My guru once called me: "Sit down." And I was struck by the way he himself sat: effortlessly he shifted his legs, as if a flower had opened, and settled into the lotus posture — one hand in jñāna-mudrā (the sign that you're chanting the mantra), the other on the beads — and instantly went entirely within, into consciousness of the Name. Oh, I thought — so this is how japa is chanted. I've spent years learning to bring that same composure into my own practice.