Transcendental meditation: Encyclopedia - Transcendental meditation

Transcendental meditation

The Transcendental Meditation technique, or TM, is a form of meditation that originates from the Vedic tradition of masters that includes Guru Dev and the venerated Shankara, a part of the long history of India. It was introduced by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a disciple of Guru Dev, fifty years ago. It has become a worldwide movement, with more than five million people having learned the technique. The TM organization has founded an accredited university Maharishi International University, and at one point even had a political party, the Natural Law Party. It has received support from public schools [1][2] [3], governmental institutions such as the National Institute of Health (NIH) [4][5] and scientific research. In the last couple of years alone, there have been published scientific studies in peer-reviewed journals such as The American Journal of Cardiology ([6]) - this study was funded by the US government, The American Journal of Hypertension ([7]) and The Journal of Offender Rehabilitation ([8]).

Transcendental meditation - History

In 1957, at the end of a big "festival of spiritual luminaries" in remembrance of the previous Shankaracharya of the North, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati, his disciple Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (or simply "Maharishi") inaugurated a "movement to spiritually regenerate the world". That was the formal beginning of the spread of TM throughout the world.

In the movement's initial stages, Maharishi emphasised the religious aspects of TM and operated under the auspices of an organization he called the Spiritual Regeneration Movement. However, the requirements of the West made him adopt a more secular approach in the 1970s. He focused on western science both to show theoretical parallels with his thinking and practical verification of the results of TM. The main emphasis was on relaxation, relief from stress, and improved personal effectiveness.

In the early 1970s, Maharishi launched his "World Plan" to establish a TM teaching center for each million of the world's population, which at that time would have meant 3,600 TM centers throughout the world. The centers established in many cities flourished for a time, but not all are operational now. Today, there are TM centers and facilities in many countries of the world, and over five million people have learned the technique, though not all continue to practice it. Since 1990, Maharishi co-ordinates his global activities from his headquarters in the town of Vlodrop in the municipality of Roerdalen in Holland.

Transcendental meditation - Effects of TM

Studies [9] indicate that regular practice of TM leads to significant, cumulative benefits in the areas of mind (Travis, Arenander & DuBois 2004), body (Barnes, Treiber & Davis 2001), behavior (Barnes, Bauza & Treiber 2003) and environment (Hagelin et al. 1999). Other studies suggest that TM has possible negative side effects, but in accordance with a review of more than 75 studies "none of the studies reviewed tried to disentangle the effects of meditation per se from the influence of the presenting problem or/and premorbid personality of the subjects."

Various top level institutions are interested in the documented effects of TM:

There's "very strong evidence from this and other studies that meditation has health-promoting effects," says Prevention advisor John Astin, PhD, assistant professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore. And benefits could extend to all ethnic groups." [10]

Transcendental meditation - Procedures and theory

TM is practiced for fifteen to twenty minutes twice daily while sitting comfortably with the eyes closed. In essence, the TM technique comprises the silent mental repetition of a simple sound known as a mantra, allowing the repetition to spontaneously become quieter and quieter, until it disappears and one is left conscious, but without thoughts. This is the goal of the inward stroke of meditation and is called pure consciousness (in Sanskrit: turiya or samadhi similar to Abraham Maslow's concept of peak experience). Alongside the settling down of mental activity, the body also settles to a state of deep rest, and this allows for the release of deep-seated stresses from the system. The release of stress is a bodily activity, and this increase in bodily activity results in corresponding activity on the level of the mind, i.e., thoughts return to the mind. This is the outward stroke of meditation. After the purification has finished, the inward stroke starts again. This whole cycle is repeated many times during each sitting of meditation.

The TM organization emphasizes in its teaching that the procedure for using the mantra is very important: it must be natural, easy and effortless, and can only be learned from a trained teacher of TM.

