Zen and the Art of Bicycle Maintenance

I just finished putting new handle bar tape on the rear bars on our tandem. Putting on new tape is one of the jobs that if you ride long enough you have done enough times to know how to do it but it is done infrequently enough that you never really get good at it. It is a simple job that has the right amount of challenge to require your full attention without being frustrating. The job is done by feel as much as by sight, as you stretch the tape to get the correct tension and eyeball the overlap. By focusing on the task at hand, the monkey mind, the wondering thoughts, can be tamed.

Wonderful indeed it is to subdue the mind, so difficult to subdue, ever swift, and seizing whatever it desires. A tamed mind brings happiness.

Dhammapada