We like to think of all Japanese martial arts masters as being Zen Buddhists, but they are not. The traditional and original religion of Japan is Shinto. Shinto literally means "the way of kami," and kami means "mystical." Shinto has no founder, no official scriptures or texts, and no dogma, and even thus unencumbered has survived the ages, to include the coming of Buddhism in the year 538. As a result of varying changes to Buddhism, Zen was introduced to Japan sometime during the thirteenth century. Zen cannot be described very well other than by saying what it is "not." It is not a system of ideas, metaphysics, or religion. It is even less endowed with dogma, belief, vows, or symbols than the rest.
Within Zen one seeks nothing. You can gain no merit, no faith is required of you, no savior is necessary, there is no just reward, no choice in all things, nor is there any desire for attainment.
When I am asked about what one must learn in order to do remote viewing, my normal response is: "Zen."
Zen meditation brings a strong emphasis on the mental and spiritual state of the practitioner. The rationalizing and calculating functions of the mind are suspended so that the mind and body can react immediately and in unison to an outside influence. In martial arts, this could be a physical threat. To the remote viewer, it is the completion of a thought without thought being necessary.[3]
In following the way of remote viewing, one learns to be an empty vessel, within which ideas can form that are relevant to an unknown location, event, object, person, or concept. These ideas are not connected to any personal desires, wants, issues, beliefs, or structures that may already exist within us.
Since there is no way of really describing the perfect experience of such intimate and thorough knowledge as occurs during the sharing of subject and target, training becomes more of an unlearning of habits developed since childhood. These are habits that get in the way of that perfect symbiosis between mind and target.
The right state of mind during remote viewing is very much like attempting to mentally balance on a fine wire fence. In making an effort to find that perfect point of balance within the void, you reach a point of exclusion of all other thought. It's only the sudden realization that you are in harmony, perfectly balanced on the edge, which ruins the state of being. As explained by many Zen