mantra

American  

[man-truh, mahn-, muhn-] / ˈmæn trə, ˈmɑn-, ˈmʌn- /

Or mantram

noun

1. Hinduism. a word or formula, as from the Veda, chanted or sung as an incantation or prayer.

2. an often repeated word, formula, or phrase, often a truism.

   If I hear the “less is more” mantra one more time, I'll scream.

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mantra British  

/ ˈmʌn-, ˈmæntrə /

noun

1. Hinduism any of those parts of the Vedic literature which consist of the metrical psalms of praise

2. Hinduism Buddhism any sacred word or syllable used as an object of concentration and embodying some aspect of spiritual power

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Other Word Forms

• mantric adjective

Etymology

Origin of mantra

Borrowed into English from Sanskrit around 1800–10

Example Sentences

Dominick Perrotta, an insurance adjuster who cared for his dying mom, repeated this mantra every time a negative thought popped into his head: “This is not helpful.”

From The Wall Street Journal

"That's the way we play," is a mantra of this England team and it is one of their failings.

From BBC

Maybe the "us against the world" mantra is something that can drive the team on towards the heights that they have so far been unable to get to.

From BBC

And then on a personal level, I call my book radical self-help for trying to free ourselves of the self-blame, and seeing ourselves differently and doing our mantra of attribution.

From Salon

Owning not one, but many guns, is their mantra, to protect themselves — in some hypothetical universe — from what happened to the Branch Davidians at Waco.

From Salon

Related Words

• hymn
• melody
• shout
• singing
• tune