Maharishi Vedic City, incorporated in Iowa on July 21, 2001 (no doubt at an auspicious time according to Hindu astrology) is marketing itself like any other tourist spot these days. Check out their slick website:
Maharishi Vedic City website
Showing posts with label Abraham. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Abraham. Show all posts
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Friday, August 17, 2007
Did TM End George Harrison's Marriage?
Pattie Boyd, first married to George Harrison of the Beatles and later to guitar legend Eric Clapton, has written a memoir which will be released on August 28. A sneak peek by Entertainment Weekly describes how her marriage to George went downhill after the Beatles spent time in Rishikesh , India with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
An Early Look at Pattie Boyd's Memoirs
An Early Look at Pattie Boyd's Memoirs
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Why was the KGB interested in TM and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi?
This interview with a defector from the KGB, the secret intelligence agency of the former Soviet Union, discusses the KGB's fascination with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The discussion about TM starts 10 minutes and 15 seconds into the interview and lasts about 5 minutes.
Interview with KGB Defector
Interview with KGB Defector
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s Big Lie, Part 1
Lying has been going on since humans first used language. However, only in modern times, aided by mass media, can someone tell a really big lie. What’s a big lie? It’s a lie that is so blatant, so outrageous, and so widespread that eventually, after the public keeps hearing it, they actually believe it to be true.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) program, first used the big lie when he came to the West in 1959 and began teaching TM to Westerners. The lie he began to tell was that the mantras used in the technique were “meaningless sounds.” This is still the position of the TM organization. Many TM practitioners continue to believe this. However, the truth is quite different.
The mantras are either names of Vedic/Hindu deities or sounds that are closely associated with these deities. The evidence regarding the true nature of the mantras can be found in Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s own writings. In 1955, prior to coming to the West, three of his lectures were included in a book published in India called Beacon Light of the Himalayas. In one of these lectures he states the following regarding the mantras:
“…we find that any sound can serve our purpose of training the mind to become sharp. But we do not select any sound like 'mike', flower, table, pen, wall etc. because such ordinary sounds can do nothing more than merely sharpening the mind; whereas there are some special sounds which have the additional efficacy of producing vibrations whose effects are found to be congenial to our way of life. This is the scientific reason why we do not select any word at random. 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.”
Those with a scientific inclination who are supporters of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and his teachings would argue that the origins of the technique are irrelevant. The technique clearly has positive, scientifically documented effects on the mind and body, and the technique works irrespective of one’s belief – the sounds themselves have a specific effect on the body’s neurophysiological functioning. Even if they do have meaning in India, a person practicing TM in the United States or elsewhere doesn’t have to know the meaning to get positive results from the practice. India just happens to be the place where the effects of these sounds were discovered.
This argument, however, falls flat when one considers that TM instruction requires being present at what is described by TM teachers as a “ceremony of gratitude” or puja, which is performed in Sanskrit “by the teacher, for the teacher.” If the mantras are supposed to have an effect that is universal and is not related to their Vedic/Hindu origins, then the sounds should have the same effect on neurophysiological functioning without the puja ceremony. However, the TM organization will not teach TM without the puja and will not allow research on TM to be conducted without a puja in order to test this hypothesis.
The puja specifically mentions several Vedic/Hindu deities and includes an elaborate sequence of offerings to a picture of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s deceased teacher, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati. One cannot learn TM without being present at the puja and one must bring fruit, flowers, and a piece of cloth to be used as offerings in the puja. Also, TM teachers gesture for initiates to bow down in front of the picture at the end of the puja. So the puja is more than a ceremony of gratitude and it is not just for the teacher.
Why is the TM organization so insistent on performing this decidedly non-scientific ceremony in an ancient language if TM is so scientific? Without the puja, the mantras actually are just meaningless sounds. From a Vedic/Hindu perspective, TM doesn’t work without the puja since its performance is necessary to “activate” the mantras. As a result of the puja, the mantras become enlivened and connect the TM practitioner to Vedic/Hindu deities in non-physical realms.
One can only conclude from this that TM is exactly what Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said it was back in 1955 – a method of invoking the blessings of Vedic/Hindu deities for the TM initiate.
Since the vast majority of Westerners do not believe in the existence of Vedic/Hindu deities inhabiting non-physical realms, it is easy for the TM organization to maintain the fiction that the mantras are scientific and not religious, and it is easy for people who meditate to dismiss the whole thing as a quaint ritual. But, if one considers Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s status as a Hindu monk who comes from a religious tradition that venerates these deities and seeks to obtain their blessings, then it is absolutely clear that he has been lying about the true nature of the technique for almost 50 years.
