From the Daily Speeches of Swami Omkarananda Saraswati

Mantra Repetition as a Powerful Means of Being in Tune with the Infinite
The Supreme Mantra 'OM'
The Powers of the Mind in God-Consciousness
The Mystical Powers of the Mantra

God is there with You, whether You Are Conscious of Him or Not

Outside the unchanging Truth, outside the inseparable, all-wonderful God, there can be no peace, no joy, no strength, no life possible. You try to be a billionaire, and see if you can really find any peace, or happiness, or true life. You try to do what you may in the world and possess what you like in the world - through that there is no chance of your having any true peace, or true happiness, or true power, or true knowledge, or true life. Therefore, instead of wasting time in pursuing these things, get back to the unlimited Power, unlimited Happiness, unlimited Peace, unlimited Life, eternal Life, that God is. And in order to get back to God you need not to move even a metre. He is there where you are sitting. He is within you and around you; you have not seen Him.

A great cinema actress in Paris had a wonderful, very costly, expensive, three million dollar chain of diamonds. One day, in her excitement, she absent-mindedly put her chain round her neck and began to search for it. And in her big house and among her many servants she made such a chaos, thinking that it is lost, thinking that she has misplaced it somewhere in the house and the servants have stolen it. She made a great disorder in the whole house. She sent her servant maids searching for it. She telephoned to the police. She created a great chaos in her restlessness to find the necklace. Several hours were lost in this. At the end, one among the wise and calm persons of the household asked, 'Where did you last keep it?'

'Well, it was in my dressing room.'
'Did someone enter your dressing room?'
She said, 'No one except myself.'
And the wise man said, 'Good. Take off your mantle. What is there around your neck?'
She was astonished to find, that the necklace was all the time there, and the scarf was hiding it! She was searching, suspecting the servants, accusing them, telephoning to the police; all the time the necklace was there around her neck.

Even so, all the time the necklace of billions of dollars, the necklace of infinite Happiness, Peace, Joy, Power, Grace, Beauty, Perfection, is around every man's neck. Not knowing this, every man is restlessly searching for pleasure, in the cinema, in the restaurant, with people. People are trying to cheat, deceive, in search of happiness, destroy other nations, grapple for the wealth of other countries, kill each other for a little power and a little wealth. All this human drama of restless chaos, disorder, sufferings, sorrow, injustice, evil is enstaged in search of pleasure and power and peace which no man finds. While all the time, around their necks there is the God of infinite Peace, Happiness, Power, true Love, true Freedom, true Grace. Remember this Truth. Do all you can to relate yourself to the Kingdom of Heaven, to God who is within you. And remember also the truth, outside this God you cannot find any true Wealth, true Peace, true Freedom, true Happiness, true Power, true eternal Life.

Mantra Repetition as a Powerful Means of Being in Tune with the Infinite

So long as the mind persists in any form, so long as the mind persists as your body, as the world around you, as your name, as your experiences, as your thoughts and feelings, as your awareness of the earth underneath, there is no true experience of God. When your mind becomes of the nature of God and ceases to be the body that you are, the world that you experience around you, then you have God-experience. The mind must forget itself, forget itself as your body, as the earth underneath, as everything that you see and know and experience in the outer world, as your thoughts and feelings. The moment mind ceases to be so, and assumes the form and nature of the heart of the Divine, it becomes divine, it has a true experience of God. Till then you have no true experience of God; you have the experience of anything else, but not of God. So in order there may be a true experience of God, your mind must cease to be aware of yourself as 'so and so', your mind has to cease to be aware of the earth beneath and the environment around and must subsist as a boundless Light, Love, Grace and divine Consciousness.

The moment the pure in heart sit for meditation, they do not know that there is the earth underneath them, or people around them. No other thoughts are arising: the consciousness is immediately absorbed in the Infinite.

The mantra repetition is a powerful means of being in tune with this infinite and absolute God. The simple Saints go on saying millions of times during the day, 'God, God, God.' And thus they secure for themselves the experience of only one Thing: 'God, God, God.'

