"For beginners, I recommend the method of pure recognition: recognition without judgment. Feelings, whether of compassion or irritation, should be welcomed, recognized, and treated on an absolutely equal basis; because both are ourselves.
The tangerine I am eating is me. The mustard greens I am planting are me. I plant with all my heart and mind.
I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath.
Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred."
Notes
from The Miracle of Mindfulness, page 61, by Thich Nhat Hanh, Beacon Press, revised edition, c. 1975, 1987.