One can ascribe several motivations to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi for deciding to lie about the true nature of the mantras. If one ascribes noble motives, then it was because he recognized that he could not bring about a spiritual regeneration of the West by revealing the truth about the practice, since many, if not most Westerners would not be interested in meditating if they knew it was a form of Vedic/Hindu worship. A more cynical perspective would suggest that millions of dollars in revenues would have been lost if he had revealed the truth.
Regardless of motivation, one is compelled to ask a pivotal question. How many of the six million people that the TM organization claims have learned the technique would have still chosen to receive instruction if there had been full disclosure?
What if those about to learn the technique had been told that they would be learning an ancient method for invoking the blessings of Vedic/Hindu deities? What if they had been given a translation of the puja to which they were about to bring offerings? Despite the scientifically-verified benefits of TM, it is likely that a considerable percentage would have been uncomfortable enough with these Vedic/Hindu elements that they would have decided not to learn. The number who would have received instruction would have been considerably less than six million.
It is entirely reasonable to conclude that the success of the TM organization – its celebrity and professional endorsements, its international scope, its university, its scientific acceptability, its real estate holdings, its many business enterprises – could not have happened without Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s big lie.
What is especially fascinating about this particular lie is its longevity. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s big lie has prevailed for almost 50 years because it is an especially ingenious and insidious lie. It has lasted as long as it has because it relies upon the biases and limitations of the Western intellect. Westerners know little about Eastern spirituality and view reality primarily through the lens of science. It was easy for Maharishi Mahesh Yogi to make the case that the technique was “scientific” because, as mentioned earlier, there aren’t very many Westerners who believe in the existence of Vedic/Hindu deities, but there are a lot who believe in science.
In recent years the TM organization has been attempting to reintroduce TM into educational settings under the guise of “Consciousness-Based” education. Students are being sold on the scientific benefits of TM with no knowledge of its origins. Unsuspecting parents are granting permission for their children to receive instruction because their local educators, who are also ignorant of the origins of the practice, are endorsing TM.
The TM organization has always been eager to promote the scientific literature on TM, but it has not been forthcoming about the origins of the technique. Truth in marketing demands that when people express an interest in TM, they should not only receive information about the scientific research, but they should also receive information about the puja and the origins of the mantras. Then, and only then, can they make an informed decision about whether they want to learn. Teaching TM without providing the full story is much like selling investments without providing information about risk, or manufacturing food products without listing the ingredients.
The fact that the TM organization is promoting TM for education, while deliberately choosing not to educate those they instruct about what they are actually teaching them, would appear to be the biggest lie of all.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) program, first used the big lie when he came to the West in 1959 and began teaching TM to Westerners. The lie he began to tell was that the mantras used in the technique were “meaningless sounds.” This is still the position of the TM organization. Many TM practitioners continue to believe this. However, the truth is quite different.
The mantras are either names of Vedic/Hindu deities or sounds that are closely associated with these deities. The evidence regarding the true nature of the mantras can be found in Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s own writings. In 1955, prior to coming to the West, three of his lectures were included in a book published in India called Beacon Light of the Himalayas. In one of these lectures he states the following regarding the mantras:
“…we find that any sound can serve our purpose of training the mind to become sharp. But we do not select any sound like 'mike', flower, table, pen, wall etc. because such ordinary sounds can do nothing more than merely sharpening the mind; whereas there are some special sounds which have the additional efficacy of producing vibrations whose effects are found to be congenial to our way of life. This is the scientific reason why we do not select any word at random. 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.”
Those with a scientific inclination who are supporters of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and his teachings would argue that the origins of the technique are irrelevant. The technique clearly has positive, scientifically documented effects on the mind and body, and the technique works irrespective of one’s belief – the sounds themselves have a specific effect on the body’s neurophysiological functioning. Even if they do have meaning in India, a person practicing TM in the United States or elsewhere doesn’t have to know the meaning to get positive results from the practice. India just happens to be the place where the effects of these sounds were discovered.
This argument, however, falls flat when one considers that TM instruction requires being present at what is described by TM teachers as a “ceremony of gratitude” or puja, which is performed in Sanskrit “by the teacher, for the teacher.” If the mantras are supposed to have an effect that is universal and is not related to their Vedic/Hindu origins, then the sounds should have the same effect on neurophysiological functioning without the puja ceremony. However, the TM organization will not teach TM without the puja and will not allow research on TM to be conducted without a puja in order to test this hypothesis.
