Today is Maharishi Valmiki Jayanti Before Ramayana was written, Maharishi Valmiki saw something which disturbed him deeply. He was near the Tamasa river with his disciple Bharadvaja when a hunter killed one of two Krauncha birds. The female bird cried for her companion and Maharishi Valmiki was so disturbed that he cursed the hunter. His words came out in the form of a shloka. Later, when he returned to his ashram, Bhagwan Brahma appeared before him. Now see what the Ramayana says. तद्गतेनैव मनसा वाल्मीकिर्ध्यानमास्थितः Even with Brahma sitting before him, the Maharishi was still thinking about that bird Brahma then smiled and told him that the shloka had come through His will. He asked Maharishi Valmiki to compose the story of Shri Rama. Just think of this for a moment. Bhagwan Brahma himself was sitting before the Rishi, yet he could not forget the suffering of that little bird. I find this one of the most moving parts of how the Ramayana came to be written. His shoka became a shloka. Something painful entered the heart of a Rishi & did not remain only as pain. It became the Ramayana. If possible, read Bala Kanda, Sarga 2 today. Pranam to Adi Kavi Maharishi Valmiki 🙏 Jai Shri Ram 🚩

I have seen people using digital counters for mantra japa.. might be because it is easier. Of course it counts correctly, but then why did our tradition give us a mala if the point was only counting? For normal Naam smaran, you can chant without keeping a number. but once you take a fixed japa sankalpa, the number becomes part of what you have committed to complete. If the same mind has to chant and also keep calculating 71...72.. 73, the attention gets divided. With a mala, the fingers keep track as you finish each repetition. One mantra.. one bead. You can understand this through tattva also. Shabda is associated with akasha and sparsha with vayu. during mala japa, touch accompanies the repetition of the mantra. The fingers have a steady task while your attention stays with what you are chanting. Our tradition also gives Kara Japa, where the thumb keeps count on the joints of the fingers. Even this has a prescribed sequence, which can differ according to the mantra. So there are traditional ways of counting without a mala too. A finger counter also uses touch and saves you from mentally counting. The reason for choosing a mala goes further into how it is prepared and used in worship. Mahanirvana tantra asks the person doing japa to worship the mala before starting. It gives a prayer addressing the mala as a form of Shakti. The mala itself is included in the worship. In such traditions, the mala is understood to become sanctified through its preparation and continued japa. A personal japa mala is therefore kept clean, handled with maryada & not shared with others. Even the material is selected according to the mantra and devata. Rudraksha, Tulsi, Sphatika, Chandan.. different traditions prescribe different materials and it also asks you to keep separate malas for different Devatas. So when you are given a mantra with a particular mala and method, keep that instruction in mind before replacing it with a counter..... just because both can record the same number.