Mantras

An Introduction to Mantra Meditation

Mantra meditation is one of the most common styles of meditation, dating back thousands of years. It is a common practice throughout most meditation traditions, including Hind, Buddhist, and Zen practices.

In this post we’ll give an introduction to mantra meditation and how you can get started

What Is A Mantra? Origin and Meaning

A mantra is a phrase that is repeated throughout a meditation practice. The phrase may be spoken or thought, and may or may not contain a specific meaning to it.

The origin of the term mantra comes from Sanskrit. The word can be broken into two roots:

1. Man: Often translated as “mind,” man also refers to thought and the act of thinking.
2. Trai: Probably most directly translated as “to liberate” or “to free,” and is used in the context of tools and techniques.

Thus “mantra,” quite literally, means a tool to free the mind from thought.

Mantra Traditions

Many mantras are used out of tradition, with the focus being on the sounds produced during the vocalization of the mantra, and in these cases it is often repeated as a chant. Perhaps the most common example of this is the “Om” mantra, which is pronounced in three parts (Ahh-Auu-ohmmm), and according to many yogic texts (including Patanjali, for example) is said to contain the entire existence of the universe within the single sound.

Others, often in Sanskrit, are used for their meaning and intention. Many of the mantras date back thousands of years, and part of the practice of mantra meditation is to invoke the energy that has been imbued in these phrases over many generations.

Powerful Mantras: The Top 10 Most Common Mantras

1. Om: The sound of the universe.
2. So-hum: I am that.
3. Shanti Shanti Shanti: Peace of mind, body, and word.
4. Sat Chit Ananda: Beingness, consciousness, and bliss.
5. Ajai Alai:: Being in Power; Warrior’s mantra.
6. Sabbe Satta Sukhi Hontu
7. Gayatri: Earth, Heaven, and Everything between.
8. Ganesha: salutation to the God Ganesh
9. I am that I am.
10. Every day, in every way, I am getting better and better:

The Benefits of Mantra Meditation

Like all types of meditation, practicing mantras has a number of important health benefits. The top among these is improved concentration and focus, centeredness, happiness, and ease of life.

 

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Loving Kindness Metta

Mindfulness

• Metta Meditation – 3 Tips for Practicing Loving Kindness Loving-kindness, also known as metta, is the practice of unconditional love and forgiveness even in the face of past struggle or difficulty. This is one very common Buddhist practice, but the spirit of metta is by no means limited to Buddhism. Loving-kindness is a trait glorified by most major religions. Despite the common presence of this ...

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Trataka

How To Do A Tratak Sadhana Meditation

Trataka meditation, also known as a tratak sadhana or candle-gazing meditation, is a meditation technique in which the practitioner center his focus on a single visual point.

The point may be an image, a word, a symbol, or even just a dot on the wall. The idea is to allow the gaze to soften and rest gently on this point, so that the mind can relax. Candles are a particularly powerful object to use, because the soft flicker of the candlelight has a natural lulling motion that allows the individual to relax more easily, as if in a trance-like state.

The goal of tratak sadhana is to enter samadhi – an intense, focused concentration – by raising the energy in the sixth chakra, located at the third eye. This center is the chakra aligned with one’s vision, both physical sight and internal vision and intuition. Thus, resting the eyes softly is said to induce higher activity in this region.

Like many meditation techniques, there are a number of common variants. Most commonly, the focal point is set at eye-level, three to four feet in front of the practitioner. Another common variation is for the focal point to rest on the floor a little further away, between one and two meters from the individual.

A secondary aim of candle-gazing meditation – or simply relaxing your gaze on a single point – is to develop the solar plexus in the third chakra (naval center). There are strong associations between the 6th and 3rd chakra centers, so as one gazes at the candle or image, he can more easily build a feeling of warmth and inner fire in his abdominal region.

Tratak Yoga – Maintaining Drishti

Tratak sadhana is also a common practice in yoga. Commonly known as drishti, the technique is applied in yoga not as a specific meditation, but as a focal point to help the individual maintain balance.

Drishti refers to a single point of focus, which, again, may be on the floor or on a wall slightly in front of the individual. Maintaining this focus through a yoga sequence helps the individual to maintain balance. Thus, the technique is particularly popular in balancing postures such as Vrkasana (Tree Pose), Garudasana (Eagle Pose), Ardha Chandrasana (Half-Moon Pose), and Virabhadrasana (Warrior Pose), among others.

The Benefits of Trataka

This technique has a number of well-established results and positive effects. The primary benefit of trataka meditation is an increased ability to concentrate, both during meditation and throughout other daily tasks.

The improved concentration occurs in two ways, as the individual develops both an increased capacity to maintain focus for longer periods of time, as well as an ability to enter into a state of deep focus. This level of concentration is commonly associated with clearer reasoning faculties and an ability to make effective decisions.

