Mantra Meditiation

What Is Mantra Meditation?

Mantras are single words or groups of words. The practice of Mantra Meditation simply involves repeating those words. You repeat the mantra over and over again.

As you repeat any mantra, you do it in a special way, with a particular approach. We call this approach having "self-collected awareness". Some Buddhists call this "mindfulness". To cultivate self-collected awareness as you repeat a mantra, you do it in a way that enables you to be aware of what you are doing as you repeat it. In other words, you cultivate an awareness of what you are doing as you do it.

Special Value

Mantra Meditation is an ancient practice. For thousands of years people have done this in one form or another. Mantras have been used in both secular and religious contexts and are still used in both contexts. Many people have discovered their benefits.

So many mantras exist that it is hard to even guess at the number. There would be millions. There are mantras for awakening consciousness, for making love, for conceiving children, for making money, for influencing the weather, for making money, for awakening particular energy centres in the body, for awakening kundalini energy in the base of the spine, for opening the Third Eye, for promoting Enlightenment and Full Realisation, for healing ourselves, and for healing others. Any purpose that interests you is likely to have a mantra that could help you realise that purpose.

You can think of them as like TV channel selectors. As we repeat a mantra, we tune into a particular "frequency" or "wavelength" of life, a particular channel. We find the programs that are available through tuning into the channel, that is, through repeating the mantra, and we can master these programs, if we decide to stay tuned in, watching and participating for long enough.

In the Biame Network, the Mantra we use is Om Tat Sat. This Mantra promotes deep spiritual Awakening. Some people express this as Enlightenment or Full Realisation. It is for helping us to release ourselves into a direct experience of Being. This Mantra has been used for many thousands of years. It links people directly to and helps them participate in the Vital Force, the Life, that is available to them. The source of this Life is everywhere, both "inside" and "outside" our bodies, although it is often experienced as residing "deeply within" our systems.

The Mantra helps us to access this Life Force and to integrate it into all aspects of our beings. Repeating the Mantra is like turning up the power on a dimmer switch for a light. Every time you repeat it, the light shines a little more brightly, you become a little more available to and saturated by the power of your own vital force. The more often you repeat it, the more you can experience this intensification. With the intensification, the flow of Life from your core to your edges also intensifies progressively.

One major advantage of this sort of meditation is that you can do it almost anywhere and at almost any time. It will remain beneficial to take regular time away from your daily routines to meditate the Mantra, however, you can do it much more often than that. And the benefit comes from the repetition.

As your vital force flows from "within" through various layers of your being, it reaches your body. It enlivens and perfects progressively everything it passes through. It then flows out through your body into the physical world around you, performing the same service for your body as for the other layers as it does so. To make this passage from "inside" to "outside" as open as possible, you need to stay grounded, balanced and integrated, that is, you need to stay appropriately connected to and involved in the world in which you live.

While the enlivening occurs, potentially everything returns progressively to an optimum state of health and capacity. Practitioners experience themselves coming back to life. For thousands of years, Masters of this Mantra have taught that every repetition increases Life, Vitality, Love, and Light, regardless of whether the practitioner notices the increase at the time or not. They taught and still teach that eventually will be radiating and expanding with Ultimate Brilliance, Harmony, Vibrancy, Fragrance and Sweetness. This is inevitable for everyone, they have taught, as long as they repeat the Mantra often enough and commit to realising the result. Our experience in the Network confirms the accuracy of these claims.

Mantra Mediation starts, then promotes a cleansing and purifying process. This is a natural part of making ourselves available to the great aliveness in which we participate increasingly through the Meditation. At times this is very stimulating and at times quite bland. At times, it is very comfortable, perhaps even ecstatic, and at times it can be very uncomfortable. Whatever we experience once the process is started, is part of the cleansing and purifying process. Also, it is inevitable that our experience will become more comfortable, provided we continue the meditation for long enough.

A good analogy is to do with a muddy pond. Imagine that you are a muddy pond. Your life force is the water. It is not crystal clear and your system in which your life force resides and through which it flows, is made of the bottom and the walls of the pond. The silt and the suspended material in your water have collected through the normal living of your life. Now imagine that you have started to do the Mantra Meditation. This is the equivalent of introducing a crystal clear water source into the pond somewhere. The more you meditate, the more crystal clear water, the more life, passes into your system. Eventually, it fills you up completely, so that you begin to overflow. Before the overflow occurs, you may already have noticed the greater fullness. Something also noticeable is that the water flowing out of the pond is murky, since it is carrying silt and other material in it. In similar fashion, your feelings, thoughts and actions may not be as clear as you would like, because they are carrying still the residue of the past that is still to clear from you. Inevitably, the water will clear, provided the water keeps flowing in, until all the water in the pond and all the water leaving the pond is as crystal clear as the water entering the pond at the source. Similarly, inevitably our systems clear and what we think and feel, and what we do, will express fully the beauty of the Source.