The normal man is completely lost in hundreds of silly experiences. Therefore, the normal man is so ignorant and morally imperfect, unhappy and restless, always seeking for goals which are never fulfilled. Your heart has also said millions of times: 'My body, my things, your body, your things, my father, my mother, my children, my typewriter, my happiness, my unhappiness, my salad, my chocolate.' Millions of times this is going on in the unconscious, and therefore you are tied to the earth. When the opposite process is started, you are liberated, spiritually freed and enlightened. You must say millions of times, 'God, God, God', in order that all these dirty experiences and impressions are effaced.

Mind is so treacherous that it makes us always forget God, and it makes us experience only a sensuous, physical, material world. Mind is completely absorbing us in a physical, earthly experience of pains and pleasure, good and bad; it is not allowing us to get closer to God. Therefore, we must discover special ways by which we can make the mind always think of God. In order to do that, supposing if you have a word like 'OM', or if you have a word like 'Lord', every time you say 'OM' or 'Lord', you are reminded of God. And remember, the greatest Mystics and Saints have discovered that this OM is one and the same with God; and hundreds of Saints have had the vision of God. If that is so, why don't you try to control the mind and constantly put it in memory of God by repetition of the word 'OM' or 'Lord'?

Suppose, you are Mrs. Smith. You don't like Mrs. Brown. The moment you see Mrs. Brown, there are in you deep feelings of dislike for her. If you see her, you think of her daughter who offended you, and so on. So long as you are lost in this kind of experience, where is God in your life? On the other hand, with one word, 'OM' or 'Lord', you can bring down God into your everyday existence. The moment you see Mrs. Brown, don't recognise her as Mrs. Brown; let all your heart and mind say: 'Lord'. Now there is no more any feeling of hatred for Mrs. Brown, no more memory of her daughter's offending you. And there is a constant consciousness that God is omniscient, all-powerful, all-beautiful, that He is all-loving, all-seeing, that He is in Mrs. Brown and in yourself also. So instead of mind displaying the reactions of hatred, dislike, in the presence of Mrs. Brown, with that wonderful word 'Lord' or 'OM' it is full of a reflection upon God's Omniscience, Omnipotence, Protection, Beauty, Love, Light. So in this way you see how very valuable such a word, a mantra, is for daily life.
You see a car flying by. The moment you see it, you say 'God'. That seeing the car becomes an excuse for remembering God, repeating God's name and submerging yourself in God-Consciousness. And instead of the car leaving an impression upon your mind, the emotion and awareness of God's presence remains in the mind the moment you repeat 'God'.

Thus, you can apply the Lord's name everywhere, in all conditions of life, in all experiences, and in all situations. If you are going from Winterthur to Zurich with the train, don't put your leg into the carriage until you say mentally or with all your heart, 'God'. And don't sit down without uttering in your heart 'God', and experiencing the Lord's presence. If in the interval you get up from the seat for a minute, say 'God', and get up. And if the people around you in the carriage are constituting a distraction upon your eyes, you can pretend to be tired and close your eyes, and having closed your eyes again mentally and by heart say 'God'. And you know what God is - an omnipresent, omnipotent, all-beautiful, all-protecting, all-seeing Power and Presence.
There are many types of mantras. The kind of mantra you repeat depends upon the kind of conception you have of God and the way you love Him. Mantra can be a verse, or it can be one mystical syllable like OM, or it can be a name of God; and the mantra has to be repeated again and again, until the mind is controlled, transformed, uplifted, united with God.

Mantras like OM are fundamental sounds, mystical sounds. They are not words created by man; they are not sounds caused, formed, created by the genius of man. Man, in his genius, has created many languages. All communications have been rendered possible by special languages he has evolved, but OM and other mystical syllables consist of sounds which are eternal, timeless, uncreated. Whereas there are other mantras which are created by the holiness and the divinity of an aspiring soul. They too are called mantras, because they, in the long run, lead one to God-experience.