Gazing meditations have also been shown to improve memory and recall, as they cleanse the cerebral cortex, helping to decrease anxiety, relieve depression, and promote deeper, more relaxed sleep.

According to yogic traditions, the practice also helps to relieve eye tension and may be a factor in curing diseases related to eye fatigue and poor vision, though this has not been confirmed.

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Techniques

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Metta Meditation – 3 Tips for Practicing Loving Kindness

Loving-kindness, also known as metta, is the practice of unconditional love and forgiveness even in the face of past struggle or difficulty. This is one very common Buddhist practice, but the spirit of metta is by no means limited to Buddhism. Loving-kindness is a trait glorified by most major religions.

Despite the common presence of this ideal in cultures across the globe, the actual act of practicing loving kindness can be a tricky art. In this post we’ll look at a few tips for how to incorporate this practice into your daily life, as well as a good loving kindness meditation to get you started.

How To Practice Loving Kindness: 3 Tips for Practicing Metta into Your Daily Life

 

Develop a Daily Gratitude Habit

The first tip to begin practicing loving kindness in your life is to begin a practice of gratitude. Gratitude is an important habit for a number of reasons, and has been scientifically proven to help you improve brain function and lead a happier life.

In the context of loving-kindness, however, the importance of gratitude deals with how you interact with others. When you are consistently grateful, you train your brain to look for positive aspects in situations. When you deal with other people, then, you’ll automatically be on the lookout for these positive traits.

That means that even if you’re dealing with a situation in which it is difficult for you to forgive or get past a previous event, you’ll still be able to enjoy higher levels of compassion, and will at least start the practice of looking for reasons for forgiveness.

 

Stay Mindful

Believe it or not, the simple act of mindfulness, or developing an awareness of your surrounding environment, can also be a great way to expand upon loving kindness.

That’s because the entire point of mindfulness is to center you into the present moment, and when you are fully centered in the moment, you are unable to hold negative emotions. Mindfulness, in its purest form, requires letting go.

Developing a habit of mindfulness about things that don’t seem related to whatever your “big issue” with metta is can be a great way to build up strength and consistency, before tackling the larger issues you’re dealing with.

Take Time for Meditation

Finally, it’s important to remember to take time every single day to sit quietly and center yourself. Sit comfortably, focus on your breath, and allow your natural energies to flow.

You don’t have to do a “loving-kindness meditation” every day in order to improve your practice of metta. Any type of meditation will do. If you do want to work specifically on the loving kindness ideal, however, I recommend the meditation below.

 

Loving Kindness Meditation

Check out the following video for one of my favorite examples of a loving kindness meditation.

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Ajai Alai Mantra Meditation

Ajai Alai Chanting

This is a really beautiful chanting set to peaceful background music, using the Ajai Alai mantra and prayer. This track would work perfectly either for a seated meditation practice or simply for some beautiful, relaxing music to play in the background while you go about your day.

I hope you enjoy!

About the Ajai Alai Mantra

Ajai Alai (pronounced “A-jay, A-lay”) is a mantra developed for a focus on inner power and strength. The energy of this mantra instills a feeling of radiance within the body and mind. It is both relaxing and energizing at the same time, as it stimulates your mind to a frequency at which you can better appreciate your own inner strength.

The reliance on this internal source energy can be used to develop self-confidence in the face of a challenging situation, or it can be used simply to develop a stronger reliance on your own internal compass and inner guidance. The vibrant feelings it often evokes are great for helping to alleviate mild depression or unhappiness, as they are soothing vibrations for the mind.

This mantra meditation is best used when the student chants along with the prayer, but silent reflection on the mantra while listening to the chant can also be extremely powerful.

If you practice this mantra consistently, you will likely experience an overall state of calmness and centeredness within your body, which will expand outwards into greater feelings of confidence and well-being.

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Deepak Chopra So Hum Meditation: Guided Mantra Meditation for Relaxation and Peace of Mind

So Hum Mantra Meditation

In this post I wanted to include one of my favorite meditation practices: the so-hum mantra. I think this is one of the easiest mantra to work with. It’s short, simple, and easy to coordinate with the breath. I like to breathe-in to the “So” and breathe-out to the “Hum.” Using this technique creates a nice, easy flow to the breath and allows the mind to relax into the phrase, and away from your other noisy thoughts.

I hope you enjoy.

You can get more recordings to try for yourself and read more about the So-Hum Meditation here.

Why Use Mantras?

In my opinion, mantras are one of the best meditation techniques around. They date back thousands of years and are incorporated into virtually every Eastern meditation philosophy, with many different types of mantras that can be used for different purposes.

When you use a mantra, the idea is to focus on a single thought or phrase that you repeat consistently throughout the meditation. In most cases, these mantras fall into a few common categories, and most of the traditional mantras are performed in Sanskrit.

