ॐ : A MAGICAL EXPERIENCE

ॐ : A Magical Experience

This article is about the Divine Word,  ॐ, and my small experiences with it, alongwith a small introductory background based in our Vedant Shastra. This is a road I am trying to walk, and what follows is a true chronicle of my path, in the hope that I can encourage other students like myself to walk on this wondrous path. It starts from my first actual exposure to the Symbol, this Word, and goes on to detail my experiences in full truthful words, culminating in my first small / tiny personal experience of the immense calm, quietitude and impact this one Word has on the human mind.

THE FIRST EXPOSURE

As befits this Word’s importance and primacy,  my first real exposure to this, beyond the daily hymns we used to sing at home and in temples, was through my Guru, my Management Professor, Dr Hemant Indurkar from Indore.  {May God Bless his Soul}! What could be more fitting – this letter being revealed to me by my teacher? Earlier, the word had only a rough meaning for me – it was mostly the first word in prayers etc. It was a symbol of our religion – beyond that, I was completely unaware of the majesty, the importance, the relevance and the impact of this one lovely Word.

Dr Indurkar’s message was that Om is not spoken from the mouth, but has to emanate from your stomach… He advised me on the proper way to chant Om, and suggested that I do this as a practice for a minute or so daily. This I could not really undertand; and sadly, I did not get the chance to enquire about it in more detail, principally because I focused on the words, without thinking of their meaning, and the deeper questions just did not occur to me then. It wasn’t till much, much later that the full meaning and import of that advice hit home…

MOVING FORWARD

Life moved on for me, meandering through its curves, ups and downs, and had me flowing with it, just going with the flow – while simultaneously doing my utmost to fight it with all my might… big mistake; but that is a story for another article, in another time. Let us move on. To cut a long story short, I got into the habit of reading the scriptures daily; and from there, slowly, over time, my real learnings started. It now occurs to me that as I did not have a Guru, my learning was perforce slow, meandering and had lots of diversionary paths leading off in divergent directions. More of that later, in further articles on this Sanaatan Dharm Series on my blog. A small clarification – Sanaatan Dharm is a the broader term of our common path – within it, I follow the Sankhya philosophy, also called DnyaanYog, which is itself a part of Vedant.

WHAT IS ॐ

ॐ is mentioned quite literally countless times in the various Vedic Texts and Upanishads; but in this small summary, I use the Atharva-Vediya Mandukya Upanishad, a small Upanishad of 12 verses. It is small only in size, in importance, it is one of the 11 most prominent Upanishads in our Shastra. This Upanishad described ॐ in detail, and the meaning of Aatmaa in its 12 verses.

ॐ is composed of three letter – A, U and M; as quite a few of us are no doubt aware. But going deeper, it emerges that ॐ is in reality the name of God, Parabrahm, no less; and its three letters {which merge to create the sound of ॐ}, are emblematic of first, this entire creation; second, Hiranyagarbh – who is the creator of the current cosmic cycle, that is the Brahm in the trinity of Brahm-Vishnu-Mahesh; and third, the Parabrahm,

CHANTING ॐ

One way to look at it is that the Universe merges into the Hiranyagarbh, which in turn merges into the Parabrahm. When you chant ॐ, this is, in effect, what you are saying… merging into the world with A, then into Brahm with U, and closing with a merging into the creator, the originator, the Parabrahm with the extended M.  This is just one of many ways to chant ॐ, and there are known to be several deep meanings.

There are other methods of Chanting ॐ; these are mentioned in the various Shruti texts. {Shruti refers to The Vedic books – Rug, Yajur, Saam and Atharvan Ved; and the Upanishads. These together form the Shruti-vaakya, and are the core of Vedant and Sanaatan Dharm both}. One of the these is the Udgeeth, described in exhaustive detail in the Chhandogya Upanishad. The Udgeeth is a high tonal vocal chant, in simple words.

Another method is the one I call the Pranic method – wherein the focus is on the nostrils and nose, understanding that the Pran, human life itself, is resident in the Nasal area. A fourth method is the Mahakosh-centric method, wherein the vowel A starts with the outer body, pulling it into U which resides in the inner Sukshma-Shareer, and closing out with a Heart / Nose / Head based prolonged M that represents the Creator. One of my Gurus today, Hemant Dada Aadkar, says there are many other ways to Chant ॐ. Point here is that  ॐ is not just a letter or a sound; it has deep meanings associated with it.

EXPERIENCING ॐ

I will be honest – at first, nothing. Absolutely nothing. This is where your faith, belief, trust, effort, perseverance come in. And your hunt for Dnyaan, knowledge. I kept at it, though intermittently. What was regular, was my daily prayers. It is, in my opinion, the combination of the two that really clicks – Dnyaan and Faith. That said, I must admit – the experiential dim realization of its power preceded the dawn of intellect, the dawn of knowledge for me  at least. This is validation of the various Shruti which state that faith, devotion is paramount.

The Faith part was the prayers to the Devatas – Bholenath, Mata Saraswati etc. And the dedication to reading the Shruti-Vaakya. The Dnyaan part was the repeated Paaraayans I did of the Krushnaarjun Sanvaad {Shrimad Bhagwad Geeta}, and the various Upanishads. Initial realization was slow – I had no Guru. Neither had I a study group. But the cumulative reading finally began to help. And then, I started the Agnihotra! {More on this in a later article – suffice it to state that the Agnihotra is the single most important prayer in all our religious rites. It has clear paramouncy over everything}

ॐ : AUM….

The first realization was heaviness in the heart region; once this became regular – I realized that when I spoke, my voice was actually coming from one of : Mouth, Throat, or deep within the heart, depending on the feelings and the depth with which I spoke. That was when I slowly noticed my Chanting of the ॐ Word was now starting deep within somewhere in my body. It was still not reaching the naabhi {navel} level – which is the ideal; but the sound was definitely coming from the depth of the Body somewhere. It is a wonderful realization, though it takes time for our vivek, our intellect, to realise…

The realization of body tingling as you chant is another experience. It started with me from the palms of my hand, and now it reverberates from shoulder level to toes. Though honestly, this is still sporadic – stilling the mind is very, very hard to do. And holding it still is even harder… and this needs a still, steady mind. But the most awesome experience is the feeling of immense quiet, calm, and solitude, of peace, and of wellness, that emanates from deep within you, and stills for head, your brain, every pore of your being… This is a magical calm, a magical beautiful and hypnotically enthralling experience, as everything ceases – albeit for a few seconds. For those few seconds, all that exists is sheer nothingness, and an infinite calm extends upon your corporeal being. That is the sheer magic of ॐ.….