The Supreme Mantra 'OM'

OM is the supreme mantra, highest mantra. It is prefixed to every other mantra. It is the battery; if you put it in anything it becomes light. Add to the OM names of God, and it becomes a mantra.

When you are constantly repeating it, and all your heart and mind is in it, and through it you have spiritual experience, it is your mantra. If through its instrumentality you have God-experience, it becomes a mantra.

So mantra is the means by which you commune with the Divinity. Mantra is that by which you call upon the Divinity and ask It to be with you, in you, around you, in your experience. Mantra is something that holds your heart in Light, inspiration. Mantra purifies the mind, elevates the mind, makes the mind one-pointed; and from there you can meditate better. It also gives you strength in time of fear and distress. It also helps you see things clearly, mentally, in thought and in judgement, in times of doubt and difficulties.

Supposing your greatest friend suddenly enters into the room, how will you feel? Suddenly you jump out of the chair. Your face is full of smiles, and you warmly try to shake hands and embrace the friend. In the same way, always feel yourself suddenly in the presence of Someone called your greatest Friend: God. As your heart jumps into smiles and makes you embrace the friend, when you think of God let your heart jump with smiles, and embrace God's Presence. Every time you say the mantra let this experience be undergone. God is the greatest Reality - more real than the bones in your fingers - and is with you, around you, listening to you always.

So mantra is not merely a verbal repetition. It is being accompanied by love for God, faith in God, a perception which is in itself purifying you, transforming you, changing you, altering you radically within. When you are in the mantra, whatever nonsense you have heard, nothing has entered you. When you are in the mantra, whatever pains are experienced in the body, they have not touched you. When you are in the mantra, whatever may be the hundred limitations and weaknesses you have, they have not affected you. And when you are in this state, day after day, and year after year, nothing will any more trouble you: you are all-perfect. You are as perfect as the Divine.
Om is a divine Word, the Word of God, that was in the beginning and that will be at the end, that is always in the universe, that is always in your inner spiritual heart. All the highest mysteries of the infinite Consciousness, the potentialities and powers of absolute Consciousness are resident in OM. Therefore, It is something which constitutes the key to the whole reality of the Infinite.


Om is that fundamental Sound which has brought into existence all forms of sounds, all types and frequencies of sound. It is the Energy behind all energies. It is the Infinite. It has brought into existence time and space, and in the time- and space-universe It is resident. Resident in it, It is yet exceeding it. The beautiful tree that you see with its green leaves and beautiful flowers and fruits is also a product of OM, is being sustained in its energy by OM. The life in the tree by which the tree grows is a product of OM and is sustained by OM. So OM is the pervasive, all-permeating Energy in the universe. It is the Music of the celestial spheres that is in all the magnificent activity of the stellar universes beyond and the fundamental, all-pervasive, all-creating Force, the Force which is the basis and foundation even of consciousness and intelligence and awareness, the Force which bears all magnetism. All forces like the gravitational force, even powers like the power of love and faith, are energies, forces, emanating from the universal, all-pervading OM. So this grand, infinite Being that OM is has not only brought into existence, by the million energies in Its Being, this universe, but It is also something transcendent and exceeding and standing beyond what It has created.
Now, how to understand this much better? Take the case of our own mind. Can you see what mind is? Nobody knows what mind is - not your greatest psychologist. He can frighten you by special cases, published by the world-leading universities, but he is a poor fool, a child, playing tricks. Nobody knows what mind is, what its nature is. Let us take a hypothesis. Let us consider mind as something like an atom, an electronic atom in our brains. Let us say it is a tiny little particle of light in our brains. We fall asleep. Now the body is at complete rest, the mind's activities are completely suspended, we are not conscious of the body or the external world, we don't know what time it is, we don't know that we are sleeping. All this knowledge is blocked out; we are in a deep darkness; we are in deep sleep. Suddenly a dream arises. You feel that it is 9 o'clock. There is a blazing sun. You feel that you are in a tropical forest in Africa. You feel that you are a young person, aged 20 years, a man. You experience that you are walking along a path in the forest. There is a terrific glare of the blazing sun. You find the deer and some animals of the forest crossing your path. In the meantime, something awakens you from the sleep. Your dream is broken.