Transcendental meditation - Pure consciousness

According to the teaching of TM, the daily practice helps enliven in the meditator's life the field of "pure consciousness" or "pure intelligence", a field of "pure knowingness" that is expressed in the different objects of knowledge. In this world view, all thoughts and actions and the entire universe are expressions of the field of pure knowingness. Every experience that the individual has is an experience in this field, but usually not in its pure form. Transcendental meditation settles the mind so that the field of pure knowingness becomes a living reality for the individual. Since the field of pure consciousness is allegedly only progressive and supportive of the good, people enlivening this field in their life through regular practice of TM should spontaneously (without the need of any intuitive or non-intuitive intellectual understanding) more readily behave well. The TM theory is that the field of creative intellegence is life enhancing, and that by connecting to it, people spontatously act in harmony with it.

Transcendental meditation - Stress

In Hans Selye's definition, stress is a neutral concept, simply meaning "load". He distinguishes eustress and distress, roughly meaning "challenge" and "overload". According to Selye, the physical changes experienced during TM are the opposite of the body's reaction to stress. (In common usage, the word stress has taken on a meaning close to Selye's distress.)

In TM parlance, stress is defined as "structural or material impurities resulting from overload on the physiology", which includes both body and mind. The assumption is that it is possible to purify the physiology completely and that this should be the goal of human life, equal to gaining enlightenment. (Compare with psychologist Abraham Maslow's self-actualization.)

Transcendental meditation - Mantra

According to the TM organization the mantra is a meaningless sound specifically chosen and communicated to the meditator at the time of initiation, to have a soothing effect upon the individual's nervous system. The TM organization encourages practitioners to keep their mantra private and never to repeat it aloud, since it allegedly has the effect of moving the attention inward toward more 'refined' levels of the mind.

Transcendental meditation - TM and religion

With regard to religion, Maharishi states that:

• Religion and meditation are both necessary -- "One without the other will not survive."
• Everyone should follow their own religion.
• At its beginning, every religion included transcendental meditation.
• Now that religions have forgotten the technique, they are "like bodies from which the soul has departed".

Despite the fact that different practitioners of TM practice many of the world's different religions, and religious practitioners are encouraged by Maharishi to continue with their own religion, there is some controversy as to whether TM is a religion. Those who say it is a religion point to the puja, a Hindu ceremony that everyone who learns TM must go through, its reference and use of Hindu scriptures, terms, use of the Hindu Astrology, use of Yagya Hindu fire ceremonies and that the TM organization celebrates Hindu holidays. Those who practice the TM-Sidhi program are encouraged, as part of their daily practice, to listen to recorded excerpts from the ninth and tenth mandalas of the Rig Veda in which the names of Vedic-Hindu deities are recited. Maharishi has published his own translation and commentary on the Bhagavad-Gita (Penguin: 1990), one of the primary texts of the Hindu religious tradition, and passages from his version of the Gita are often used in TM advanced lectures and in the teaching of the Sanskrit language in TM centers.

For the TM organization, with regard to religions, the important point is that TM works independently of the beliefs of the practitioners, relying on natural tendencies of the mind. It emphasizes that the natural brain or mental mechanisms used in TM can be studied with scientific methods. The TM organization explains in its introductory lectures that TM comes from an oral tradition of Vedic masters such as the Guru Dev and Shankara, the great reviver of Vedic Sanatana Dharma, a part of the long history of India. Such masters in different areas produced a vast literature, including the Vedas and treatises such as Ayur Veda in health. Although it is considered a Hindu text, Maharishi calls the Bhagavad-Gita the essence of Vedic Literature and a complete guide to practical life. The TM organization considers that the core of Hinduism, the wisdom of the Vedic Tradition, provides and illustrates technologies of consciousness that are in essence practical, verifiable and not based on religious beliefs.

