THE GURUMANTRA – BLESSING FOR ETERNITY
Spiritual awakening by oneself is very difficult, nearly impossible. Help of a realized guru is needed to enlighten the path of the seeker. It is not given to everyone to charter one’s course all alone. They are the blessed few, the elect that can attain to salvation on their own.
A real guru removes the disciple from darkness and shows him the path of reality. It is said that biological parents give physical birth but the Guru gives spiritual birth. Under the guru’s guidance, through meditation one treads on towards perfection of body, mind and soul. Progress depends on the disciple’s sincerity to walk that path. Those who have sincere yearning will make of their struggles a proof of unconditional love and devotion, and growth will doubtless appear.
For someone to benefit fully from meditation the guru’s grace is imperative. God bestows his grace upon us through the Guru. The guru awakens the kundalini shakti present in all human beings. The kundalini shakti remains dormant until the Guru’s grace is received through the Guru Mantra. The gurumantra is the guru’s ineffable grace for eternity.
A charged guru mantra carries Divine Shakti, Divine energy. A mantra is a sacred word or words revealed to ancient seers in a state of superconsciousness. They have been known to man since time immemorial. These words are eternal, neither invented nor coined by man. The great sages and yogis of ancient times received them from God during meditation. They saw them ‘engraved’ or heard them in the stillness of their illumined mind. They used it in their life and passed it on to their disciples. These ageless spiritual gems have come to us through the grace of these super beings in a bid to uplift humanity.
Mantras are not mere words but forms of concentrated thought. They are not just a combination of physical vibration, but highly illuminative and creative. Illumination is latent in the mantra as a huge tree in a tiny seed. Highly sacred and potent, they can give direct access to God as they are the sound form of God; God in the form of sound bestowed by God to self realized gurus. God is the material form of the mantra. A mantra is in fact intermediate between the impersonal and personal God, being neither absolutely immaterial like the former nor embodied as the latter.
A mantra also means ‘that which protects’. It provides a subtle means of protection against all dangers: physical, mental, intellectual, emotional, moral or spiritual. One may repeat the mantra anytime and anywhere. The more one utters the mantra, the better one is purified. It elevates and ennobles the thoughts, purifies body and mind. Thoughts are kept pure, spiritual unfoldment arises. It is also conducive to health, mental discipline and moral well being.
Mantras received from books or incompetent persons are not charged mantras. They are dead or inert mantras, without any spiritual value. Only someone who has realised the mantra’s power is able to charge it. To the one who has fully realised a mantra comes its divine and spiritual powers. A live mantra can be received only from a genuine guru. Such a mantra contains the combined spiritual power of all former gurus who belonged to that lineage. As soon as such a mantra is uttered, the person’s kundalini is awakened, to lift him into the superconscious. Salvation through realisation of the Self is its potential.
A mantra received from a genuine guru can completely transform our inner being, quieten the mind and transcend our restlessness and ignorance. Because of its spiritual value and power it can give purity, calm and the concentration needed for meditation. The mantra and the deity linked to it are identical, the deity being the power embodied in the mantra. Constant repetition will reveal its divine potency and help attain perfection.
The gurumantra has the power to cause miracles in our life. It unlocks the door to the treasures of meditation. It steers us on the spiritual path. The sound form of God, it is melody divine and the sound sublime. It is the call of our heart for the loved One, the Absolute God. We call Him constantly through the gurumantra until it resounds within the inner space and we lose ourselves in the mantra and the mantra becomes us. Then only will we merge in God and become one with Him.
As in all spheres of life, one has to learn from others. Without the mantra from a guru the seeker is unable to purify himself and prepare for meditation. The gurumantra is the most powerful spark to consume past karma. A siddha guru burns the devotees past karma by transmitting his divine energy into him through the guru mantra. The awakened kundalini generates within his being an immediate spiritual purification process.
Personal repetition of any mantra cannot produce spiritual power. It might take several lifetimes to gain some experience or nothing at all, without a ‘live’ or charged mantra from a realised guru. By transmitting his spiritual power into the seeker and awakening his kundalini shakti, the guru bestows on the recipient the invigorating vibrations of his tremendous spiritual power. Repetition of this mantra makes the recipient gain spiritual power arising from the power of the mantra.
The gurumantra has the potency to transport the aspirant into a superconscious state where there is no longer any doubt of God’s existence. One also gets the confirmation that man is essentially spirit. The body dies and decays while the spirit lives on into eternity. The gurumantra being the living force of God should be one’s constant and eternal companion. Repetition of the gurumantra will help cultivate God awareness.
Every breath should call Him, every thought dwell on Him, every action be His until we merge in Him and be eternally one with Him. Wherever one is and whatever one is doing, one should always rely upon mental repetition of the gurumantra to keep the mind pure and protect oneself from distractions and temptations of unending desires. By repeating the guru mantra we fill our mind with it. A time will come when all the negative impressions will have subsided and the innermost recesses of our mind will resound with the guru mantra.
These sacred mantras are very potent with the power to uplift and transform one’s life and destiny. Anyone who displays sincerity of purpose, determination and perseverance is bound to benefit tremendously. Even the sinner becomes less sinful with a lesser and lesser inclination to sin. Listening to and repeating the Divine mantra is a purifying process which takes place on a subtle level. The aim is to remember God constantly.
The more we repeat the charged gurumantra, the more it will purify our conscious and subconscious minds, taking us to the superconscious. Our ideal is union with the essence of love and becoming one with the Supreme Being, the epitome of Love!