A mantra is a word or a sound that is silently repeated during meditation.
When you meditate on a repeated mantra, you are not thinking about the mantra 20 iterations ago. Each iteration of the mantra is the one existent. When the current one is complete, your mind is only on the next present iteration of the mantra. In life, you can tolerate anything because, like every time you think a mantra, everything passes, everything is temporary.
Whatever is happening on your in-breath is over on your out-breath: that comment, that gesture, that moment. And it can be that way for that feeling as well.
Suggested practice:
Choose a mantra (a word that represents a concept you want to explore, a sound given to you by a meditation teacher, or the universal mantra Om) and meditate. Notice that each time you think the mantra, it is only that single repetition you are focused on.