The meaning of the source water in the analogy is understood differently, depending on people's orientations. Amongst other things, it is variously expressed as the Ultimate, the Source, God, the Higher Self, the Core, Nirvana, or "I AM". However you may understand the meaning of these descriptions, you can understand that we in the Network place very great significance on the value of doing the Mantra Meditation. We understand that the practice enables us to become at one with this source, whatever that may be.

INITIATION

When anyone starts to repeat a Mantra, that person will experience some effects from the repetition. This seems true, regardless of the source, or whether you see or hear it. So may people who have discovered mantras and started to experiment with them have benefitted from doing so. They start themselves.

Another way of starting involves what is called initiation. This occurs when someone else starts us, in particular, someone who has Mastered the mantra. There are often great advantages in being initiated into a mantra, that make it very worthwhile.

When a Master of a mantra initiates us into a mantra, the immediacy of the full level of Mastery that person has realised already is awakened in us during the process. The Master's accomplishment can become part of our own potential, a potential that is much more immediately available to us than our own potential at that point. One analogy used to illustrate aspects of how this works is of a lighted candle being used to fully light a smouldering one; another analogy is a vibrating tuning fork setting off another tuning fork when they are close enough to each other. Without the Master's involvement, we could still realise the fullness of the mantra ourselves and so become a Master of the mantra, too. Nevertheless, initiation generally accelerates our unfolding and our developing mastery of a mantra. How much acceleration occurs depends on many things, including the level of Mastery of the initiator, his or her on-going availability, and our own dedication and application.

Initiation may occur in a variety of ways. All involve the Meditation Master conveying the mantra to the person in some way. For example, it may be done personally by the Meditation Master actually saying the sound to the meditator. It might be passed on in writing; or it might be passed on by audio recording; and it might be passed on by videotape. It can be passed on, also, without any overt or obvious exchange taking place. The realisation of some Masters of meditation is so great, that they can instruct or initiate others into various practices, including Mantra Meditation, simply by meditating, in special ways, that the process has already taken place.

Initiation into the Mantra used within the Network is available in three ways. Either Ken or Elizabeth Mellor can do this for you. They are each Masters of Meditation, a Mastery that includes Mastery of the Mantra practised by people associated with the Network. They introduce people personally to the Mantra. You can contact them through the Network. (See Contacting The Awakening Network in the General Directory.) The third method is through and audio recording available from the Network. The recording takes about an hour and ten minutes to complete and the listener is initiated into the Mantra while listening to it. You can obtain this from the Network. (See the recording in Public Shop.)

HOW THE MANTRA WORKS

A natural question at this point is "How do mantras work?" How can repeating words produce such results? There are two parts to the answer. The first part is to do with the way everything in and every aspect of Creation has a sound that is unique to it. The second is to do with the effect on that thing or aspect of making its sound.

The first part of the answer is that everything vibrates. It vibrates at its own frequency. Every vibration produces a sound. Very slow vibrations (low frequencies) produce low or deep sounds. Very fast vibrations (high frequencies) produce very high sounds. To experience this, the sound, "Huh---", made deep in the back of your throat has a lower frequency than the sound, "Ah---", made high up in the mouth or in the head.

Experience has taught many people that every physical object has a sound. Researchers found that, when they took any object in the world, it had both a basic vibration and a sound that arose out of its basic vibration. The more physically solid something is, the lower or deeper the sound. The more physically diffuse it is, the higher the frequency or sound. Consider two examples. The floor or ground, underneath you right now, has its own sound. It looks very solid and it is. This sound is very deep because the floor or ground is vibrating very slowly. Moreover, the frequency of the sound is so low that the sound is below the audible range of the human ear. Now consider the air around you. It has a much faster vibration. It is transparent; it is so thin. This and other high sounds are so high pitched that they are above the range of the human ear. Then, of course, there are the many sounds that we can hear. Every physical thing in creation has vibration, vibration that often can be felt, seen, heard, tasted or smelled quite easily. Also, you look at anything and it has vibration; you name it and it has sound, touch it and the sound and vibration are there.

