I have had a long history of working with mantras. At the age of 17, I invoked Vedic mantras vocally. Later that year, I did some Buddhist chanting. By the end of that year, I started meditated effortlessly with a mantra in a silent manner. I found this to be most effective and - shall I say?-
en-chanting.
This technique was Transcendental Meditation, which I practiced for three years, then became a teacher, and taught it to many hundreds of people while training dozens of its teachers. In 2010, inspired by all that experience, I launched Higher Self Healing Meditation, also an effortless mantra-based technique. Both methods regularly brought about the experience of
Samadhi,
that steady state of unbounded awareness beyond thought. They did it for me, and for every one of the many hundreds of people I taught these meditations to.
Mantras are powerful vibrations, and need to be understood by the people who use them. Not all mantras are the same, something not widely known at all by so many of the people who employ them. Mantras are sounds, and their effectiveness rests in their vibratory quality. Mantras soothe the nervous system to transform consciousness from the waking state to the state of transcendence beyond thought. Our minds and bodies resonate with customized mantras in an analogous way to how a crying one-day old infant will often stop crying and go right to sleep when placed upon his mother’s chest.
Types of Mantras Another thing about mantras not at all widely known by many people who take Yoga classes and meditate casually is that there are specific mantras for worldly householders and specific mantras for renunciates, who live in ashrams and monasteries apart from typical worldly activity. Om is the best mantra to use for this latter group because it inspires spiritual living and breaks down the renunciate’s attachments to money and material things. The mantras that are used by householders have the opposite effect: while also developing the spiritual experience of transcendence they stimulate energy and creativity and interest in participating in the world with much more enthusiasm. This is vitally important for the spiritual aspirant who wants to gain Enlightenment and also enjoy the glories of material life that money
can
buy. It would not be useful, however, for the cloistered seeker who lives a quiet life of contemplation. The great guru Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who first taught me how to teach others how to meditate and gain the experience of
Samadhi,
said this about the matter:
“Om is the mantra for the
sanyasi
(renunciate)… It is given to him at the time when he has completely renounced attachment to the world. Renunciation and detachment increase with the repetition of Om. Om is chanted aloud by a
sanyasi
to put an end to his desires. Desires are destroyed by loudly chanting the mantra Om. And if there is any desire deeply rooted in the mind of a
sanyasi,
the chanting of Om will result in the destruction of the object of such desire in order to make the
sanyasi
wholly desireless. The
sanyasi
thus attains peace through the renunciation and destruction of desires.-
“Theory of Spiritual Development” discourse, Kerala, India, October 24, 1955 Maharishi contrasts Om with householder mantras in that same lecture:
“Peace comes to the householder when his needs are satisfied, when his desires are fulfilled. The mantras for the householders have the effect of fulfilling the desires. If, unfortunately, the householder begins to repeat….Om, he experiences destructive effects in his material life. The effect starts with monetary loss and then goes on to destroy objects of affection, one by one.”
He further went on to articulate the differences between the way of the recluse and the way of the householder.
“Renunciation is foreign to the way of life of the majority of the people who are householders, men of action in the world, whose life is naturally a life of attachment - not detachment or renunciation. Spiritual development through renunciation and detachment is an ideology of the order of the recluse and its application should be restricted to that order alone. When it is brought to the field of the householder it creates confusion. He feels that he is not in a position to detach himself from the responsibilities of an active life, and if renunciation is essential for realization, then unfortunately he is not meant for it. Such an attitude in the majority of the people has created a gulf between materialism and spiritualism, breaking the natural harmony of the inner and outer life and leading, consequently, to the spiritual degeneration of man; depriving the majority of the great gains that spiritual development lays open to them.”
- Address at the Seminar of Spiritual Luminaries, Mylapore, India, January 1, 1958 The beautiful gift of the effortless mantra meditation for householders is that it provides the experience of inner spiritual awakening, while inspiring the meditator to plunge into the world with increased eagerness and energy to attract all manner of prosperity, thereby living
two
hundred percent of life - the life of the enlightened millionaire.