A nine-minute video, a steel instrument played by hand, and a single phrase repeated 108 times: that is the whole frame of this recording. Posted in January 2020 under the title "Lakshmi Mantra 108 Bhakti HandPan," it pairs the handpan of Masood Ali Khan with the Sanskrit mantra Om Shrim Maha Lakshmyai Svaha, a chant addressed to Lakshmi, the goddess associated with abundance and prosperity. The material offers no transcript and no spoken commentary, so what follows is not a record of what is said on the track. It is an account of what the video declares about itself, what the mantra means, and why a counted, instrumental repetition of this kind asks something different of a listener than a song does.
The video's own description states its intention plainly: "Practice 108x the mantra of Lakshmi for Abundance & Prosperity." The mantra itself is short, and it helps to take it apart before sitting with it.
- Om is the opening syllable that appears at the start of countless Sanskrit chants. It is traditionally read as a sound that gathers the whole of the utterance into one note.
- Shrim is a bija, or seed syllable. Seed syllables are short sounds with no literal dictionary meaning in ordinary speech; in this tradition, Shrim is associated with Lakshmi specifically.
- Maha Lakshmyai means, roughly, "to the great Lakshmi." This is the address: the chant is directed toward the goddess rather than merely about her.
- Svaha is a closing word of offering, spoken to finish an invocation, the way one sets something down at an altar.
Read this way, the mantra is less a request with a fixed outcome than an addressed act: a sound directed toward a particular deity, ending in an offering. The video's framing of abundance and prosperity sits inside that structure. It names a desire, but the grammar of the phrase keeps the practitioner in the role of one who gives something back.
The number is the spine of the piece. In many devotional traditions, 108 is the standard length of a mala, the string of prayer beads used to keep count while chanting. Repeating a mantra 108 times is therefore not an arbitrary length; it is a complete circuit of the beads, a fixed amount of attention that begins and ends in the same place.
That structure does practical work for anyone who has tried to sustain a chant. Without a count, a repetition can drift: the mind wanders, the phrase loosens into habit, and the sound becomes background. A fixed number gives the practice edges. You know roughly where you are, and you know where you are going. The 108-count version of this mantra asks the listener, or the practitioner, to hold the same small phrase across a long enough span that its meaning has time to change shape.
"Practice 108x the mantra of Lakshmi for Abundance & Prosperity."
— Video description, Masood Ali Khan, published January 11, 2020
The handpan is an unusual vehicle for devotional repetition, and its character is worth taking seriously. It is a steel instrument, played with the hands, that produces tones which bloom and then settle rather than cutting off sharply. That decay matters. When a phrase is struck and allowed to ring, each repetition leaves a trace that the next one meets, so the sequence of 108 becomes a continuous field rather than 108 separate events.
For a listener, this changes the work. A chanted mantra depends on a voice and its breath; the instrumental version pushes attention onto timbre, spacing, and the gaps between strikes. Those gaps are where a practice like this lives. Between one repetition and the next there is silence the length of a breath, and the listener is invited to notice what happens in that silence rather than rushing toward the next syllable.
The video's credits list the handpan as the sole musical voice, credited to Masood Ali Khan, with camera work by Donaes Plattel, artwork by Roise Santos, and mixing by Oliwa. Sianna Sherman is named alongside Khan in the description. The material does not specify her role on the recording, so this account does not assign one.
Nothing in the material prescribes a method, so the following is practical guidance rather than the creator's instruction. The most useful approach is to treat the recording as a container for a counted sit rather than background music.
- Set the intention first. The stated purpose is abundance and prosperity. Name it briefly, or leave it open, but decide before the first strike so the practice has a direction.
- Keep a count if you can. A mala is the traditional tool. Moving one bead per repetition turns the listening into a physical discipline and keeps the 108 honest.
- Say the mantra silently with the music. Holding the words inside the handpan's tones links the sound to its meaning, which is the strand the four syllables above are meant to strengthen.
- Stay with the gaps. The space between strikes is part of the composition. Notice when the mind leaps ahead to the next repetition and return to the one in front of you.
- Finish with the offering. Svaha closes the phrase. Ending the session with a moment of stillness mirrors that closing gesture.
This video is a small object, and it should be described as one. It was published on January 11, 2020, and at the time of the material it had 7,808 views. It is not a documented landmark in the history of handpan music or of Lakshmi devotion; it is a specific, careful offering: one mantra, one number, one instrument. Its significance lies in how cleanly it fuses a traditional count with a modern instrument whose sound is built for sustained attention.
The description also directs listeners to two places: the track's availability for direct purchase through the creator's own site, masoodalikhan.com, and a yoga teaching presence at siannasherman.com, associated with Rasa Yoga Collective. Those are the creators' own channels, and a reader who wants to go further can follow them directly.
Start with the mantra itself. Say Om Shrim Maha Lakshmyai Svaha aloud a few times, slowly, and notice the four parts. Then find a mala, or any string of 108 small objects, and sit with the recording for its full length. If the count feels mechanical at first, let it. The repetition is the teaching, and the handpan's ringing tones give each pass somewhere to land. Listen first, then return to the words. Over time, the phrase tends to hold more than it did on the first pass.
