Kundalini.Tantra.by.Satyananda.Saraswati

Mantra
The second method of awakening kundalini is through steady regular practice of
mantra. This is a very powerful, smooth and risk-free method, but of course it is a
sadhana which requires time and a lot of patience. First you need to get a suitable mantra
from a guru who knows yoga and tantra, and who can guide you through your sadhana.
When you practise the mantra incessantly, it develops in you the vision of a higher force
and enables you to live amidst the sensualities of life with indifference to them.
When you throw a pebble into a still lake, it produces circular ripples. In the same
way, when you repeat a mantra over and over again, the sound force gathers momentum
and creates vibrations in the ocean of the mind. When you repeat the mantra millions and
billions of times, it permeates every part of your brain and purifies your whole physical,
mental and emotional body.
The mantra must be chanted loudly, softly, on the mental plane and on the psychic
plane. By practising it at these four levels, kundalini awakens methodically and
systematically. You can also use the mantra by repeating it mentally in coordination with
the breath or you can sing it aloud in the form of kirtan. This creates a great potential in
mooladhara and awakening takes place.
Closely related to mantra yoga is the awakening through sound or music - nada yoga.
Here the sounds are the bija mantras and the music consists of particular melodies
corresponding to particular chakras. This is a most tender and absorbing way of
awakening.
Tapasya
The third method of awakening is tapasya, which means the performance of
austerities. Tapasya is a means of purification, a burning or setting on fire so that a
process of elimination is created, not in the physical body, but in the mental and
emotional bodies. Through this process the mind, the emotions and the whole personality
are cleansed of all the dirt, complexes and patterns of behavior that cause pain and
suffering. Tapasya is an act of purification. It should not be misunderstood to involve
standing naked in cold water or snow, or observing foolish and meaningless austerities.
When you want to eliminate a bad habit, the more you want to get rid of it, the more
powerful it becomes. When you abandon it in the waking state, it appears in dreams, and
when you stop those dreams, it expresses itself in your behavior or manifests in disease.
This particular habit must be destroyed at its psychic root, not only at the conscious level.
The samskara and vasana must be eliminated by some form of tapasya.
Tapasya is a psychological or psycho-emotional process through which the aspirant
tries to set in motion a process of metabolism that will eradicate the habits that create
weakness and obstruct the awakening of willpower. 'I must do this but I can't.' Why does
this difference between resolution and implementation arise in the mind of the aspirant?