Non-physical aspects of experience also have distinctive vibrancy or sounds, aspects such as feelings, perceptions, attitudes, thoughts, shared group experiences and many more. As your meditation progresses you may come to understand this. One way to begin to understand it is to notice the effect that music has on such personal experiences as feelings, perceptions and attitudes. Music can both stimulate and release such experiences.

As individuals, each of us has a sound too. Many factors influence this individual sound, factors such as body size, shape, and weight, feeling and thinking patterns, and life experiences. This is basic to each of us. More basic still is the sound of Being, the sound of the Essential Nature each of us has as a Human Person. Whatever it is, the Being, or Essential Nature in each of us, has its own sound. This is where the Mantra on this tape comes into its own.

The sound of Being is the sound of the Mantra used within the Network. As we repeat the Mantra, we are repeating the sound of Being. This activates us and makes us available to the unique Being that each of us is.

This is where the second part of the answer is relevant. Repeating the unique sound of something affirms and confirms its full existence. It affirms and confirms both the very essence of that "thing" and every one of its qualities. The sound of the Mantra used in the Network affirms and confirms Being in all its many dimensions.

As we repeat this Mantra, we make ourselves progressively more open and available to Being. We can then directly experience Being, true Life. Already amazingly alive, Mantra repetition can make us even more alive. As we repeat the Mantra, we are affirming the aliveness we know already and we make ourselves available to the vaster Aliveness that is also in us - the Aliveness of Being.

We learn through using the Mantra just how alive we are, and just how alive we can be. At the beginning, we may not know much of this. As we persist, we can become increasingly aware. Just as we cannot hear some sounds because they are too low or too high, so, initially, there are parts of Being we do not detect, because their frequencies are too low or too high. As we repeat the Mantra we become aware of these frequencies, or aspects of Being. Our perceptions and sensitivities become more highly tuned and refined and, as they do, we perceive and experience more. The change is so great for some people that they can come to think that, at first, they were asleep. Then, as they repeated the Mantra, they woke up. And this is an apt analogy. The Mantra wakes everyone up and helps everyone live fully the Life that is available to live. The Mantra helps everyone to become the Aliveness "within", to become fully the Being he or she uniquely is.

To help you understand all of this better, consider an analogy. Think briefly about what it is like to be within sight of a big city, but still some distance away from it. You can see the city in the distance. You also can hear the distant sound of the city. It is generally something like a rumbling, throbbing sound. What you hear is a sound made up of all the sounds of the city. Every sound is part of it. Just as when you look at the city from a distance without looking at any particular part of it, your overview includes everything that is there to see.

If you were to move closer to the city, the closer you got, the more you would notice the general sound changing. Specific sounds would become more noticeable. In all likelihood you would begin to hear fairly loud and piercing sounds, such as, sirens, bells, tyres screeching and dogs barking. As you moved even closer, you would hear other distinctive sounds, such as, engine noises, banging, and loud shouts. Eventually you would be completely inside the city, surrounded by its specific sounds. By that time you would, in all likelihood, only be noticing the sounds that were quite close to you. You would no longer be chiefly aware of the general sound of the city, because the general sound would be lost behind the specific sounds that were coming from your immediate vicinity.

One point of this analogy is that every sound of the city is contained in in the distant sound of a city. So if you make that sound, you are making a sound that includes every sound of the city, even if you are not making each sound individually. If you looked you would find every sound in it. Another point is that it is the collection of all the sounds occurring that makes the overall sound at any point in time. So as you increasingly make more of the individual sounds of a city, the closer the sound you are making will be to the overall sound of the city. While making the individual sounds, you become aware of the nature of the overall sound and of the part played in the overall sound of the sounds you are making.

The Mantra is like this. We discover two things at once: the true sound of Being as a whole, and the nature of the individual sounds that make it up and their connection to the overall sound. Put another way, we discover what the whole picture is as well as seeing the individual parts of it. The Mantra's sound represents both levels, the overall and the specific. As we repeat it, though it is only three words, we are making a sound, or vibration that includes every sound, or vibration that goes with Being. It is the same as the way reproducing the distant sound of a city as one sound, produces all the individual sound coming from inside it. And our whole Being responds to the repetition.

