands in soil can boost your mood, one form of gardening focuses on restoring your balance and encourages you to embark on a journey toward enlightenment: Zen gardens.
What is a Zen Garden?
Originally developed by Japanese Buddhist monks as places for meditation, Zen gardens offer a space where peace and tranquility reign. Calming, natural scenes replete with symbolism invite reflection and contemplation. While western gardens excite the senses with vibrant colors, flowers, textures, and decorative elements, Zen gardens provide a soothing environment, allowing a journey toward self-knowledge.
In fact, Zen Buddhists believe that contemplation and mediation are tools in the quest for self-knowledge. Zen master gardeners design spaces to clear the mind, providing a perfect environment to reflect and embrace the journey toward enlightenment.
“Zen” means meditation. Gardens designed with Zen principles provide a soothing space for contemplation and meditation.
Elements of a Zen Garden
While Japanese gardens feature beautiful plants, meandering paths, and lovely water features, a traditional Zen garden, known as Karesansui, is a minimalist dry landscape comprised of natural elements—rocks, gravel, sand, and wood—with few plants and no water. Zen gardens eschew man-made objects, instead, they use natural elements to create a beautiful, reflective space. Typically, a wall, fence, or hedge surrounds a Zen garden, providing a reclusive spot away from the distraction of the outside world.
Within the space, rocks, gravel, sand, and minimal plants are placed to tell a story, using the 7 guiding principles of Zen design:
- Simplicity (Kanso)
- Austerity (Shibui)
- Asymmetry (Fukinsei)
- Naturalness (Shinzen)
- Mystery or Subtlety (Yugen)
- Magical or Unconventional (Datsuzoku)
- Stillness (Seijaku)
Natural Elements
Rocks represent enduring elements in nature and a desire for eternity. Gravel and sand, when raked into patterns, suggest water, with wavy patterns mimicking the flow of rivers and lines surrounding large rocks evoking ripples in water. Patterns raked into the sand or gravel signify a season or mood. The actual art of raking the gravel or sand is part of the meditative process and helps improve mental concentration. A fine-toothed metal rake is used to smooth the sand or gravel, while a wide-toothed rake is employed to draw patterns. Straight lines echo serenity, leading the eye through the landscape, while wavy lines provide a flow through the garden. Intricate designs can be achieved through raking.
Photo courtesy Portland Japanese Garden
The patterns in a Zen garden create an ever-changing scene that’s visually engaging. Early morning and late afternoon sun highlights textures and designs, while moonlight makes the garden look ethereal. Meditating by moonlight in a Zen garden may inspire sweet dreams.
Zen Buddhism requires that every task is performed with love. It’s believed that the love and care put into raking gravel or removing fallen leaves, for example, will produce a serene and kindly atmosphere in the garden and gardener.
While most gardeners can’t wait to load their gardens with brilliant blooms and fabulous foliage, Zen gardening’s use of plants is more selective and restrained. A single, brilliant weeping cherry tree to admire and contemplate as it morphs throughout the seasons or a natural ground cover of moss are plants you’re most like to find in a Zen garden. In fact, the Moss Garden of Saihōji includes more than 40 different mosses, creating an atmosphere of quietness and calm. Small-leaved azaleas tolerate hard pruning, making them popular in Zen gardens for shaping into mounds resembling clouds. Groups of evergreen shrubs often are pruned to resemble an outline of a clump of trees.
The overriding rule with Zen gardening is: less is more.
Photo courtesy Portland Japanese Garden
Symbolism in a Zen Garden
All elements in a Zen garden tell a story. In fact, symbolism is used to visually remind the ordinary person of their place in the universe. The numbers 3, 5, and 7 are considered auspicious by Japanese garden masters, with rocks often grouped into auspicious clusters. Ryōanji is famous for its composition of 15 rocks in a 7:5:3 layout, thought to represent a Buddhist tale of a tiger carrying her cubs across the water.
