YesBut are you aware?

I am away from home for a few days, so I've had to resort to using a borrowed computer. Strange browser - no tabs to open a new window, no nice drop-down menu with all my bookmarked web addresses, and worst having to remember my log-on names and passwords.

When you are confronted by the unusual you realise how, in a routine day, your actions are performed on autopilot without thinking. We can go through the day without being mindful of our actions.

Novices when commencing Zen meditation training are often asked “which shoe do you put on first?”. At first sight there is no obvious relationship between meditation and whether you put your left or right shoe on first. But it’s a measure of how mindful they are.

Which shoe do you put on first?

Trevor Leggett, head of the BBC Japanese Service for 24 years from 1946, Zen scholar and Judo expert recommended as training in mindfulness: right handed men when shaving should hold the razor in their left hand.

I once heard a Tibetan Rinpoche describe London as a mindful capital. When getting on and off an underground train an announcer says “mind the gap”. The gap, neither the train nor the platform.

Mindfulness the continuous awareness of the moment between two points in time, just before a dog lands on your head.