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What’s the purpose of a mantra? What are the psychological benefits of reciting daily mantras?
A mantra is a word or phrase used to help train the mind to be in the present and instill a certain state of mind. Reciting or meditating on mantras can help you reprogram your mind from life’s conditioning and limiting beliefs.
Here’s how reciting mantras can help you reprogram your mind along with some examples of daily mantras you can use for your practice.
Mantras and Affirmations Are Tools for Change
Meditating on a mantra is one of the core practices used for cultivating mindfulness in Buddhism, it’s also widely recommended in positive psychology. A mantra can be simply a sound used in meditation, such as “Om,” or it can be a statement, such as a positive affirmation, used to focus the mind on a specific thought or idea.
Scientific research has confirmed the usefulness of using daily mantras and affirmations. With regular practice, the use of mantras and affirmations has been shown to decrease stress, help people make changes in diet and exercise, and even improve academic performance.
Many self-help authors stress the usefulness of mantras and positive affirmations for realizing desired outcomes. Here are some examples of daily mantras to inspire your practice.
Daily Mantra for Success
According to Gay Hendricks, the author of The Big Leap, reciting daily mantras can help you reprogram your mind from life’s conditioning and limiting beliefs. To that end, he recommends reciting his “Universal Success Mantra”:
“I expand in abundance, success, and love every day, as I inspire those around me to do the same.”
Hendricks recommends repeating it in sequence with your breath in meditation daily. As you repeat it, notice any resistance your mind has to the mantra. It’s natural—just notice it and go back to the mantra. It will take practice to retrain your mind; you’re deprogramming from a lifetime of embedded false beliefs.
In addition to setting aside time to focus on your mantra in meditation, occasionally just repeat it as you go about your day any time you think of it. You may also want to write the mantra down on pieces of paper and put them where you’ll see them throughout the day, for example in your house, car, or office, in order to prompt yourself to repeat it regularly.
TITLE: The Big Leap
AUTHOR: Gay Hendricks
TIME: 22
READS: 44.6
IMG_URL: https://www.shortform.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/the-big-leap-cover.png
BOOK_SUMMARYURL: the-big-leap-summary-gay-hendricks
AMZN_ID: XYZ
Daily Mantra for Positivity
Mantras can also teach you how to think more positively. A recent study into the effect of mantras confirms that repeating a single word or short phrase quiets your internal critic. Researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine the brain blood flow patterns of people who silently repeated a mantra. The imaging showed a reduction of activity across the brain, primarily in the area of the brain that gives rise to internal thoughts—this is the area that generates self-critical and negative thoughts.
To make positivity mantras most effective, mind coach Vex King recommends creating honest and achievable affirmations, writing them down in your own voice and in the present tense, making them as detailed as possible. For example:
I am a confident, smart person who can handle any challenge that I face. Nothing can bring me down and make me feel negative because I have an impenetrable bubble of positivity surrounding me all the time.
TITLE: Good Vibes, Good Life
AUTHOR: Vex King
TIME: 14
READS: 39.3
IMG_URL: https://www.shortform.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/good-vibes-good-life-cover.png
BOOK_SUMMARYURL: good-vibes-good-life-summary-vex-king
AMZN_ID: XYZ
| Do Positive Mantras and Affirmations Actually Work? In his review of scientific literature on positive affirmations, addictions counselor Steve Rose noticed that positive affirmations don’t often work the way we expect them to. Despite claims that affirmations help us battle our worst thoughts and moods, studies show that isn’t totally accurate. One study found that using affirmations we don’t already believe may actually make us feel worse. Another noticed that while listening to positive affirmations may help boost your mood, reading them may lead to unproductive self-reflection. This doesn’t mean mantras and affirmations are useless, but if you find they make you feel worse, don’t force it. You can’t compel yourself to instantly accept something you don’t believe—yet.So when do affirmations work? Rose says they’re better for affirming beliefs you already hold. One study found stating your values or beliefs out loud can boost your motivation or guide your internal compass. |
How to Use Your Mantras
Engaging with your mantras regularly, like your goals, helps you draw the most benefits. Here are some tips for practicing daily mantra meditation:
- Read them two or three times per day. Read them aloud if it makes sense to do so. Read them when you wake up, in the middle of the day, and before you go to bed.
- Visualize doing what the mantra says. Rather than thinking about how you’d look from someone else’s perspective, picture how it will feel from your perspective. How will it look? How will you feel? What will you hear? For example, if your mantra is feeling great from hiking, imagine hearing the wind in the trees, smelling the fresh air, and feeling accomplished that you went the distance.
- Say the mantra a second time.
- Repeat these steps with each of your mantras.
Here are some other ways to regularly use your mantras:
- Say your mantras in first person (“I am…”), second person (“You are…”), and third person (“[Pronoun] is…” or “[Your Name] is…”).
- Record yourself saying your mantras and listen to them on your commute, at work, or as you fall asleep.
- Say your mantras when doing tedious things like standing in line or exercising. You can say them out loud or in your head.
- Write your mantras on three-by-five cards and place them around your home. Or incorporate them into the screensaver on your computer or phone.
- Have your parents make a recording encouraging you. This could be words that you wished they had said when you were younger, or what you need to hear now.
TITLE: The Success Principles
AUTHOR: Jack Canfield
TIME: 90
READS: 118.1
IMG_URL: https://www.shortform.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/the-success-principles-cover.png
BOOK_SUMMARYURL: the-success-principles-summary-jack-canfield
AMZN_ID: XYZ
Final Words
Reciting mantras is traditionally a Buddhist practice aimed at cultivating the mind’s qualities of mindfulness and concentration. More recently, mantra meditation has become a more mainstream practice recommended by positive psychologists and self-help gurus.
With regular mantra meditation practice, you’ll notice positive changes in your internal dialogue and general attitude to life. Your thinking will become less rigid and more flexible, and your negativity and limiting beliefs will no longer have such a hold over your mind.
If you enjoyed our article about daily mantras, check out the following book suggestions for further reading:
Do you get irritated, angry, anxious, or emotional more easily than you would like? Mindfulness meditation may be worth trying. Being mindful means observing your thoughts and emotions as they arise, without succumbing to your typical knee-jerk reactions. You discover the roots of your anger, greed, and selfishness, and you learn to banish these psychic irritants. Ultimately, you become more at peace, and friendlier to other people.
Mindfulness in Plain English is an approachable introduction to mindfulness and meditation. These are practical tips and truly written in plain English with little spiritual mumbo-jumbo. Inside are practical tips on how to start meditating and deal with common problems.
The Bhagavad Gita is a conversation between Prince Arjuna and Krishna, a mortal incarnation of the god Vishnu. Arjuna is worried about an upcoming battle for succession, since he will be fighting against his kinsmen. In explaining why Arjuna should fight, Krishna goes over a wide variety of spiritual and religious topics relating to dharma, karma, spirituality, and the cycle of reincarnation.
The Gita is one of the most famous pieces of Hindu literature, and the lessons it teaches are central to that faith. As a cultural touchstone and a spiritual guide, it’s one of the most important ancient texts in the world. The translation and commentary by Eknath Easwaran help even those who aren’t learned in Hindu mythology to understand its teachings.
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