The puja specifically mentions several Vedic/Hindu deities and includes an elaborate sequence of offerings to a picture of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s deceased teacher, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati. One cannot learn TM without being present at the puja and one must bring fruit, flowers, and a piece of cloth to be used as offerings in the puja. Also, TM teachers gesture for initiates to bow down in front of the picture at the end of the puja. So the puja is more than a ceremony of gratitude and it is not just for the teacher.
Why is the TM organization so insistent on performing this decidedly non-scientific ceremony in an ancient language if TM is so scientific? Without the puja, the mantras actually are just meaningless sounds. From a Vedic/Hindu perspective, TM doesn’t work without the puja since its performance is necessary to “activate” the mantras. As a result of the puja, the mantras become enlivened and connect the TM practitioner to Vedic/Hindu deities in non-physical realms.
One can only conclude from this that TM is exactly what Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said it was back in 1955 – a method of invoking the blessings of Vedic/Hindu deities for the TM initiate.
Since the vast majority of Westerners do not believe in the existence of Vedic/Hindu deities inhabiting non-physical realms, it is easy for the TM organization to maintain the fiction that the mantras are scientific and not religious, and it is easy for people who meditate to dismiss the whole thing as a quaint ritual. But, if one considers Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s status as a Hindu monk who comes from a religious tradition that venerates these deities and seeks to obtain their blessings, then it is absolutely clear that he has been lying about the true nature of the technique for almost 50 years.
One can ascribe several motivations to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi for deciding to lie about the true nature of the mantras. If one ascribes noble motives, then it was because he recognized that he could not bring about a spiritual regeneration of the West by revealing the truth about the practice, since many, if not most Westerners would not be interested in meditating if they knew it was a form of Vedic/Hindu worship. A more cynical perspective would suggest that millions of dollars in revenues would have been lost if he had revealed the truth.
Regardless of motivation, one is compelled to ask a pivotal question. How many of the six million people that the TM organization claims have learned the technique would have still chosen to receive instruction if there had been full disclosure?
What if those about to learn the technique had been told that they would be learning an ancient method for invoking the blessings of Vedic/Hindu deities? What if they had been given a translation of the puja to which they were about to bring offerings? Despite the scientifically-verified benefits of TM, it is likely that a considerable percentage would have been uncomfortable enough with these Vedic/Hindu elements that they would have decided not to learn. The number who would have received instruction would have been considerably less than six million.
It is entirely reasonable to conclude that the success of the TM organization – its celebrity and professional endorsements, its international scope, its university, its scientific acceptability, its real estate holdings, its many business enterprises – could not have happened without Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s big lie.
What is especially fascinating about this particular lie is its longevity. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s big lie has prevailed for almost 50 years because it is an especially ingenious and insidious lie. It has lasted as long as it has because it relies upon the biases and limitations of the Western intellect. Westerners know little about Eastern spirituality and view reality primarily through the lens of science. It was easy for Maharishi Mahesh Yogi to make the case that the technique was “scientific” because, as mentioned earlier, there aren’t very many Westerners who believe in the existence of Vedic/Hindu deities, but there are a lot who believe in science.
In recent years the TM organization has been attempting to reintroduce TM into educational settings under the guise of “Consciousness-Based” education. Students are being sold on the scientific benefits of TM with no knowledge of its origins. Unsuspecting parents are granting permission for their children to receive instruction because their local educators, who are also ignorant of the origins of the practice, are endorsing TM.
The TM organization has always been eager to promote the scientific literature on TM, but it has not been forthcoming about the origins of the technique. Truth in marketing demands that when people express an interest in TM, they should not only receive information about the scientific research, but they should also receive information about the puja and the origins of the mantras. Then, and only then, can they make an informed decision about whether they want to learn. Teaching TM without providing the full story is much like selling investments without providing information about risk, or manufacturing food products without listing the ingredients.
The fact that the TM organization is promoting TM for education, while deliberately choosing not to educate those they instruct about what they are actually teaching them, would appear to be the biggest lie of all.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
Breaking Up is Hard to Do
Several years after I stopped meditating and left the Transcendental Mediation movement, I spent some time with an old friend who was still deeply involved, and asked him about recent happenings in Fairfield, Iowa, the home of Maharishi International University. He asked me why I was still interested, since, after all, I was no longer a meditator. I thought for a moment and then responded that one always maintains a curiosity about one’s “ex.”