In reference to gods, Maharishi Maheshi Yogi in an older piece of TM literature (Beacon Light of the Himalyas, 1955, page 65) says that the mantras are mantras of Gods: "For our practice we select only the suitable mantras of personal Gods. Such mantras fetch to us the grace of personal Gods and make us happier in every walk of life." In the early days of the TM movement, Maharishi also published the lengthy devotional poem Love and God. Within the TM teaching, the mantras are meaningless sounds that animate some specific collection of laws or intelligent mechanisms, which depending on the context are sometimes called gods or personal gods. In the TM teaching, the laws of nature (or gods) control all aspects of life, including its most tender and personal aspects. This is also true in modern science, but this notion of tender and personal aspects of life is perhaps less discussed. The controversy may come from the fact a religious term is used to identify a concept, namely the laws of nature, that is usually not considered religious.

Despite the fact that the U.S. District Court ruled that TM was too religious to be taught in public schools (Malnak v. Yogi, D.C. Civil Action No. 76-0341, TM is now being taught in Public schools in the US with positive results [11]

Transcendental meditation - Criticisms and controversies

Criticisms and controversies can be divided in seven broad categories: whether the TM Program is a religion, possible negative side effects, challenges to the validty of TM research, whether or not the TM-Sidhi program and the Maharishi effect actually work, political activities, sexism within the TM organization, and coercive methods.

Transcendental meditation - Possible negative side effects

Critics of TM refer to a paper that reviews 75 studies on various meditation techniques (of which TM was a small part of this eclectic mix of techniques) [12]). In this report, they present excerpts of the paper to support their claim that TM has harmful effects, even though the paper is not specifically about TM. However, they did not report an important alternative explanation for these effects that is mentioned in this review: "None of the studies reviewed tried to disentangle the effects of meditation per se from the influence of the presenting problem or/and premorbid personality of the subjects."

Leon Otis, a staff scientist at the Stanford Research Institute, testified that after surveying hundreds of meditators, he concluded that "TM may be hazardous to the mental health of a sizable proportion of the people who take up TM." However, his conclusion was in fact an explanatory conclusion or explanation, not a logical conclusion. The main observation which brought him to this explanatory conclusion was that those who practiced TM for a long period disclosed more adverse side effects than the dropouts and the new meditators. A key point that is not mentioned by critics of TM is that, as an alternative explanation for this same obvervation, Dr. Otis mentions the following: "... dropouts and those who continue the practice of TM may differ in some fundamental way(s) prior to learning TM. [...] The latter appeared to have more problems before starting TM than the former." His study even presented evidence to support this explanation. To further support this alternative explanation, Dr. Otis mentions other studies that indicate that the probability of occurrence of these so called adverse effects is higher among psychiatric populations. It is interesting to note that the alternative explanation, which put the blame on prior conditions and other factors in the survey, appears more supported by direct evidence than Dr. Otis proposed explanatory conclusion, which blamed TM per se. This corroborates the alternative explanation that is proposed in general in the review paper that is mentioned above. This alternative explanation of Dr. Otis does not blame TM per se. Instead, this alternative explanation says that the mechanisms of TM, which have been shown to have positive effects in the same study, get intricated with prior conditions. With regard to the possibility that these side effects are only purifying mechanisms, Dr Otis only say that these purifying mechanisms must have lasted for the duration of the entire study. Depending on the prior conditions, this is not so surprising. It is also interesting to note that when critics of TM have reported this study as an evidence of their claim that TM has harmful effects (see second paper reported in [13]), they did not mention the alternative explanation.

In a study conducted by a German Governmental department, called "the Various Implications Arising From The Practice of Transcendental Meditation," 76% of the participants developed adverse mental side-effects including: depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation. 25% experienced a nervous breakdowns and 20% experienced suicidial feelings. Only 9% of the these participants had received theraputic care previous to this study. There conclusion was: "Psychological illness already present before the TM phase worsened considerably. TM can cause mental illness or at the very least prepare the way for the onset of mental illness." [14]. It should be noted that this study was not published.