For example, as we repeat the Mantra, we can become aware of many particular capacities of which we were previously unaware. We may not have known previously that these were part of Being who each of us is. We simply discover that we can do things that we could not previously do. At the same time, we can become clearer on the wholeness of everything in our lives. People often live surrounded by their individual experiences, lost in the detail of their lives. As we repeat the Mantra, we can become clearer and clearer about the whole - about the complete picture, about what the basics of living in the world actually are. We come to know the specifics of life as they relate to the Life that we are expressing through them. It is as if, by repeating its whole sound, we move to two positions at once. We move into the city so We can perceive the specifics of Real Living, at the same time as We move away from the city of our Being to a vantage point from where We can perceive its wholeness. Occupying both positions simultaneously, We can perceive directly the relationships that exist between each of the many parts and the relationships of the parts to the whole.

As mentioned earlier, the outcomes claimed for repeating this Mantra are very great. They go to the roots of Being in each of us. We can discover the fullness of being a Realised Human Being. We can discover that the Mantra is a "Divinely economical" expression of Life itself that stimulates the release of that Life into everyone who repeats it. We can discover that by repeating it, We participate in the Infinite.

These are great claims, claims that may seem far from true to you as you read this and as you live your life day by day. In our everyday lives, We often feel, look and sound finite and fallible. We are often acutely aware of apparent limitations. Yet, the Life, the Aliveness, the stuff out of which We are made, does not share these limitations. Its Infinity, its magnificent beauty, strength, creativity, love, its joy, are manifest for everyone to see, hear, touch, taste and smell, and to live. We just need to take the time to notice and to have a way of discovering what is there. The whole world in which We live, everyone and every thing on this world, is throbbing, alight and resonant with aliveness. Even one atom has so much energy in it that, if its energy were to be released, it could destroy whole cities. In our bodies alone, there are billions upon billions of atoms. Just imagine the vitality and life that this means We have tied up in our physical forms alone. What wondrous creatures We are. Imagine the life in groups of people. Imagine the life in this vast Universe in which We dwell. Imagine experiencing this Life directly.

PRACTICAL HINTS

When people begin to meditate several issues arise regularly. We discuss some of these in what follows, so you have some hints to which you can refer once you get started yourself. It is worth noting that you may not find some of what follows relevant at the moment, because you may not yet have started. If this is so, then simply note that this material is available and refer back to it when you have started to meditate.

The first common issues to arise relate to the time We need to devote to meditation. In the long term, you are best to find your own answer to this question. For as you meditate, you will learn from your own experience what works best for you. However, in the beginning some guidelines may be helpful to you. In this context, We make several recommendations: one general and four specific.

DEVELOPING A HABIT

The general recommendation is that, at the beginning it is usually best to take deliberate steps to establish a meditative habit. To do this, We suggest that you select a particular time or times of the day that you will set aside for meditation and then make sure that you meditate at those times. After you have done this for some months, you will have a habit and you will be in a good position to start to experiment with other ways of doing it.

CHOOSING A FREQUENCY, PLACE & TIME

The first specific recommendation is that you meditate for two short periods each day - perhaps five to ten minutes. It is far better to decide to meditate for five minutes, twice a day, for example, than to decide to meditate for half an hour, or an hour every day, when you are already hard pressed for time. Many people have found they had easier success by devoting less time at the beginning than they intended to spend later.

Second, as you establish the habit, you can expand your meditation time gradually. You can do this so that you scarcely notice the extra time you are devoting to it. Once you get to the stage of wanting to expand the time you are using, the benefits you will be experiencing from your meditation are likely to have become noticeable and will offer natural encouragement to you to spend more time at it.

Third, rapid results also come from finding a quiet or relatively quiet place in which to meditate. If you can, you may find it helpful to set aside a place that you will only use for meditation. If not, then have something special to wear, or to place near you as you meditate that signals to you that you are doing something different from what you usually do in that place. Then every time you sit to meditate, the special location or special item will act as an obvious signal to you that this is what you are doing.

Fourth, identify times for meditation when you can remain free to concentrate on what you are doing. Treat these times as special, make them your times. You may even make a formal appointment with yourself at these times.

Eventually you will find that your habit is established and meditating becomes easier to do. You are likely to notice, too, that the benefits of your meditation become so obvious that the your motivation and commitment become stronger the longer you continue through the weeks, months and years of your life. Eventually, too, you can find that time and location are less important because you will be able to do the meditation easily while you are doing other things.

MEDITATING TO MUSIC OR IN SILENCE

Many people have wondered if it is best to meditate in silence or to music. This arises because, as you will find, you will be meditating to music when you do the meditation on this recording. We recommend that you experiment with both. You can meditate with or without music. Find what works best for you. If you find music helps you to concentrate, then use it. If you find that it is a distraction, then meditate in silence. You might find that your preferences vary according to your mood as well as the purpose for which you are meditating on particular days.