Along with numbers, symbolism runs throughout all elements in a Zen garden. Rocks placed vertically represent heaven, while rocks with break lines pointing horizontally represent earth. Diagonally-placed rocks represent humanity.
Sand or gravel represents an empty mind, which is then raked into swirls resembling the way water eddies around stones and islands or patterned into waves to represent rivers. While water is a vital element in Japanese gardens, in a dry Zen garden it’s symbolized through raked gravel to imitate the energy of real water. Positioning of “rivers” is important, as traditionally dry rivers run from east to south to west.
Plants tell stories in the Zen garden, too.
Although used selectively, each plant is chosen carefully for its symbolic addition in the garden. Pines are one of the most venerated trees. Loved for the bark, which resembles dragon scales, pine trees symbolize longevity. In fact, pine, plum, and peach trees are known as the Trees of Life. Plum blossoms symbolize the beginning of the Japanese New Year, representing quiet strength for surviving winter. Acers often are included in Zen gardens, representing the fresh spirit of spring, as well as the richness of fall’s shortening days. A gorgeous, lacy-leafed Japanese maple makes a perfect addition to a Zen garden.
How to Create a Zen Garden
If you think you don’t have room for a Zen garden, think again. A side yard, a small courtyard, or a pretty corner in the back garden makes a perfect place to create your sanctuary. The space doesn’t need to be big: in fact, starting small may make the area more manageable and pleasurable as you learn more about creating a mindful space. The goal is to relax, unwind, refresh, and rejuvenate in a Zen garden—not worry about weeds.
Here are some tips to get started:
- Select a site. Pick a spot away from noisy neighbors or busy streets. Choose a flat area and measure the space. Many Zen gardens are designed to be seen from the house to enjoy a soothing view even when you don’t have time to meditate in the garden. Wherever you choose to create your garden, make sure you include a spot where you can sit and reflect while enjoying the view.
- Visit virtually. Nothing is more inspiring than seeing what Zen master gardeners create. Take an internet trip to Ryoan-ji Zen Garden or the Sand and Stone Garden at The Portland Japanese Gardens for inspiration.
- Draw a design. Sketch the garden space, making sure to incorporate the 7 guiding principles of Zen gardens. Remember: asymmetry is integral in Zen gardens, as it’s believed to create harmony. Design a simple, uncluttered garden that exudes a feeling of calm.
- Think about scale. Stones are the main features of a Zen garden, but large boulders can overwhelm a small space. Likewise, small stones become lost in vast spaces. Choose elements that look proportionally correct in your garden. Also, make sure you’re happy with the position for large rocks: they’re difficult to move once installed.
- Remember color and texture. Play with complementary and contrasting colors, choosing darker stones that stand out in a sea of lighter gravel. The palette of a Zen garden creates a soothing aesthetic, so eschew bold blooms and rainbow foliage. Instead, incorporate plants that provide a mix of textures in shades of green, like mosses, ferns, hostas, and evergreen shrubs or trees.
- Select a specimen plant as a focal point in the garden that provides four seasons of beauty. A cherry, plum, or Japanese maple make excellent choices for a featured tree.
- Add a spot to meditate. Place a bench or chair where you can enjoy a full view of your serene space.
- Maintain. Caring for the garden is an important part of the meditative process. Rake the gravel to keep patterns sharp and looking fresh. Pick up fallen leaves and remove weeds for a pristine, clutter-free garden. (“Leave the leaves” doesn’t pertain to Zen gardening. The space should be tidy and free from distractions while you relax and reflect in the garden.)
- Enjoy. Leave your mental “to-do” list outside the garden. Your goal is to reflect, relax, re-energize, and reconnect with nature as you enjoy your Zen garden
Ah…now don’t you feel better after spending time in the calming, reflective space of your new Zen garden?
“This post about Zen Gardening is provided as an educational/inspirational service of the National Garden Bureau and our members. Please credit and link to National Garden Bureau and author member when using all or parts of this article.”