“Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally.” – Jon Kabat-Zinn (American professor emeritus of medicine and mindfulness advocate.)

Sure, mindfulness can be a relaxation technique – a way to attune to your inner peace – but it is also a means of immediate clarity – not just the development of focus and attainment of acuity but of paying attention to the nature of things and comprehending.

Mindfulness meditation is observation, the goal is to see clearly our true selves, we see it by dropping our beliefs and prejudices. We empty the mind of clutter to uncover what some Buddhist practitioners may call the original mind – a mind freed from attachment. We pay attention with our breath, with our body, with our full and true potential – with our presence.

We observe. We witness. We attend. We recognise. We are the awareness. We are the awe. We are not bound and we are not separate. That is the wisdom sought, that is the wisdom found, that is the original mind, that is the original soul. Discover that in the garden today. Let yourself notice the reality of life all around you. Let wisdom, joy, original self, unfold like a leaf or the pop of a flower.

I am reminded of a waka (traditional Japanese poem) attributed to Dōgen; ‘Mimi ni mite / me ni kiku naraba / utagawaji / onore nari keri / noki no tamamizu – Seeing with ears and hearing with eyes, there is no doubt that, the jewel-like raindrops dripping from the eaves are myself’.