Perhaps the best-known mandala-cum-plotting device in the Tantric universe is the Sri Cakra and Sri Yantra of Hindu Tantric practice, a perfectly balanced three-dimensional geometric diagram of a series of eleven interlocking and embedded triangles (also called Cakras) radiating downward and outward from a central point and enclosed by a circle and a square. The mandalas of Buddhist and Jain Tantric practice follow similar structural and dynamic principles.

The energy levels of the Tantric universe are generally represented as a set of concentric circles (cakras) of hypostasized forms of the divine energy which, in addition to appearing as an array of divine enlightened, perfected , demonic, human or animal beings, also manifest themselves on an acoustic level, as garlands or piled-up aggregates of phonemes (mantras), on a graphic level, as the written characters of the hieratic alphabets and as the hierarchized cakras of the yogi body.

Tantra is the [[w:Asia}Asian]] body of beliefs and practices which, working from the principle that the universe we experience is nothing other than the concrete manifestation of the divine energy of the godhead that creates and maintains that universe, seeks to ritually appropriate and channel that energy, within the human microcosm in creative and emancipatory ways.

The Tantrik approach to self-realization is different from the Vedic approach. The former looks upon the Goddess as Shakti, energy, to be experienced while the latter looks upon the Goddess as Maya, delusion, to be transcended. The former is more sensory, the latter less so.

Tantra often runs into trouble in the West, because it utilizes transgression as the vehicle to transcend dualism in certain cases. To even begin to understand tantra, however, we must bear in mind the cultural and philosophical context in which it exists. Tantra originated as a range of bodily technologies for perfecting the individual. Many of its practices, texts, beliefs and traditions are opposed to any normative order and serve as a form of counterculture in India. Its rejection of order takes the form even of sanctioning the deliberate violation of norms, particularly those centred on ritual purity. Over time, there occurred a healthy cross-fertilizing back and forth with Vedic and other traditions. Elements may have been borrowed from Vedic and other rituals, symbols and philosophies, and reformulated, systematized and integrated into the coherent corpus of what became known as the tantra tradition. These two poles of values and rituals coexist and mutually penetrate each other in complex ways.

In contrast with our own Christian upbringing which taught us a very small world, Tantra knows an infinite number of universes, themselves already as large as the modern physicists’ universe. All these together are the Mother, all universes are part of it, but the Mother is not just the physical dimension, She encompasses deeper, more subtle levels of reality as well. Navarātrī is the time to contemplate this.

The mantra vehicle is the most common name in Tibet for the path of meditation practice following the “Books of Kiu-te,” or the Tibetan Buddhist Tantras. This is also referred to as the quick path...

Transmission Meditation is really a combination of two yogas: Karma Yoga, the yoga of service, and Laya Yoga, the yoga of the chakras, the energies. This is the true yoga of the coming age. By taking part in Transmission Meditation, your evolution is propelled forward at an extraordinary rate, because of the potency of the spiritual energies sent through the chakras. The energies galvanize and activate the chakras as they pass through them. The Masters register the point in evolution of any individual by looking at the state of the chakras.

To take part in Transmission Meditation, you only have to hold your attention at the ajna centre. In practice you will find that the attention will not stay there. It will keep dropping to its usual level somewhere around the solar plexus. As soon as the attention drops and you become aware of that, you have to bring it back to the ajna centre. This is done by thinking, inwardly, the mantram OM. As soon as you think OM, you find that your attention automatically comes back to the ajna centre. While your attention is held at the ajna centre, a connection, or alignment, is formed between the physical brain and the soul. The energies do not come from your soul. They come from the Masters, from the Kingdom of Souls. But they proceed from the soul level. While the alignment between the physical brain and the soul is kept, you are in the Transmission. As soon as your attention drops from the ajna centre, you are no longer taking part. As you think OM, the attention rises again, you are aligned. The process is one of being aligned, for a moment not aligned, and then, once again, aligned, back and forth.

But now that the Christian influence has diminished in India, the old tantric cult is coming back openly on the surface. There are around fifty-two known centers in India where tantra is taught and practiced. In its crudest forms, it includes worship of sex organs, sex orgies which include drinking of blood and human semen, black magic, human sacrifice and contact with evil spirits through dead and rotting bodies in cremation grounds, etc.

Handle even a single leaf of a green in such a way that it manifests the body of the Buddha. This in turn allows the Buddha to manifests through the leaf. This is a power which you cannot grasp with your rational mind. It operates freely, according to the situation, in a most natural way.

To practice tantra requires even greater compassion and greater intelligence than are required on the sutra path; thus, though many persons in the degenerate era are interested in tantra, tantra is not for degenerate persons. Tantra is limited to persons whose compassion is so great that they cannot bear to spend unnecessary time in attaining Buddhahood, as they want to be a supreme source of help and happiness for others quickly.

Meditation is a microcosm, a model, a mirror. The skills we practice when we sit are transferable to the rest of our lives.

Tantra emerged out of South Asian elite and popular mainstream some time in the middle of the first millennium C.E.