Now you are, say, a woman. You had a dream. In that dream you felt that you were a boy walking in the blazing sun at 9 o'clock on the path in a South African forest. Who created that boy? Who created that sun in the dream, that forest, those animals which you saw? This fantastic mind in you, which is just this tiny little thing in your brain, in your head, had created a sun, a world, the sunshine, the animals, the huge forest. This tiny little space in the head which does not hold even a single tree, could hold the whole forest, could give you experiences which embrace vast spaces.

All these experiences you had within your brain, within your mind, within such a short time. Was not that boy you saw and felt yourself to be in the dream purely a creation of your mind? Was not that person formed of the substance of your mind? Were not that sun, those forests, the trees that you saw all formed by the mind? And as you were walking as that young man, and while all the time thinking that you are different and distinct from whatever you have been experiencing in that forest, was not all this a possibility, a grand self-expression of the power of the mind in you? Was not, in everything that you saw, the central mind's capacity and energy present, pervasive?
Even so, OM, which is a tiny little Particle, has brought into existence all these vast and immeasurable spaces of the universe, all this creation, and all that time that accompanies the processes of this universal being. All these have emerged from that tiny little OM.

What is this tiny Thing which is infinite in Its expression? That is why a passage in the Upanishad says, God, the supreme Reality, is smaller than the smallest particle, and vaster than the infinite space. Is this not a paradox? How can the smallest, the tiniest thing, which is smaller than the smallest atom, be, at the same time, vaster, greater than the vast, immeasurable space which cannot be measured even by light-years? It is not a paradox for those who have direct experience of God.

OM is both, God as impersonal and transcendental, and God as immanent and personal. It combines both aspects of God.

OM is divine Harmony. It is divine Consciousness. It is divine Intelligence. Its very nature is Luminosity. It is indescribably brilliant. Its nature is also Love. It is infinite and boundless Love. Its nature is also Beauty. It is Fullness. It is infinite and absolute Peace. It is the Music of music. It is absolute Joy. It is everything, and transcends everything. OM contains in Itself the manifest and the unmanifest aspects of the Divine.

Every repetition of OM should help your mind and heart suddenly touch something of God's Presence, Power, Light. Every repetition of OM should be for you a means of establishing active relations with God. Let every repetition of OM be accompanied by the knowledge that It is the Word of God, and God is in It, that It is of God, that It is God's sound-form. Let every hair and foot and tooth, everything, repeat the mantra, let everything repeat the mantra. Take it into the subconscious. Take the mantra into the unconscious. Take the mantra into the conscious memory, and so on. Every part and portion of your inner being and consciousness must be charged with the mantra power.
You must repeat the mantra, not mechanically, but with a feeling, awareness, that the Divinity is present with you, around you. When you are repeating the mantra, if you are full of faith and love for the Divine, if you are conscious that God is omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, if you know that there is Someone who loves you supremely, Someone who is your beloved, Someone who is your strength and support and life, the Divinity, all-seeing, all-powerful, all-wonderful, eternal, and that we cannot separate ourselves from It - such a Divinity is with you.

When you meditate and find peace in meditation, and also a sense of God's Consciousness, you can bring that peace and God-consciousness into your work through the help of this word OM. Whenever you say OM, let peace be poured into your mind and heart and will, and let peace express itself through your outer actions. So through continuous repetition of OM you will be able to sustain yourself in peace and God-inspiration.

Whenever peace or inspiration or God-consciousness wanes, at once repeat OM, loudly or mentally or by heart. When the OM is chanted, it releases such a fire and force and energy that harmonizes the atmosphere around us, that drives away and destroys discordant forces around us. Repeat for fifteen minutes. As you repeat, disturbing thoughts and feelings subside. And with every repetition feel that you are in the immediate presence of God, that OM is God, that God is expressing Himself through OM, that this mantra is the means of your establishing relations with God. And wherever OM is repeated, there God's presence is at once generated: there, at once the obstacles and the veils that are hiding God's presence from your view are broken.

