The way-seeking mind of a tenzo is actualised by rolling up your sleeves.

— Dōgen Zenji (道元 禅師, 1200–1253)

When everything seems to need my attention at once, I often return to the kitchen in search of order. With a full schedule, it would seem reasonable to let kitchen work slip. The same is true in moments of emotional fatigue or exhaustion. When time and energy are scarce, surely the more efficient, self-soothing choice would be to order in, eat out, or reach for something ready-made.

All the more reason, I’d argue, to return to the kitchen. Nourishment is non-negotiable, and meals made from scratch tend to be healthier, better equipping us for the day’s demands. But beyond nutrition, the kitchen offers something more: a moment offline, a shift into a simpler mode where one physical action follows another in a practical order. The sequence of preparing, cooking, and cleaning is a contained cycle that, once complete, leaves me refocused and re-centred.

Silence suits me best during preparation—the slicing, stirring, and assembling. Later, as I wash pots and wipe down surfaces, a podcast works well, provided there isn’t too much on my mind. When my thoughts are still circling, I opt for yet more silence to confront the noise within.

This week, London has felt like it's entering the transition from spring to summer—sunny and dry, with low humidity and minimal wind, making it ideal for kitchen work with the door and windows open. Into the evening, there has been only a slight breeze, rustling the leaves and carrying a little of the outdoor soundscape inside to complement the clatter of pots and pans.

During these phases, I also tend to reach for my copy of Tenzo Kyōkun (典座教訓). It’s a significant text, written in the spring of 1237 by Dōgen, founder of the Sōtō school of Zen Buddhism. I reread it whenever the need arises.

The term tenzo (典座) refers to the head cook in a Zen monastery—a respected officer within the monastic order, entrusted with the preparation of food. Kyōkun (教訓) translates to ‘lesson’, and connotes a set of teachings or earnest instruction. Together, Tenzo Kyōkun is usually rendered as “Instructions for the Cook”.

Within Zen, cooking is not a menial task but a form of practice, demanding presence, discipline, and a grasp of Zen principles. Dōgen’s guidance for the tenzo combines practical instruction with philosophical thought, urging the head cook to approach their job with attentiveness and a sense of duty.

Unlike some of Dōgen’s more abstruse works, Tenzo Kyōkun speaks in relatively plain language. Though composed nearly eight centuries ago, it outlines an approach to living that remains relevant to the demands of modern life. Most people’s daily routines are far from monastic, but one needn’t be a monk, a Buddhist, or even religious to find something instructive in its pages. So, with sleeves rolled up and life arriving at point-blank, I’d like to share a few passages that helped me this week.

Honing Focus

When soaking rice and measuring the water, the tenzo should be present at the sink. Keep your eyes open.  Do not allow even one grain of rice to be lost. Wash the rice thoroughly, put it in the pot, light the fire, and cook it. There is an old saying that goes, “See the pot as your own head; see the water as your lifeblood.

Washing Japanese rice at home typically begins by measuring the grains and placing them in a bowl, often the rice cooker's inner pot. Cold water is added just enough to cover, and then, with fingertips, the rice is stirred gently but briskly, pressing and rotating the kernels against one another. This loosens the fine starch that clings to their surface. As the water turns cloudy, the bowl is tipped in one fluid motion, the hand forming a sieve to keep the rice from escaping. The process is repeated until the water runs clear.

Various gadgets exist to make draining rice easier. One has been on my Kappabashi Kitchen Street shopping list for years, but I've never quite managed to buy it. Deep down, I prefer using bare hands. It is trickier and, without fail, the moment my mind begins to wander, I lose a grain or two to the sink. But perhaps that’s how it should be.

Dōgen repeatedly instructs the tenzo to devote themselves wholly to their work and to meet each task with full attention. This ethos runs through every line of the text, but it’s in washing rice that I understand it best. The moment a grain slips away is the moment I’m prompted to return to reality. It becomes a parable—for chopping vegetables, for sitting in meditation, for writing this newsletter. For almost anything, really. Life, seen this way, becomes a continual act of refocusing.

In addressing the many other facets of the tenzo’s duties, Dōgen offers this summary:

These things are truly just a matter of course. Yet we remain unclear about them because our minds go racing about like horses running wild in the fields, whilst our emotions remain unmanageable, like monkeys swinging in the trees. If only we would step back to reflect on the horse and the monkey, our lives would naturally become one with our work.

Maintaining focus feels like a vital yet overlooked skill in today’s world, where attention spans wane and unfiltered push notifications are the norm. If calming the horse and the monkey was a challenge for 13th-century monks, it’s no wonder we, too, struggle.

Observing Thoughts

Both day and night, allow all things to come into and reside within your mind. Allow your mind and all things to function together as a whole. Before midnight, direct your attention toward organising the following day's work; after midnight, begin preparations for the morning meal.

In the way I’ve come to see it, this passage speaks to sitting with one’s problems and ideas, allowing a blend of passive processing and active consideration to shape the next steps forward. A common notion—perhaps a misconception—is that Zen is about eliminating thought. But the tenzo is not instructed to stop thinking. Even when their kitchen work is complete, Dōgen is clear: the head cook is not to step off the path, not even for a moment.

