Mantra meditation: wax on or wax off?

In the movie, “The Karate Kid,” Mr. Miyagi begins to teach karate to young Daniel by having him do chores requiring simple repetitive movements. Who can forget the memorable Zen wisdom of “Wax on wax off”?

Repeating a mantra is a spiritual equivalent of Mr. Miyagi’s training method. This has been the core of my meditative practice since I started studying yoga thirty-seven years ago. If I had gotten a dollar for every time I’ve said a mantra in or out of meditation, I’d be rolling in riches.

Since that didn’t happen, the question is: have I benefited spiritually from the countless hours I’ve engaged in mantra meditation? I don’t know. But I suspect that I’ve frittered away much of the potential benefit by failing to understand the difference between waxing on and waxing off.

Most of the time our minds are full of useless thoughts. Repeating a mantra such as “Om” is supposed to clear out a lot of that unessential mental debris. Instead of cultivating many different thoughts (most of them weeds), we’ve thinned the garden of mentality down to a single crop.

This monoculture of consciousness would produce a boring blandness if the mantra was all that we were aware of. What’s the point of trading the rich diversity of our external and internal worlds for an endlessly repeated word (or words)? However, the basic hypothesis of mantra meditation is that clearing the mind of clutter enables us to perceive reality more clearly.

When I’m not wearing my contact lenses, I usually have my glasses on. Like right now. I don’t clean them very often. Between me and my computer screen are a bunch of blurs. Dust. Grime. Dirt. Water spots. Still, all that isn’t as bad as how my dark glasses looked after my wife wiped them with a cloth that had gotten smeared with hand lotion. Wax on. Couldn’t get it off. Couldn’t see clearly. Had to put on another pair of dark glasses before I crashed the car.

This points to the problem with the mantra meditation hypothesis. A mantra can just as easily obscure as it clarifies. It all depends on whether you are waxing on or waxing off. I’ve come to believe that a mantra filled with meaning is akin to the greasy cloth that my wife used to try to clean my glasses.

That word, or words, leaves a mental residue. For example, a traditional Christian mantra is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.” Assuming that you know English, it would be almost impossible to repeat those words without thinking about Jesus and mercy. You may stop yourself from thinking about other things, but Jesus’ mercy is certainly going to be on your mind.

I believe that mantra meditation can lead to a clearer view of reality. Inside of my head, I feel like I’m getting closer to the essence of life, existence, and consciousness when I sit on my meditation cushion in darkness and silence, repeat a single syllable, and become aware of what remains. Outside of my head, I feel more connected to other people and the world when my mind is filled with the simple unifying sound of a mantra rather than many divisive thoughts.

For a long time, though, I repeated a mantra that had a significant meaning to me. I realize now that this meaning was like Mr. Miyagi’s wax. Every time I repeated the mantra I was rubbing something onto my consciousness, rather than clearing something off.

Basic rule of car cleaning: you don’t use the same cloth to clean the wax off that you used to put the wax on. Applying this principle to meditation, I’ve come to the conclusion that the more meaningless a mantra is, the better. It shouldn’t be associated with a person, theology, metaphysics, or goal that has any meaning.

Churches have stained glass windows. Those images are there to capture your attention and prevent you from seeing what is, in reality, outside the church’s confines. A mantra with meaning has an equivalent effect. Every time you repeat it, you’re placing a conceptual filter between you and what is really there.

I don’t know if we ever can see through the glass of our consciousness, clearly. But we certainly have the option of either adding onto the mental grit and grime or removing as much as we can.

Wax off. Wax off. Wax off.

Like I asked before, “Mantra meditation: what’s in a word?”

Ideally, nothing.

Comments

[running snail]

how is the world,
why is the world,
how is the world,
why is the world,
how is the world,
why is the world, how is the world, why is the world, how is the world, why is the world, how is the world, why is the world.

that mantra sound familar to anyone ?

[running snail]

The path is real. The experience is real and objective.

That's the message i get everytime one of my family members calls me. It's the first thing out of his mouth. He's not a satsangi. It happened to him about a year ago, he's completely different now.

He says now, it only takes a few minutes and there's no peak experience. It's continuous heightining. He uses the word joy and light alot when he's trying to explain to me.

[Edward]

I have used a single- and multi-syllable mantra for meditation. I have also chanted out loud, and been silent, and meditated only on breath. Vanilla, chocolate, strawberry. Hopefully I have been more aesthete than poppinjay.

One of the physical benefits to meditators is a change in brain wave pattern that has produced optimum cardio-pulminary operation. Good for the mechanical meditator. I think that this is also good for the spiritual body because, well, no separation.

I have a compulsion called echolalia, which is the repetition of a word or sound for no apparent reason. Not necessarily an autistic characteristic, it represents a deep brain function. When mice are threatened, they chew... just about anything they can get their little yellow teeth around. The benefit is that they get a nest, through anxiety.

Somehow, my brain is soothed and functions better, anxiety and blood pressure are reduced, when I repeat words absurdly. Of course, it is amusing for a while, and then it starts getting mighty annoying for my wife.

All this story to ask: when do sounds lose and gain meaning? I expect that there is a specialized definition for "mantra," but really, this is a species behavior, and although locution is basic to the organism, there are other brain functions. The logic of pragmatics in language will limit the meditational field to lilies when the seed of meditation is lingual.

I think I thought that a meaningless mantra gains meaning by being a mantra, sorta ipso facto. The very mission of the syllable(s) freights them with potential causation.

The stricter the rules, the more constricted the message. So I cultivate body tics: oh I know it is silly, but when my eye twitches, I try to get to a quiet place and really live it. No words are necessary. I meditate to breezes, to pain, to the incessant chattering and clattering on the train.

Because the incredibly important freight of potential causation comes in many forms. And flavors.

[running snail]

Edward, thank you for that..

don't forget to post more..

i'm going to have to think about that

thanks a lot