Transcendental meditation - TM-Sidhi Program and Maharishi Effect

In the late 1970s the claims for the TM technique and the associated advanced TM-Sidhi Program became more radical and increasingly targeted at existing adherents. Propounded benefits include a measurable decreased crime rate in cities with 1% of the population practising TM, or the square root of that number practising the TM-Sidhis program (this phenomenon being called "the Maharishi Effect"), and extraordinary powers (Siddhi being sanskrit for "suppernatural power") including metaphysical levitation. Despite early released photographs which seemed to show people levitating, as of yet, there has not been a documented case of any TM meditators achieving levitation.

James Randi, noted skeptic and critic of paranormal claims, investigated the claims of Dr. Rabinoff, a MIU professor and TM researcher on the Maharishi effect which claimed that a large gathering of TM meditators had reduced crime and accidents, and increased crop production in the vicinity of Maharishi International University in Fairfield, Iowa. After speaking with the Fairfield Police Department, the Iowa Department of Agriculture, and Iowa Department of Motor Vehicles, Randi said that there was no evidence to support these claims (Randi 1982).

Transcendental meditation - Publications on Maharishi's technologies

In 1991, an article on the benefit of Maharishi Ayur Veda was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). This immediatly triggered a strong reaction from a science and medical journalist, Andrew A. Skolnick [[15]], and an expose of the TM article on issues such as "Failure to Disclose Connections" and "Ran Marketing Company" was published in JAMA [[16]]. The author/journalist wrote "An investigation of the movement's marketing practices reveals what appears to be a widespread pattern of misinformation, deception, and manipulation of lay and scientific news media. This campaign appears to be aimed at earning at least the look of scientific respectability for the TM movement, as well as at making profits from sales of the many products and services that carry the Maharishi's name." It should be pointed out that the scientific validity of the study per se was never contested, and JAMA still continues to publish papers on the benefits of Maharishi's products and technologies, especially TM. In addition media articles on scientific published research on TM appears in medical journals to this day: The American Journal of Cardiology ( [17] )-[this study was funded by the US government]; The American Journal of Hypertension ( [18] ); The Journal of Offender Rehabilitation ( [19] ).

Transcendental meditation - Political activities of the TM organization

The TM organization founded the Natural Law Party in 1992 in support of candidates for public office dedicated to promoting TM and Maharishi's far-reaching political goals at all levels of society in the field of action. The Party ran Dr. John Hagelin, former physics professor at Maharishi University of Management, for president of the United States in the 1992, 1994, and 2000 elections. The Natural Law Party did not run a candidate in the 2004 presidential election and the NLP is no longer a registered party in the UK. Following repeated NLP failures at the polls, Maharishi unilaterally inaugurated his own Global Country of World Peace and crowned Dr. Tony Nader as Raja (Vedic king) of the new government, which is devoted to achieving Maharishi's goals, including the practice of TM in the public schools and the demolition and reconstruction of all public and private structures throughout the world along Vedic principles.

Transcendental meditation - Sexism and the TM organization

According to historian Stanley Wolpert (A New History of India, sixth edition, Oxford University Press: 2000), ancient Vedic society was undeniably patriarchal, and this characteristic is reflected in the present structure of the TM organization. Although women are not barred from becoming teachers of TM, they are rarely seen in positions of political leadership, especially at the highest and most visible level of the organization. Evidence of discrimination against women can be seen in the failure to include women as ministers when Maharishi proclaimed his Global Country of World Peace (all of the 40 appointed ministers were men) and in the failure to include female spokespersons in the discussions that accompany Maharishi’s weekly televised press conferences.

