A koan is a story or riddle, used in meditation to help you unravel greater truths about the world and yourself.
In order to solve a koan, the pupil must leave behind all thoughts and ideas in order to respond intuitively.
They are meant to focus the mind on the central questions of Zen by creating “great doubt”.
A koan is a story or riddle, used during meditation to challenge you to think differently about a concept or experience.
to help you understand the true nature of yourself and of everything, and to increase your awareness of what is.
Koans don’t have a right answer.
Western pupils often find this very frustrating, since most westerners are used to trying to get the right (and only) answer to a problem. For the same reason, the truths of Zen can’t be learned just by reading a scripture or getting a solution from a a teacher or a text book.
The best way to work with koans is with a teacher. Without a teacher it can be too easy to fool yourself into thinking that you’ve solved a koan.