I didn’t realize at the time how meaningful that comment was. For me, leaving the TM movement was very much like leaving a long-term relationship. I had been emotionally “married” to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s ideas and organization for 22 years, and it was not easy to find the courage and resolve to initiate a divorce.
Over the years, I’ve seen various marriages come to an end around me, and I’ve had my own share of ill-fated romantic entanglements. Attachment to a person is not unlike attachment to an ideology. Relationships and ideologies both serve as emotional anchors that are hard to give up. Giving them up means being alone and choosing what’s unknown over what’s known and familiar.
I guess that’s why so many people stay in bad marriages, and perhaps that’s why people have trouble leaving the the Transcendental Meditation movement. It’s easier to stay in one’s comfort zone even if things aren’t great than to leave for something unfamiliar. When Neil Sedaka sang “Breaking Up is Hard to Do,” he had it right.
The last time I was in Fairfield I ran into more than a few old-time meditators who had stuck around for years but didn’t seem especially fulfilled. When they saw me, there was invariably a look on their face that I found consistent across encounters. It was as if they couldn’t quite verbalize the question that must have been on their mind: “what’s it like out there?” I represented the choice not taken.
I see now that my years in the Movement were just like staying in an unhealthy relationship. I speak from experience as someone who went through lots of them. I would get physically involved with someone inappropriate and then try to justify the relationship until things just didn’t work anymore. Unhealthy relationships last as long as one or both partners pretend that everything is fine when it’s not. These relationships finally end when the truth can’t be ignored. I left the TM movement when I could no longer live with the self-deceit.
I see now that I was seduced. TM was my lover, and I was in love with an ideology that kept me enthralled but ultimately wasn’t right for me. If my involvement with TM could be compared to involvement with a person, it was as if the sex was good but the person wasn’t.
I certainly deserve some of the responsibility for this myself. I stayed in the Movement as long as I did because I was emotionally unhealthy. I liked the short-term, feel-good benefits of meditating, but I wasn’t ready to be an adult in the world. I wasn’t mature enough to take on the very human challenges of a career, finances, marriage, responsibility, and independent thinking.
After several years of increasing discomfort and inner struggle, I finally got up enough courage to leave the TM movement. The big surprise was that I immediately felt enormous relief and freedom. I’ve never looked back.
Life after getting out of a lousy “marriage” is great. I decided to join this blog to share that message. There is life after TM, and it’s much better.
I didn’t realize at the time how meaningful that comment was. For me, leaving the TM movement was very much like leaving a long-term relationship. I had been emotionally “married” to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s ideas and organization for 22 years, and it was not easy to find the courage and resolve to initiate a divorce.
Over the years, I’ve seen various marriages come to an end around me, and I’ve had my own share of ill-fated romantic entanglements. Attachment to a person is not unlike attachment to an ideology. Relationships and ideologies both serve as emotional anchors that are hard to give up. Giving them up means being alone and choosing what’s unknown over what’s known and familiar.
I guess that’s why so many people stay in bad marriages, and perhaps that’s why people have trouble leaving the the Transcendental Meditation movement. It’s easier to stay in one’s comfort zone even if things aren’t great than to leave for something unfamiliar. When Neil Sedaka sang “Breaking Up is Hard to Do,” he had it right.
The last time I was in Fairfield I ran into more than a few old-time meditators who had stuck around for years but didn’t seem especially fulfilled. When they saw me, there was invariably a look on their face that I found consistent across encounters. It was as if they couldn’t quite verbalize the question that must have been on their mind: “what’s it like out there?” I represented the choice not taken.
I see now that my years in the Movement were just like staying in an unhealthy relationship. I speak from experience as someone who went through lots of them. I would get physically involved with someone inappropriate and then try to justify the relationship until things just didn’t work anymore. Unhealthy relationships last as long as one or both partners pretend that everything is fine when it’s not. These relationships finally end when the truth can’t be ignored. I left the TM movement when I could no longer live with the self-deceit.
I see now that I was seduced. TM was my lover, and I was in love with an ideology that kept me enthralled but ultimately wasn’t right for me. If my involvement with TM could be compared to involvement with a person, it was as if the sex was good but the person wasn’t.