This is because Maharishi has outlined three acceptable “paths” for women in society: 1) marriage and motherhood, 2) monastic celibacy (in his “Mother Divine” program), and 3) engagement in a life-supporting profession or occupation that does not strain the allegedly delicate nervous system of female physiology. Also, in live and televised presentations sponsored by the TM organization, females are patronizingly referred to as “ladies” (not “women”) while men are called “men” (not “gentlemen”). TM apologists point out that even married women are called ladies, but fail to appreciate that gender bias is inherent in the organization’s failure to apply the corresponding term “gentlemen” to males. Over the years, the TM organization has implemented a deliberate policy of segregating the sexes in its parochial schools, course facilities, assemblies, etc., and in doing so, has placed itself outside the mainstream of American life.

Transcendental meditation - Coercive methods

In his televised press conference of November 16, 2005, Maharishi personally announced that it might not be worth speaking to those among his “workers” (TM teachers and administrators) who do not move into dwellings constructed according to Vedically-correct principles. Many individuals would have been affected by this decision were it to be followed through, but as yet has not been, are followers who have devoted 30-40 years of their lives to his cause, at very low pay and consequently some are so poor that they cannot even afford adequate medical and dental care, let alone the high cost of a house built to Vedic standards. Yet, if they wish to remain within the organization, they are being forced to do business with companies owned and operated by the TM organization.

Transcendental meditation - Notable practitioners

• Richard Branson, British Entrepreneur, Virgin records, Virgin airways, First Private space vehicle, balloonist adventurer
• Clint Eastwood, actor
• Hugh Jackman, actor
• Beach Boys, musicians
• The Beatles, musicians
• Stevie Wonder, musician
• Céline Dion, singer
• Donovan, musician
• Mia Farrow, actress
• Heather Graham, actress
• Doug Henning, magician
• John Hagelin, physicist, presidential candidate and HiFi designer
• William Hague, former leader of U.K. Conservative Party
• Andy Kaufman, comedian
• David Lynch, film director
• Christopher Reeve, actor
• Howard Stern, radio personality
• Itzhak Bentov, inventor, kundalini researcher, author

Some of these individuals have died or are no longer practicing TM.

Transcendental meditation - Reference

• [1] The Transcendental Meditation Program official website
• [2] Transcendental Meditation compared to other mantra techniques
• [3] Selected Studies on Transcendental Meditation

• Barnes, Vernon A., Bauza & Treiber, Frank A. (2003), "Impact of stress reduction on negative school behavior in adolescents", Health and Quality of Life Outcomes, vol. 1, no. 10

• Barnes, Vernon A., Treiber, Frank A. & Davis, Harry (2001), "Impact of Transcendental Meditation1 on cardiovascular function at rest and during acute stress in adolescents with high normal blood pressure", Journal of Psychosomatic Research, vol. 51, no. 4, p. 597-605

• Hagelin, John S., Rainforth, Maxwell V. & Orme-Johnson, David W., et al. (1999), "Effects of Group Practice of the Transcendental Meditation Program on Preventing Violent Crime in Washington, D.C.: Results of the National Demonstration Project, June--July 1993", Social Indicators Research, vol. 47, no. 2, p. 153-201

• MacLean, Christopher R. K., Walton, Kenneth G. & Wenneberg, Stig R., et al. (1997), "Effects of the Trancendentale Meditation program on adaptive mechanism: changes in hormone levels and responses to stress after 4 months of practice", Psychoneuroendocrinology, vol. 22, no. 4, p. 227-295

• Rabinoff, Robert A., Dillbeck, Michael C. & Deissler, Robert (1981), "Effect of coherent collective consciousness on the weather", Scientific Research On Maharishi's Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi Programme - Collected Papers, vol. 4, paper 324, p. 2564-2565

• Randi, James (1982), "chapter 5, "The Giggling Guru: A Matter of Levity"" in Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions; [introduction by Isaac Asimov], Prometheus Books, Buffalo, New York, ISBN 0-87975-198-3

• Travis, Frederick, Arenander, Alarik & DuBois, David (2004), "Psychological and physiological characteristics of a proposed object-referral/self-referral continuum of self-awareness", Consciousness and Cognition, vol. 13, p. 401-420

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Transcendental meditation", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki