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Mantra

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Back in early December of 2016, when the world was young, or at least younger, I created a mantra for Squatchers. I did it because the Reverend Jeff asked me to.

In a particularly peculiar case of synchronicity, there was an episode of Finding Bigfoot, that aired a bit after I invented that mantra, in which Ranae Holland comes up with the identical mantra. That episode was recorded earlier in the year, but, and I swear to the gods that this is true, I knew nothing of it until after I also wrote that mantra.

If you want to hear the mantra, it’s on my YouTube channel with the title, “A Squatcher’s Mantra”.

But that is all beside the point of this quasi-dissertation, in which I will tell you the theory behind the term ‘mantra’.

You all know what ‘mantra’ means in common usage. You repeat a word, or a series of words, damn near endlessly, hoping that it gets you what you want, such as a Sasquatch, or makes something go away, possibly a scary Sasquatch.

The real meaning of the word mantra is much more profound.

Mantra is a Sanskrit word consisting of the root word, ‘man’, which means to think, and the suffix ‘tra’, which means the prefix is a tool or instrument. The word “man” is also the root word for ‘manas’, the Sanskrit word for mind. So a mantra is a tool of thought. In practice, a mantra shapes the mind, shapes it in the form of what a given mantra is designed for.

Now, this mind we’re talking about is not the physical mind, it is not all that wobbly, globby mass inside your skull. No, it is something nonphysical. It is what the ancient Greeks called the psyche. The Greeks, along with most of the ancient world, said man was composed of a body, or sarke, as in sarcophagus, the psyche, or soul, and the pneuma, as in pneumatic, or spirit. Our spirit is our real self. It uses the soul to think and tell the body what to do. The soul is nonphysical, in the sense that it exists in a higher order reality than the body. The spirit is in an even higher order reality. That’s the simplistic version, anyways.

The soul is the equivalent of the Sanskrit manas, or mind, and we all know how wiggly our minds are. A mantra is used to focus the mind on a specific intent and stop all those wiggly jiggly thoughts.

Now, there are mantras devised to shape your mind for all sorts of purposes, including naughty purposes. Using naughty mantras for naughty purposes is called black magic. Doing black magic will make some very bad karma for you. Aside from having a bad time in future incarnations, it will land you in an astral hell for a long period of astral time, and astral time can seem like an eternity. I did two different quasi dissertations on astral hells. They are not nice places. And technically, those naughty purposes include trying to get rich, get laid, get a pony, i.e., anything selfish.

Most mantras, though, are intended to quiet your mind enough to allow the light of your spirit to come through, thereby illuminating your mind, and letting some of that light come into this lower plane where we live.

Normally, this is where I would end with a bad pun, or some witticism, but I’ll just say this: Om, shanti, shanti, om.

First shared on the Squatcher’s Lounge Podcast:

For the reading impaired, an audio version of this quasi theory may be found here:

A Squatcher’s Mantra

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I have been asked by the Right Reverend Jeffrey Kelley, and several other members of the Squatcher’s Lounge, to devise a mantra for those searching for the elusive beast, that a repetition of which would help to calm them in their frequent mental typhoons over all things Squatchy.

A small subcommittee of the Lounge has insisted that I be their guru, presumably due to my long, white hair and beard. It must be the hair and beard since there is no other rational reason that I am aware of.

What, exactly, does the word mantra mean? Mantra is a Sanskrit word, dating back to well before 1000 BCE. It is derived from the Sanskrit word manas, which means to think, and also means mind as such. The English word man is derived from the same root. The second syllable, tra, means tool. Mantra therefore means tool to think by. In practice, a mantra is used to focus the mind and enable it to focus on the object of the mantra. More broadly, as the great Tantric scholar Sir John Woodroffe wrote, “Mantra in its most basal sense is the World viewed as—and in its aspect of—sound.” Explaining that statement would be an essay in itself, and not really amenable to a quasification by me.

The mantra most familiar to many of us is the Sanskrit word om. If you have been to any typical yoga class, and the class ended by sitting in the lotus posture for a few minutes, trying to calm down after sticking your feet behind your head, or done the downward facing dog, while the teacher walks behind you, obviously looking at everybody’s butt, you probably ended the meditation by chanting om.

Although a mantra is usually in Sanskrit, typically a few words that are chanted repeatedly, the basic idea is the same as repeating “Hail Mary’s”, or “Our Father’s”, is to Catholics. It quiets your mind so that you may become receptive to higher forces.

Applying the concept of mantra to finding Bigfoot seems more than a bit woo to me, but here goes.

I constructed a seven word mantra that, once you learn it, can easily be expanded to encompass more verses. I made it seven words long because, as everyone knows, seven is a lucky number. The first three words mean “come by here”, and are from the African American creole language of the South Carolina coastal islands. The meaning of the next two will be obvious, as will be the way it is chanted.

The mantra should be repeated loudly, for as long as you are out hunting our forest friends. A silent mental repetition should be used if the presence of bears or cougars is suspected. Wolves would suspect you of being a lost pack member and call back in response, so you’d be safe from them.

I shall now reveal to you the mantra. Listen with devotion and an open heart. Feel free to join in, once you have it memorized.

Kum ba ya, my Squatch, kum ba ya.

Kum ba ya, my Squatch, kum ba ya.

Kum ba ya, my Squatch, kum ba ya.

Oh Squatch, kum ba ya.

First shared on the Squatcher’s Lounge Podcast: