Chanting the Name of God is the foundation of the spiritual practice recommended by the Spiritual Science Research Foundation. It is important that chanting be increased quantitatively and qualitatively in a stepwise manner across timely intervals. This is to facilitate spiritual progress and gaining of higher level spiritual experiences.
Let’s take a closer look at the various steps or milestones that a seeker typically goes through on this path of spiritual practice. Depending on one’s spiritual level one may require a period of a few months up to two years to cross each step.
Many of our readers have started chanting the Name of God for the very first time in their lives after reading this website. Typically these readers may only be capable of a few minutes of chanting per day. In order to begin and sustain this practice it is advisable that in the beginning they take time out to chant for at least 10 minutes a day. From there, the process of increasing our chanting stepwise slowly begins.
The next stage is becoming aware when one is idle and remembering to chant during that time. This could be when waiting for someone or standing idle in a queue.
After this, one should try to chant while performing physical activities such as bathing, cooking, walking, travelling in a bus or train, etc. These are day-to-day chores that are done by force of habit and one does not need to think while performing them. This makes it possible to chant during physical activity.
The next, higher, stage is chanting the Name of God while performing mental activities which are not important in day-to-day life, for example like reading the newspaper, watching television, etc. Hence at such times one can chant mentally.
After this, the more advanced stage is being able to chant while performing mental tasks which are important in day-to-day life, like reading or writing official papers. When doing such tasks the eyes, intellect and hands are active so one can chant mentally. By focusing on increasing our spiritual practice in a stepwise manner, we can assure that we are always making spiritual growth.
Please refer to the article which explains how it is possible to chant continuously when performing any activity.
In the current times, over and above the chant of the Name of God as per one’s religion, SSRF recommends that everyone does at least 2 hours of chanting of the protection chant of ‘Sri Gurudev Datta’ for problems due to departed ancestors.
