Hakuin Ekaku (c.1685–1768) is a towering figure in Japanese Zen. A fiery and dynamic teacher and renowned artist, he reformed the Zen Rinzai tradition, which had fallen into stagnation and decline in his time, revitalizing it and ensuring its survival even to our own day. This intimate self-portrait of the Zen master includes reminiscences from his childhood, accounts of his Zen practice and enlightenment experiences, practical advice for students on the problems that arise in intensive meditation practice, and the only description of a technique he calls “introspective meditation.”