My Saviour Mantram..

I had been an atheist till my 12th standard. But somehow, I had gone to temples to pray for my 12th results. I could hear an inner voice whenever I used to visit the temples. Then thru my college days, I did not visit temples often. In the 7th semester of my BE, we had campus interviews. All of us were very keen to get into any one of the big IT firms. After my disastrous interviews with INFY and WIPRO, I was devastated. I can still remember how time literally came to a standstill. That’s when my dad told me how he used to visit a temple (Shivili Maharaja Siva temple) at his native place, Tharuvai and he asked me to pray to lord. My interview with TCS clicked for me and from that moment my devotion towards god increased. I visited that temple and me and dad performed pujaas.

Though I would go to temple once in a while, I never used to pray at home. But that changed after a big incident. I had been preparing for my GMAT for quite sometime. But I was not getting the desired scores in my practice tests. The situation at my workplace also was not very rosy and also I had big-time health problems. Facing such a big strain and pressure from all ends, I was mentally and physically exhausted and I got affected with viral fever. At this point of time, an uncle who resided above my home provided me with homeopathy medicines and also told me a story which changed my life completely.

I had my upanayanam (thread ceremony) when I was studying my 10th std. But I did not comply with the rituals associated with that. One of the important part of the ritual is the recitation of Gayathri Mantram for 108 times. Now this was the same thing that the Homeopathy doc uncle had told me lot of time before. I actually never took it seriously. But that day when I was sick he told me a story about this gayathri mantram.

"Long time ago, during Akbar’s rule, Akbar and Birbal would go around the city secretly at night to check the needs of their people and stuff. Now they noticed a beggar who approached them for alms saying that he had not eaten for 2 days. Akbar spoke to the beggar, enquired about him and gave him alms. On the way back to the palace Akbar taunted birbal by saying that the beggar was a Brahmin and that muslim people don’t beg for alms. Birbal didn’t reply to this. The next day he called for the beggar and told him that he would give him 25 paise if he would recite "Gayathri Mantram" 10 times. The beggar was overjoyed and promised that he would start reciting the mantram. Slowly the Brahmin noticed lots of changes in his life. He started getting food and alms without asking. After a month birbal called the Brahmin and asked him to recite the mantram and that he would pay him 50 paise for it. The Brahmin accepted the offer and started praying big-time. Now it happened that people who came and told the Brahmin their problems had their problems solved. Birbal had called the Brahmin again and asked him to recite the mantram for 1008 times and told him he would give him 1 rupee for that. The Brahmin told birbal that he would recite the mantram and he would not need any money for that. Soon the Brahmin kept on reciting 1008 times Gayathri Mantram and Goddess Gayathri gave him darshan and he became a saint. Whoever told the problems to the saint, their problems vanished and so the Saint’s popularity grew and Akbar got to hear about this saint. Akbar decided to meet the saint and he along with Birbal went to seek the Saint’s blessings. The Brahmin and Akbar had a discussion and Akbar sought his blessings. On the way back he asked Birbal on how they missed having the darshan of this saint before. Birbal asked Akbar whether he had seen the Brahmin saint before in his life. Now Akbar was very confused and said no. Birbal then replied saying this is the same person who once sought alms from them and the power of Gayathri Mantram had changed him. Hearing this Akbar was very astonished."

When the uncle told me this story, for the first time I kinda quite believed it. I started reciting Gayathri Mantram daily and it had an immediate effect. I could see my scores in my GMAT prep test increase, my health and my office problems lessen. I started reciting 1008 times the Gayathri Mantram everyday before my exam and this directly reflected in my exam where I got 710. The most interesting part of this is that I had expected only in the range of 610-620(my friend Vikram would know about this for sure ;) ) and that I have had heard many people getting higher scores in preparatory tests and low scores comparatively in the real tests. But I guess for me it came the other way round.

The Gayathri Mantram:
"Om Bhur Bhuva Suvah
Tathsavithur Varenyam
Bhargo Devasya Dhimahi
Dhiyo Yo Naha Prachodayat"

U can also view this site : "http://thillasthanamsabha.freehosting.net/Gayathrijapam.htm"