We strongly recommend that you avoid music with vocals. When We meditate We are very open and suggestible, and the words of the vocals can be taken into the unconscious very literally and influence us from then onward. The vocals can become part of our personalities. This recommendation applies even to vocals in other languages that you do not understand. Of course, the decision is yours and remains with you, despite this recommendation.

AWARENESS EXPANDS

The next issue is to do with thinking or awareness. Some people wonder if they are expected to be aware only of the Mantra. THEY think they should "empty their minds" while meditating. But they find that they are aware of many things during their meditation sessions and do not know that it is quite normal for this to happen.

Mantra Meditation actually increases awareness and attentiveness. So for quite some time you may notice very much more than you usually do. Relax, if this is what you find. Your one job is to keep repeating the Mantra, whatever else you may be thinking, feeling, or experiencing. The way to do this is to keep repeating the Mantra, whatever else is there. You don't try to remove, or suppress what you are noticing; you just repeat the Mantra, whatever else you may be noticing.

As time passes during your Mantra repetition, you are likely to find that you naturally become calmer, more serene, quieter, more transparent, sweeter and more fragrant. You will not need to contrive this. It will occur naturally. As it does, you will find that the Mantra and the benefits of the Mantra become more and more central in your awareness. This is likely both at the same time as you are sitting to meditate and at other times during your day to day life. These benefits increasingly replace everything else. To realise this result, all that is necessary is for you to keep repeating the Mantra, whatever else you may be experiencing, and to do so for long enough.

HOW TO REPEAT IT

On the recording there is a certain rhythm to the repetition. This rhythm may or may not suit you. We suggest that you allow your own rhythm to assert itself during your meditations. Sometimes you may repeat the Mantra so quickly that you could not say it out loud in that way, and sometimes you may repeat it so slowly that one repetition takes an hour or longer to complete.

Another issue related to how you repeat the Mantra is to do with the repetition itself. There is no set way to do this. Your way of doing it is unique to you, so you will need to find your easiest method. To give you some ideas in how to approach it, here are a few ideas on what others do. Some people will say it under the breath. This is called subvocalising it. Some will see it repeating as flashing lights, or rotating signs, or in some other pictorial form. Others may hear it as an actual sound on the "inside" or the "outside". Others may feel it as a form of repetitive sensation or experience, or a movement in their bodies of some sort. Still others may have a sense of the repetition in fragrances or essences they can taste or smell while they meditate. Whatever way you do it, you are likely to find that your experience of the repetition evolves and changes. If you do, allow this evolution to occur.

POSTURE

Posture is very important during meditation and We have a general recommendation in relation to it. We suggest that it is best to keep your back and neck as straight as possible for as long as possible while you are meditating. The energy currents flowing up your spine can flow much more easily, if your back and neck are straight. There are several ways that you can do this.

One method is to sit on a straight-backed chair. Usually, you would do this without leaning against the chair back. You place your feet together, while resting your hands, palms upward, on your thighs - right hand on right thigh, left hand on left thigh. You also can join your hands and rest them in your lap, if you find this encourages better results while you are meditating. A second method is to lie on the floor, or another flat surface. If you are tired, experience quickly suggests to most meditators that too great comfort can stimulate sleep rather than meditation in this posture. So it is best for you to be comfortable, but not too comfortable, if you are tired. A third method is to sit on the floor with your legs crossed, or with them straight and pointing out in front of you, and with your back against a wall. Again you can rest your hands palms up on your thighs, or rest them clasped together in you lap. A fourth method is to kneel on the floor with both feet in contact and with your hands in one of the two positions already mentioned. Kneeling stools can be bought or constructed that make this position more comfortable by taking the weight off your knees and calves. The last method is the traditional posture. In this, you sit cross-legged on the floor with your back and neck straight. For those accustomed to sitting on flat surfaces with legs crossed, this is a relatively easy posture to use. For those not accustomed to this, it can be a great challenge.

Whatever posture you choose, regularly practise meditating with your back unsupported. The idea is for you eventually to be able to meditate all the time with you back unsupported. If you choose to lie down to meditate, then it is important that you get up and move around from time to time - say, every five minutes or so.

MOVEMENT

Another very important issue is to do with movement. Many people think, for various reasons, that they need to keep their bodies completely still when they meditate. With the Mantra Meditation to which we introduce you here, many people's experience in the West shows that it is best not to do this, initially at least.

