Mantra has become well known in the West. We normally associate it, rather superficially, with some meaningless sound we repeat mechanically until we are put in some kind of trance. Actually mantra is quite different than this. 

All learning involves the energization of the mind. It is by the power of attention, the concentration of the mind that one comes to know anything. As long as we are distracted or our minds are wandering, we cannot come to really see anything. Hence the real object of learning is not to learn anything in particular but to gain the mastery of the mind through the power of attention. Then we can find truth in all things. 

This energization of the mind is the true purpose and meaning of mantra. Whenever we have a deep insight or profound realization in life that thought has a special power. The empowered thought is mantra. Hence the more deeply we can think and inquire into things the more our thoughts become mantra, the greater our power of observation, the more mantric force enters into our minds.

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