Dear instructors, I am a slanderer. I slander people on a daily basis, I have said horrible things to people and on a daily basis I slander. I even slander the person who is the I should least slander, and that is the person who in this physical world represents my Divine Mother. Recently my inner being has opened my eyes to this and has made me realize that this is why I am miserable, why my life is stuck and why I don't progress either physically or spiritually. I must control my speech, I must control my tongue which has kindled fires and defiled even my whole body. For me this has been very difficult and despite efforts I have changed very little. Therefore I know that to ultimately defeat evil speech I must eliminate the egos that have led me to evil speech day by day but in the meantime I must attain some control over my speech so that I can get to a position to even be able to meditate on those egos of speech. My questions for the instructors are for one is there a mantra to vocalize to help me resist the temptation of slander and also to be more aware of slander? And also when doing a fast of speech if you decide you are going to do a fast of speech and you are alone and concentrated on something and a word slips out does this ruin the entire practice or do you continue with the practice? Thank you.