We recommend that you move your body regularly in some way - and make the movements significant. This recommendation applies whatever posture you choose. For example, rock your torso, move your arms, legs, or neck, arch your back. Do various things to stretch and move your body parts in relation to each other. Movement makes a definite contribution to the meditation, a contribution that is more than simply keeping you more comfortable than if you stayed still.

Mantra meditation actually releases great vitality and aliveness throughout the human system. The body becomes charged and alive. As this happens, this charge needs to flow through the body and out into the physical world around the meditator. Physical movement actually encourages the flow of vitality through the body. It encourages opening and clearing processes in the body. It also strengthens the body so it can sustain itself under greater load than it usually has carried before. In short, you will be more comfortable and you will experience greater benefits if you move while you meditate.

After meditating regularly for quite some time, you are likely to find that you need to move less. This transition will occur naturally as your body becomes more open and flexible, and strong enough to do the meditation easily. However, this could take years, so be patient. Eventually you may be able to meditate with little or no movement. This is how Masters of Meditation do it, although if you watch them closely, you will notice that their bodies are also in motion, subtle though it is, most of the time.

WHAT NORMALLY HAPPENS?

The final issue to mention is to do with what experiences typically accompany meditation. The simplest response to this is - anything. There are no reliable predictions possible about the exact nature of your experience. What you experience will depend on your nature and on what is happening in your life at the time. Nevertheless, it is possible to give you a beginning idea by listing some of the experiences people have had.

Some people feel inner security, serenity, certainty, a sense of self, or a real sense of identity for the first time in their lives. Some notice that they are getting along better and more easily with others. They see things more optimistically and more realistically simultaneously. They become more attentive and available to others. Many people's marriages, work relationships and relationships with parents or children, become easier and freer. Many people report feeling healthier, younger, more alive, brighter, happier, more alert and attentive. And they look younger and sound younger, too, both to themselves and to others. Along with these changes, many people have noticed that they are visiting their doctors less often. They stay well for longer and if they become unwell they recover more quickly than they used to recover. Experiencing more initiative, more staying power, heightened ability to concentrate, and better memory, is also common.

Beyond all these results, many people experience increasingly transcendent states of awareness. Some become transported with feelings of love and joy; some are awash and awakened with inner Light of such beauty, strength and completion that it cannot be described adequately in words. Some find their Ultimate Purpose in Life and become Enlightened or Fully Realised.

MAKE IT HABITUAL

Our last hint is this: Make your Mantra repetition habitual. Because its repetition can be a totally private affair, you can repeat it at any time, in any location and while doing anything you can do. The advantage of repeating it at all times, or very often, is that you build up the momentum very much more than if you only do it at the times that you sit to meditate. Certainly, sitting to meditate is advantageous and We recommend that this be an important part of our practice - and you can have more. So while you are walking, meditate; while you are talking, meditate; when you are sitting at traffic lights, meditate; when you are watching television, meditate; pause at certain times during the day and meditate for a few seconds. With application and ingenuity, you are likely to find, as many others have, that you can meditate at most times and that this actually adds important dimensions to whatever you are doing then and whatever you do following your meditation.

USING THE RECORDING

Having obtained the recording of the Mantra Meditation from the Network, the way you proceed is very simple. First play the introduction, then do the meditation. The ordered progression through the process through which this takes you is important, if you are to get the full benefit from the initiatory process. Many people have gone through this process and have experienced it as very powerful, awakening and enlivening. Remember that you are able to obtain the Mantra Meditation recording from the Public Shop.

COMPLETING THE LINK

Remember, we would like you to feel free to contact the Network for discussion or with your questions as you continue your meditation practice. (Go to Contacting The Awakening Network in the General Directory for details of how to do this.) For example, you may want further information on the meditation itself; you might have questions about the specifics of what you experience while meditating; you might want help in how to progress for fully or more quickly; or you might want to know people in your area who are meditating in the same way as this - it is certainly beneficial to meditate with others in the same way.

We also invite you to fill in the requested information on the paper that accompanies the recording and return it to the Network. If there is no paper with the recording you receive, we will send one to you immediately you contact us. Sending this to us lets us know that you are meditating with us and enables us to send you, from time to time, information about available materials and upcoming events. More importantly, it enables the initiation process to complete by the link becoming established in both directions: first from the Network initiators to you, then from you to them. We approach the process of meditation as a joint project in which we all participate as colleagues. We at the Network would like to provide as much support and companionship as we can.