Gathas for Mindfulness

Excerpted from "Beginning Mindfulness: Learning the Way of Awareness" by Andrew Weiss. Published by New World Library.

Gathas are small poems designed to help us in meditation practice, whether we are sitting, walking, or slicing potatoes. A gatha accomplishes several aims: It occupies our thinking; it sets a direction for our practice at that moment; and, if used correctly, it helps us to be mindful of our breathing.

Unlike a mantra, which is the same for all occasions, we can have specific gathas for specific activities. We can have gathas for waking up in the morning, for turning on the light, for using the toilet, for turning on the television, for answering the telephone, for driving the car. The list of gathas can be as long as there are activities. For example, here is a gatha for driving a car:

This car is my legs.
It goes where I choose.
When I drive with awareness,
Everyone lives in safety.

If we use this gatha when we get into the car or while we are driving it, we will have an aid to keep our attention on our driving. The gatha also directs our attention to-ward the interbeing nature of ourselves and the car ("This car is my legs"). Each gatha encourages mindfulness and also seeks to awaken us to the true nature of the world as it is contained in that action.

Gathas are best used in coordination with our breath. As we breathe in, we can say the first line to ourselves; as we breathe out, the second line; and so forth. In this way, we touch the act we are performing with the gatha, and we touch our breathing too. As we become more grounded in our breathing, mindfulness of breathing will assist mindfulness of the action, and so breathing, action, and gatha go together. Each reinforces the other, and our ability to be in the moment is increased.

Continued on page 2: »