one of the main techniques involved in mahāmudrā śamatha with support is mindfulness of breathing (s. ānāpānasmṛti). mindfulness of breathing practice is considered to be a profound means of calming the mind to prepare it for the stages that follow. for the kagyupa, in the context of mahāmudrā, mindfulness of breathing is thought to be the ideal way for the meditator to transition into taking the mind itself as the object of meditation and generating vipaśyanā on that basis. the prominent contemporary kagyu/nyingma master chogyam trungpa, expressing the kagyu mahāmudrā view, wrote, "your breathing is the closest you can come to a picture of your mind. it is the portrait of your mind in some sense... the traditional recommendation in the lineage of meditators that developed in the kagyu-nyingma tradition is based on the idea of mixing mind and breath."