Selecting a mala
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Selecting a mala
How does one select a good mala? I'm just worried about the thing not falling apart.
Re: Selecting a mala
Is there something particularly bad about a mala breaking?avatamsaka3 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 25, 2021 11:48 pm How does one select a good mala? I'm just worried about the thing not falling apart.
Side story: I had a teacher whose mala broke mid zoom stream.
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Re: Selecting a mala
A wrist mala I wore made of lapis lazuli snagged on something at a Dollar Tree store and beads went all over the place. I couldn't find most of them. It lasted several years. I had a Rudraksha bead mala, too, and it also eventually snapped. I think you can be sure that, given enough time, if you use your mala it will break. Then you get another.
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Re: Selecting a mala
Yes, it will be annoying. And no more mantra repetitions on that one. I'm asking about testing the quality of the mala, not asking for something that will never break.Is there something particularly bad about a mala breaking?
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Re: Selecting a mala
You can often find good ones in a good Dharma center.
Re: Selecting a mala
Get the nicest one you can afford. It helps if you like your mala because you will use it more.
- PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Selecting a mala
I always heard that if a mala breaks during regular use, such as while saying mantras, this is a good sign. It shows that you’ve practiced so much, you have worn through the ‘material’ aspect.
I worked in a store for a few years selling semiprecious stone beads, and we also sold malas.
Many people like stone malas. Personally, I have always preferred some kind of wood beads. They seem less pretentious to me, more simple, and they are also lighter in weight. Stone also wears down the cord more than wood or seed malas do.
But sometimes a certain mala is appropriate for a particular practice. If Avalokiteshvara is your main practice, then you might go with crystal. For Medicine Buddha, perhaps lapis lazuli.
Avoid bone malas unless instructed by your teacher to use one for certain practices.
I worked in a store for a few years selling semiprecious stone beads, and we also sold malas.
Many people like stone malas. Personally, I have always preferred some kind of wood beads. They seem less pretentious to me, more simple, and they are also lighter in weight. Stone also wears down the cord more than wood or seed malas do.
But sometimes a certain mala is appropriate for a particular practice. If Avalokiteshvara is your main practice, then you might go with crystal. For Medicine Buddha, perhaps lapis lazuli.
Avoid bone malas unless instructed by your teacher to use one for certain practices.
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- KathyLauren
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Re: Selecting a mala
All things are impermanent, even mala threads!
It will break, sooner or later. You get some new thread, and a needle small enough to go through the holes in the beads, and you re-thread it.
Om mani padme hum
Kathy
It will break, sooner or later. You get some new thread, and a needle small enough to go through the holes in the beads, and you re-thread it.
Om mani padme hum
Kathy
Re: Selecting a mala
This is in itself a powerful meditation on patience. The guru bead's holes are a nightmare. Does anyone have any tips on how to actually thread them?KathyLauren wrote: ↑Mon Jul 26, 2021 3:26 pm All things are impermanent, even mala threads!
It will break, sooner or later. You get some new thread, and a needle small enough to go through the holes in the beads, and you re-thread it.
Om mani padme hum
Kathy
- KathyLauren
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Re: Selecting a mala
Yes, no doubt it is easier said then done. The only one I have re-threaded used a regular bead for the guru bead.
You can find everything on the Internet:
How to thread the guru bead 1
How to thread the guru bead 2
How to thread the guru bead 3
Om mani padme hum
Kathy
Re: Selecting a mala
I try to check my mala's string every now and then and when it starts to wear out I replace it before it breaks. Also, when your mala string breaks often, it is maybe because the drill-holes haven't been filed properly. You can buy special needle-shaped files to soothen the holes of the beads. I don't know how they're called, you can buy them in arts and crafts shops.
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- PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Selecting a mala
Think of hole in the guru bead as an upside down letter T.
┸
This bead has an end hole where both ends of the mala cord will eventually emerge, where a tassel might have attached. And there is a hole on the left and one on the right. The problem is getting your mala cord to make that sharp turn and go up through the end hole.
So, you need to send another string down there to fetch it.
Make a long loop of another thread, and use something really thin, like dental floss.
So, this loop then, is like a long letter U except you’ll need to twist it so it looks like a single thread, to go through the holes in the guru bead.
Push the bottom (closed end) of the U into the the end hole of the guru bead and use a needle to push it out through either the left or right hole, so just the loop, the ‘bottom of the U’ is sticking out of whichever hole you want you’d mala cord to enter.
Use that as a snare, to catch your mala cord:
Push one end of the mala cord through it. Through the loop in the floss. Then, use the floss, which is now holding the mala cord, to pull the mala cord up and out through the end hole.
If your mala cord is very thick, this may be challenging because for a brief time it will be doubled over as you pull it up through the guru bead. But keep trying.
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- String a guru bead
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EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
Re: Selecting a mala
Kathy and PadmaVonSambhava, thank you very much. I'd never thought of threading it like that and I was just jamming the thread hoping it would magically come out like an Orangutan or something!
Re: Selecting a mala
I meant of course to smooth the edges by filing the holes from the inside, hope that's better
"I struggled with some demons, They were middle class and tame..." L. Cohen