Meditating With a Mandala or Yantra

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Before you can meditate with a mandala or yantra you will have to be instructed on its meaning. Then, place it so that the central point is at eye level when you are sitting before it in your usual meditating position. Relax the muscles of your face and sit absolutely motionless, gazing at the centre point.

Let your gaze move slowly outwards to the edge, taking in but trying not to think about the visual content. Now let the gaze move slowly back to the centre before closing the eyes and holding the image in your mind's eye for as long as you can before opening the eyes again and repeating the process. As you become more practised, you will find that your eye will automatically be drawn to the centre and that it rests there effortlessly on the point that symbolizes the essence of being.

Chakras

Some schools of yoga {see page 48), believe that there are centres of psychic energy, or chakras, placed in the sushumna, the central canal of the astral body roughly corresponding to the spinal column in the physical body. The chakras sit at various points between the base of the spine and the top of the head. Two schools of yoga, Tantric and Kundalini, practise meditation on each of them in turn.

Each chakra has its own yantra and its own mantra (apart from the topmost one). Starting with the lowest of them, the muladhara, situated between the anus and genitals, the meditator visualizes its yantra while repeating its mantra, either inwardly or aloud, until ready to move on.

As the meditation works its way through the chakra, the latent energy of each one is released, imbuing the meditator with stronger and stronger sensations of warmth and light at the centre until, when the final meditation is completed, the physical will have merged with the spiritual-the meditator's consciousness merges with the universe. Each chakra is adorned with its own number of lotus petals, governed by the number of the body channels that conjoin at that point in the astral body.

The muladhara is adorned with four such petals and its mantra is 'lam*. In ascending order the chakras are the six-petalled svadhishtana: its mantra is 'vain'. The manipura has ten petals and its mantra is 'raw'. Next comes the anahata,with twelve petals and the mantra 'yam'. Then, with sixteen petals and the mantra 'ham', is the vishuddha chakra. The ajna chakra, with its two petals and the mantra 'om' is next, followed by the topmost, the sahasrara, or thousand-petal chakra, which has no mantra.

Anyone wishing to practise this form of meditation needs detailed instruction from an experienced teacher over a long period of time, but the following meditation may give you just a flavour of the full effect.

The space between the eyebrows meditation

This space corresponds to the ajna chakra. Sit, kneel or lie in your usual position with your eyes closed. Gently swivel your eyeballs upwards and try to visualize them as focused on the space between your eyebrows. See how close this space is to the brain-feel its central position, visualize viewing it from the outside: now visualize it from the inside. The space between the eyebrows is a part of you. As the meditation deepens feel yourself becoming a part of that space. If unwanted thoughts intrude, mentally blow them away and return your focus to the space between the eyebrows.

It is not possible here to describe the whys and wherefores of every type of visual meditation. But the ones described below have all been used successfully by meditators the world over.

Colour visualizing

There are many methods of using colour as a means of reaching the meditative state. The two given here are among the simplest.

For the first, sit in whichever position you favour and begin to breathe deeply. As usual, don't force the breath, but let it find its own pace and depth. When it has settled to a slow, rhythmic rate, begin to visualize the colours red, orange and yellow, flowing upwards into your solar plexus, visualizing each colour one at a time as a gently flowing river.

Spend a minute or so on each colour and then picture a stream of green flowing into the solar plexus from directly in front of you. After a minute or so, follow the green with blue, indigo and violet, each in turn flowing into you from the same source as the green.

Once the spectrum is completed, imagine yourself bathed in a blue light before ending the meditation by opening your eyes.

Don't be put off if at first you find it difficult to visualize a colour: with practice this becomes easier. The second method is to sit with eyes closed before focusing the thoughts on any colour you wish. Fill your mind with that colour to the exclusion of everything else and refuse to be frustrated by other thoughts that may come to mind. Wrap them slowly in the colour so that they are enveloped in it.

It sometimes helps to imagine an object of your chosen shade-a field of yellow corn perhaps-and gradually concentrate your thoughts on it until the field becomes totally unimportant and your mind is a canvas of yellow. (Some people who practise colour meditation, in fact, begin each session by picturing an easel on which rests a blank canvas that stroke by stroke fills up with the chosen colour.)