Western Zen undertakes the task of stripping away the religious trappings of Zen to reveal the practical theory of mind beneath. While Western culture conditions the physical being in hundreds of constructive ways, we are haphazard in our conditioning of the mental being. We teach it to read, write, do numbers, and know facts, but otherwise leave mental life to wander as it pleases. What is missing is a practical theory for conditioning the mind.
Zen's intuitive psychology fills that void. It not only describes processes of inner conditioning that can make positive improvements in our conscious life, it unites these results with the arts of performance creating more effective human behavior.
Remarkably, this psychology in Zen is no foreign import. Its reality is well explained by Western Psychology, and is full reflected throughout the course of American Intellectual Tradition. Western Zen takes the hidden truth in Eastern Zen, shines the light of Western Reason upon it, and makes the deeper intuitive psychology universal. The practical conditioning of the mind and the emotions to good effect is possible in terms completely consistent with Western science. The end result is a mastery of your inner life and a finer quality in your human experience.