The Powers of the Mind in God-Consciousness

Men of highest God-experience are always listening to the OM sound everywhere in the universe. Put your ear to the telegraph post; you will hear a sound. In the same way, the whole world is resonating, all the universes are resonant, with this fundamental sound OM.

The human ear is so gross and so limited that it cannot hear finer and higher sounds, but in the state of mystical consciousness and God-experience, they are disclosed to the Super-Scientists that the greatest Sages are.

Why do I say these Mystics and Sages are Super-Scientists? In the textbooks of science, books that relate to sound phenomena, you might have learned there are frequencies of sound which are inaudible to the ear. There are delicate sounds which our ear cannot catch. There are terrific sounds which also our ear does not catch. Our ear is capacitated to catch only those sounds which fall within a certain specific, small, tiny band. This poor human ear of ours is a petty power, a useless thing, useful only for conducting an animal existence, but not useful for higher purposes. So the scientist governed and guided by a spirit of search for more knowledge, devoted to discovery of facts, laws, truths of physical things, has been studying the phenomena of sound in the laboratory.

Now, by the fruitfulness of these marvellous researches, experiments, and by a combination of several technological factors, the modern scientist has helped us to have what you call hearing-aids, has made for us the radio, transistor, and so on. And this radio catches those sound-waves, which are inaudible to the physical ear. The radio catches these sound-waves of all frequencies and amplifies these sounds in order that our ear may catch them. From this we understand our physical ears are extremely limited in their capacity for hearing sounds.

It is also possible to hear the radio-waves and frequencies without the aid of the radio-apparatus. The Sage and Mystic is sitting with us, and the news broadcasted by BBC in London is heard by Him, though He has no radio apparatus. Is not the brain of this Mystic more marvellous than the radio? He can tune Himself to any station while sitting here. Is not His brain super-scientific? He can not only tune Himself to any radio-station, but He can tune Himself to a man in Bern, Switzerland, and report what is happening in his head, what he is thinking. He can also tune Himself to some lady in some corner in some city in Australia, and immediately give the whole story of her activities right from the morning till now.

You have a television. When you turn to a particular station, you see the whole picture, the whole story unfolded. Whereas this Sage can see any street, any house, in any city of the world. Suppose, war is taking place in South Vietnam. Cables are received by newspaper offices in London, in Paris, in Zurich, and all over the world, concerning the happenings on the field of war. But the Sage who is sitting here, with us, is a direct witness to what is happening there. Is not this Sage's mind far more marvellous than the most marvellous scientific apparatus that television is? Can you not therefore call Him a Super-Scientist?

Your mind is limited in its powers. You do not even know what Mrs. Herrmann is thinking now, you do not even know what is happening deep down in her subconscious and unconscious. You do not know what is going to happen to you tomorrow. Whereas this Saint's and Mystic's mind is unlimited, timeless, spaceless in its function and power. Therefore, He can also tell you, and present picture for picture, what happened 5000 years ago in the place where the city of Zurich now stands, how it looked like, how the people dressed themselves, how they lived and ate and drank, and the complete life-story of any one of them.

The mind of the Saint can travel back in time, or travel ahead in time, or make all space an immediate here. If scientists are struggling hard to fly to the moon, yet the knowledge that they have acquired concerning the moon is inadequate, insufficient; their efforts are not successful. But the Saint looks at the moon as if you are looking at a ball on this table - not only at the moon, but at any planet. For Him there are no spacial limitations. His mind is moving in a spaceless, timeless universe.

Science tells us that if a star dies somewhere it takes millions and millions and millions of light-years before its light arrives here on earth. Whereas the mind of the Sage, in half a split second, is by the star. That means the mind of the Sage is moving at a terrific speed, at which light cannot travel. His consciousness is the Light behind all lights. Space, time, all are meaningless for Him.