By using the traditional Sanskrit words and/or common mantra-sounds (such as So-Hum or Om), you engage the positive, peaceful energy that has been placed into these sounds over thousands of years of practice, encompassing millions of people. This common intention placed into the sound gives the energy of that sound power, according to traditional Eastern texts.

Even aside from this energy, the act of focusing on any repeated word or phrase gives your mind something on which to directs its attention throughout the meditation, allowing the constant stream of thought that normally occupies the mind to subside. This process gives the effect of feeling at peace and more relaxed.

Using a mantra, then, helps to “quiet the mind” by creating a specific phrase for it to direct its focus.

About Deepak Chopra

Although this meditation isn’t guided by Deepak Chopra himself, it is published by the Chopra Center.

Deepak Chopra is a preeminent author and spiritual leader. Formerly a medical doctor, Chopra has a knack for balancing Eastern spiritual and meditation practices with Western medical science. He is a strong proponent of the numerous health benefits of meditation, and is one of the leading personalities that has popularized meditation in the West.

He is the author of numerous books, including The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, Quantum Healing,  The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire, Perfect Health, Boundless Energy, The Healing Self, and many others.

You can read more about Deepak Chopra here.

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Meditation

An Introduction to Meditation

Health Benefits of Meditation

Meditation has long been known to have a number of positive health benefits. The practice dates back thousands of years, but only within the last few decades have we been able to confirm many of the purported positive effects of meditation with Western medical science.

The verdict is now in, however, and if this is a topic that interests you, you can read more details about the health benefits of meditation on this page.

Guided Meditations

Throughout this site, we publish links to some of our favorite guided meditation videos and recordings for you to enjoy. Many of these meditations are published by other sources, and we always include links to the original source when appropriate.

Our aim on this site is to give you access to a number of different meditation styles and techniques that you can use. Please keep checking back to this page as we continue to add more information for you to peruse.

Mantras

One of the biggest categories of meditation styles is mantra meditation. Mantras are sacred words or phrases that are repeated throughout a seated meditation, or can be incorporated into the individual’s daily routine by repeatedly drawing attention to the chosen mantra. The idea is that through repetition of a single phrase/thought, the student will be able to clear his mind and allow himself to become more receptive to the inner sensations of Ananda (joy). Click here to learn more about mantra meditation.

Chakras

Another major category of meditations has to do with your chakras. The chakras relate to a theory of how energy moves in the body that goes back thousands of years. There are seven bodily chakras, ranging from the root chakra located in your sacral region up through the crown chakra at the top of the head. Focusing meditation on any of these seven areas (or by combining multiple areas) is a technique that is used often to help cleanse the body of toxic energy and heal ailments (both psychological and physical) related to each chakra. Read more about chakra meditations.

Meditation Techniques and Breath Exercises

For the beginning student, getting started with meditation can feel overwhelming because there are so many different varieties of meditation techniques and exercises to explore.

If you’re new to meditation, we recommend you read our beginner’s guide to getting started with meditation. It will give you a brief introduction to meditation, an overview of common techniques, and some practice, easy steps you can use to start developing a meditation habit as part of your daily routine.

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Louise Hay’s Morning Gratitude Meditation for Positive Energy

Louise Hay: Morning Meditation

Here’s one of my favorite morning meditations from Louise Hay, reknowned spiritual author and one of the original leaders of New-Thought, focusing on how managing your energy can drastically improve your life.

Listen to this meditation in a quiet place every morning, building it into a daily habit of meditation, and you’ll see incredible positive results in your life!

Gratitude Meditations for Positive Energy

If you’re just starting to develop a meditation practice, finding the right guided meditations can be challenging and overwhelming., but It can also be loads of fun. The key is to experiment with a lot of different styles of meditation in order to find which ones work best for you. Don’t feel like you have to force yourself into any one style or teaching.

Building up a daily habit of meditation is extremely important if you want to build positive energy in your life, and one of the best ways to go about that is to start with gratitude meditations. Gratitude meditations are one of the easiest ways to create positive momentum in your life, which you can then apply to any topic or area you’d like to focus on.

That’s why I really love this meditation. Give it a try and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Who Is Louise Hay? A Short Bio

Louise Hay was a prominent motivational and self-help author. She is most famous for her book You Can Heal Your Life, which was published in 1984. She was also the founder of Hay House, a spiritual publishing company, which has grown to be one of the top publishing houses for books on spirituality, positive energy, motivation and self-help, along with other New-Thought topics.

Hay was born in October of 1926, and later became strongly influenced by the Religious Science and New Thought movements, in particular the works by Ernest Holmes and Florence Scovel Shinn, both of whom taught the power of the mind to influence one’s physical circumstances and environment.

Hay became a strong advocate of the power of using the mind for positive thinking, teaching that the key to health and success was in the ability to gain control of your thoughts. She was a student not only of these philosophies, but also of Transcendental meditation, which she studied at the Maharishi University in Iowa.

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