The key element in practicing mantra in a tantric manner is to establish a personal relationship with its power. This takes place only after intense practices resulting in the tantric adepts having a direct, intuitive experience of the ishta deva, the personified form of the mantra they are practicing. This form is the actual materialization of the mantric energy, not a product of imagination. The ancients literally saw the personified form of the mantra, just as we see tangible objects in our daily life, and when they described the physical counterpart of the mantric energy in minute detail,
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