(This is an excerpt from a University Of Metaphysical Sciences course at www.umsonline.org, please feel free to visit the school website)
Pick an area of your life you would like to improve, or a problem that has seemed unsolvable up to now. Then pick a mantra which will most appropriately assist with the problem or facilitate the change you would like to make. Ask God to assist you in your objective in changing or solving a problem. Decide on a place to recite your mantra and a time every day to practice it. The best time to recite your mantra, according to a traditional approach, is 4 AM (Brahmamahurta). Other good times to chant are transition periods of a day, when night is turning into day, and vice versa (dawn and sunrise). You can also recite before going to bed so your mind is harnessed before sleeping.
You might want to use a rosary or mala (a string of rosewood beads that is the Eastern Indian version of a rosary), to help you keep count. A rosary has 108 beads, and malas can have any number depending on how long they are. Some malas have 108 beads, and some have 1008, with “meru” beads along the strand. These are the larger beads, “head” beads that separate series and sections of the mala. You might even think about creating a beaded necklace for the practice of mantras, which adds a special sacredness to your spiritual tool. Your rosary or mala should not be visible to other people as you use it. Typically, a cloth is used to cover the hand as you roll the beads between the thumb and middle finger. The “head” of the rosary or mala should not be crossed and the beads must revert to the “head of the string after completing a series.
You can also simply decide on a certain amount of time to recite your mantra and not worry about keeping count, perhaps ten or twenty minutes, even an hour. For your first experience, keep it short. Ten or fifteen minutes is a good amount to start with. You will still create a powerful change in your life if you do this for only 40 days (the amount of time that it takes to change a habit or create a manifestation, according to some schools of thought.)
Don’t be surprised if reciting the mantra begins to bring you some trouble. The first few days will most likely go smoothly, but then are you get further into it, there will be resistance from your mind as pertains to the practice of your mantra. This means that you are beginning to affect the inner mechanism that needs to shift in order for the problem to be solved or the change to take place. The inner resistance will manifest as outer obstacles, like emergencies during the time you are supposed to be practicing, oversleeping, lack of enthusiasm, a cold, sudden obligations, restlessness, and so on. However, push through it and keep working on your practice. Small upheavals in your life are good signs that what you are doing is working at changing the inner mechanisms which are producing the unwanted reality that you are trying to change.
If
you can carry on through the resistance, it is not unusual that by day
33 or so of a 40 day commitment (sadhana) something drastically changes
and your objective becomes manifest.