He is living in the world of real marvels and wonders of divine Consciousness. He has not only access to this world of time and space, this physical universe; He has also access to all the invisible mental worlds, psychic worlds, spiritual worlds. So He can penetrate into the minds of humanity, live in and know directly all the worlds. He can move into the other higher worlds, heaven or hell, or whatever may be, as easily as you move from one room of your house into the next one. Such is the state of the mind achieved in Illumination; such are the powers of the mind in God-consciousness.

Now if a Mystic were to put His ear to the tree, He will hear the sound of OM, the fundamental Sound. If He looks at the universe, He is conscious of the vibrations of OM sustaining, maintaining, forming that universe. All that He sees, knows, feels through the senses is found to be formulations of this fundamental divine Consciousness, Energy, Force. So the Mystic is not only conscious of God in the universe, in the space-time-universe, but also is conscious of God beyond the universe.

The Mystical Powers of the Mantra

How can we ourselves achieve this state of the Mystic? You know, as science tells you, that tremendous energy, inconceivable energy, is locked up in the tiny little atom. Science says: 'Split that atom, and you will release terrific atomic energy, sufficient to destroy cities, or sufficient to put a number of factories at work.' In the same way, mantra is that power, which splits the atom of our inner consciousness. Go on splitting the inner atom of the consciousness; tomorrow you yourself will become this Super-Scientist that the Sage or Mystic is.

You see the point? The scientists are splitting the material atoms. The material atoms are inferior, infinitely inferior to the atom of consciousness. What happens when you go on splitting the atoms of consciousness by the mystic power that mantra is? After some years, your own mind will be full of millions of television- and radio-sets and millions of kingdoms of heaven. Your joy will be so great that you cannot imagine it. Your peace will be so much that nobody can understand it, a joy that is indescribable, as the Veda says. You will be living in a self-sufficient, self-contained world. This is your real destiny.

Wherever the Sage is, there inside his being is the Kingdom of Heaven. Now supposing this city is going to be bombed, the government at once announces: 'Walk out of the city!' All are frightened. The Sage is simply sitting, smiling. You understand? What can attempt to catch this person, who is a super-atom? Now there is a blazing fire. In that blazing fire, if you put a cup of water, what does it do? It only evaporates in the fire. So, when you yourself become a super-atom, no fear. You become absolutely fearless; you will be smiling; there is no such thing as danger. When you are brought face to face with a dozen lions, you will still be smiling; they are tiny cats for you - more afraid of you, and more happy in your presence, and incapable of mischief in your presence. Why? Because the vibrations of your personality affect them, touch them.

There are beautiful rose plants. You are not seeing them, but their fragrance is reaching us, and we suspect there is some rose plant somewhere there. In the same way, everything is emanating its own fragrance and its own vibration. Now you have sandalwood; it is emanating a fragrant smell. In the same way, all of us, all of our bodies, our minds and personalities, are emanating vibrations. How much more elevated, happy, inspired in the presence of a Holy Personality we feel! We feel in His presence God-realisation is an easy matter. We feel in His presence life's difficulties are nothing. If an evil person is there, he feels somehow depressed; automatically he feels slightly uneasy. He will say, 'Let us go for a walk!'

So all of us are emanating our own vibrations. We are constantly radiating specific energies; they are good or bad in accordance with the goodness or badness of our minds and hearts.

So when you are repeating the mantra, all the negative, dark vibrations, energies in you, are becoming illuminated, you are being transformed inside, a spiritual power is being generated in you. This spiritual power is felt by all sensitive minds that come into contact with you. If you go to a sick man he feels enlivened, he feels inspired, he feels that he will recover soon, he feels he is happy and he can manage and everything will be all right.

So I say, go on repeating your mantra. You will release wonderful vibrations. Your very car will draw, suck in your vibrations, and if there were to be an accident for the car it would miraculously escape it, because the vibrations will not allow any damage to take place. Now the accident has to come from another car, and as the other car is coming, the vibrations here delay its coming and divert it elsewhere, and it may hit itself against a post or another car, but not yours.

Every time you are repeating the mantra you are releasing specific, definite vibrations, of which you may not be conscious, but whose results and effects you can always notice and see in what is happening around you and in your life.