In our context too, the idea of ‘switching off’ from work presents a few complications. If your work-related thoughts lean toward stress or dread, abruptly cutting them off does little to resolve them. When you return to work next, the problems will still be there. Without the chance to observe and consider a new response, the outcome you feared may feel all the more inevitable.

Stepping back further, if sitting with thoughts about work feels persistently unpleasant, and no constructive effort seems to change that, then it may signal you’re simply in the wrong work. Dōgen, in his guidance to the tenzo, acknowledges this plainly: not everyone is meant for the job.

Such a practice requires exerting all your energies. If one entrusted with this work lacks such a spirit, then they will only endure unnecessary hardships and suffering that will have no value in their pursuit of the Way. 

There’s a sense, from Dōgen, that all monks in pursuit of the Way ought to possess this spirit. For the rest of us, I suggest that it depends on whether our work feels aligned with who we are. If unnecessary hardships at work sound familiar, then I’d propose beginning the search for work where allowing all things to come into and reside within your mind feels enriching rather than burdensome.

Shutting out work problems the moment you clock off will only prolong the discomfort. You might try channelling more energy into improving the situation, but after a number of sincere attempts, it may become clear that, deep down, the work simply isn’t right for you. Instead, if our life’s work and responsibilities can become a welcome part of who we are, then we begin to move toward a sense of agency and a more integrated way of living.

Taking Action

One day after the noon meal, I was walking to another building within the complex when I noticed Lu drying mushrooms in the sun in front of the butsuden. He carried a bamboo stick but had no hat on his head. The sun’s rays beat down so harshly that the tiles along the walk burned one’s feet. Lu worked hard and was covered with sweat. I could not help but feel the work was too much of a strain for him. His back was a bow drawn taut, his long eyebrows were crane white […]

“I can see that your work is the activity of the buddhadharma, but why are you working so hard in this scorching sun?” [I said].

He replied, “If I do not do it now, when else can I do it?”.

There was nothing else for me to say. As I walked on along that passageway, I began to sense inwardly the true significance of the role of tenzo.

Dōgen recounts several instructive encounters he had with monks during his time at monasteries in China, using them as vehicles to impart wisdom. In the above story, Lu serves as tenzo. His work is an unbroken cycle of meals, morning, noon, and night. It is relentless, but he knows he must be consistent, even when conditions are not ideal. If he procrastinates, the revolving door of duty will jam—overloaded, with responsibilities piling up behind it.

Dōgen’s question to Lu symbolises the fallacy that a better moment will present itself at some point in the future. Tomorrow, next week, or next year feels like a blank page—one we imagine we’ll fill with calm intention and perfect control. Now, on the other hand, is fraught with difficulties. We’re tired. We want to do something else. Our phone distracts us, and before we realise it, hours are lost scrolling. Tomorrow, surely, will be different. Tomorrow, we’ll have clarity. Tomorrow, we’ll begin.

Of course, tomorrow arrives sooner than expected, and we are still the same tired, distractible human. The task we postponed holds no new appeal, and some fresh urgency is bound to have surfaced. It compounds. The way out of this kind of overwhelm begins simply: choose one thing—just one—that matters, and do it now, with full attention. Then do the next. Repeat until the water runs clear.

Tidying Up

Conscientiously wash out the rice container and the soup pot, along with any other utensils that were used. Put those things that naturally go on a high place onto a high place, and those that would be most stable on a low place onto a low place … clean the chopsticks, ladles, and all other utensils; handle them with equal care and awareness, putting everything back where it naturally belongs. Keep your mind on your work and do not throw things around carelessly.

As each implement returns to its rightful place, something within me begins to settle, too, and my psychological homeostasis is gradually restored. The act of tidying and cleaning concludes our kitchen work. Unless a Zen monk has happened upon this newsletter, I imagine you’re not a tenzo. And so, with the last surface wiped clean, we exit the kitchen to tend to whatever else comes next. Hopefully, a touch more focused, attuned, and resolute.

Until we meet in the Zen kitchen,

AJ

If this is your first Tokyothèque newsletter, I encourage you to browse the archive, where you’ll find over 50 editions on Tokyo’s urban design and culture. This week’s piece takes a slightly different form. Now and then, I like to share something that has helped me, in the hope it might help you too.

Whether you’re a new or returning reader, I’d be glad to hear if this week’s dispatch resonated—and whether you’d like to see more in this style.

And as always, if this newsletter serves in some small way, and you feel moved to support it, membership is one way to do so. Like washing the rice, these repeated gestures ensure the work continues.

Links

How to Cook Your Life
Though brief in length, Tenzo Kyōkun holds numerous lessons on how to live. What I’ve shared today is just a small part. The text has several translations and editions, but the version I’ve drawn from exists inside a well-worn copy of this book, accompanied by commentary from the late Zen master Kōshō Uchiyama.