I certainly deserve some of the responsibility for this myself. I stayed in the Movement as long as I did because I was emotionally unhealthy. I liked the short-term, feel-good benefits of meditating, but I wasn’t ready to be an adult in the world. I wasn’t mature enough to take on the very human challenges of a career, finances, marriage, responsibility, and independent thinking.
After several years of increasing discomfort and inner struggle, I finally got up enough courage to leave the TM movement. The big surprise was that I immediately felt enormous relief and freedom. I’ve never looked back.
Life after getting out of a lousy “marriage” is great. I decided to join this blog to share that message. There is life after TM, and it’s much better.
Monday, May 14, 2007
Something Good is Not Happening
As I think back to my days in TM, one of the things that has become clear over time is how much of what went on was about MMY using others for his own selfish ends, one of the hallmarks of narcissism. MMY set the tone and his followers modeled his behaviors.
The TM Movement talked a good game about world peace and creating an ideal society. But the actual society they created used people, treating them poorly. There was little or no interest in addressing the individual needs and concerns of followers.
If one worked for the Movement, housing was usually decrepit. Basic medical care was often lacking. Pay was invariably low. Promises of benefits were frequently broken.
As one example of broken promises, when I first became a TM teacher in the 1970s, we received ATR (advanced training and rest) credits for each person we initiated. After acquiring a certain number of credits, we earned enough to go on a rounding course for free. We worked hard to acquire these credits because rounding was a chance to soak up some more of the bliss we all pursued so avidly and blindly.
One day, it was announced, with no explanation, that all ATR credits were canceled. I knew people who ended up leaving the TM Movement, embittered by the lack of integrity.
As another example of lack of concern for basic needs, when I went to India for a one-month course in New Delhi in 1980, everyone was initially housed in hotels. As the course progressed, announcements were made each day that certain hotels occupied by men were to be vacated. The occupants would then move to a dusty place called Noida, which was in the middle of nowhere outside of New Delhi. Men slept in makeshift tents and used unsanitary facilities that would have brought in the authorities anywhere else.
My hotel, which only housed about a dozen men, was somehow overlooked each day when the list was read. About a week before the end of the course, they figured out that we still had hotel rooms and instructed us to pack and move out of our hotel. I had decided a while back I wasn't going. So when I learned we had to move, I scrambled to find another hotel room and paid for it myself so I wouldn't have to go to Noida. It turned out to be a smart decision since I was one of the few who didn't get seriously ill. I did, however, come back with intestinal parasites, which took months to get rid of.
When mistakes were made that affected people adversely, they were covered up. Once, while at MIU, I got food poisoning. Since I hadn't eaten anything other than cafeteria food, I knew it was a result of something that happened in the campus kitchen, so I informed the kitchen staff. They denied anything was wrong and insisted I must have vomited in the middle of the night because I had the flu or ate something off campus. There was absolutely no interest in identifying the source of the problem and correcting it. They were only interested in avoiding trouble and the local authorities.
Reflecting back, the prevailing mindset of the Movement was to get the most out of people while giving them the least. I still cringe when I think about those days.
The TM Movement talked a good game about world peace and creating an ideal society. But the actual society they created used people, treating them poorly. There was little or no interest in addressing the individual needs and concerns of followers.
If one worked for the Movement, housing was usually decrepit. Basic medical care was often lacking. Pay was invariably low. Promises of benefits were frequently broken.
As one example of broken promises, when I first became a TM teacher in the 1970s, we received ATR (advanced training and rest) credits for each person we initiated. After acquiring a certain number of credits, we earned enough to go on a rounding course for free. We worked hard to acquire these credits because rounding was a chance to soak up some more of the bliss we all pursued so avidly and blindly.
One day, it was announced, with no explanation, that all ATR credits were canceled. I knew people who ended up leaving the TM Movement, embittered by the lack of integrity.
As another example of lack of concern for basic needs, when I went to India for a one-month course in New Delhi in 1980, everyone was initially housed in hotels. As the course progressed, announcements were made each day that certain hotels occupied by men were to be vacated. The occupants would then move to a dusty place called Noida, which was in the middle of nowhere outside of New Delhi. Men slept in makeshift tents and used unsanitary facilities that would have brought in the authorities anywhere else.
My hotel, which only housed about a dozen men, was somehow overlooked each day when the list was read. About a week before the end of the course, they figured out that we still had hotel rooms and instructed us to pack and move out of our hotel. I had decided a while back I wasn't going. So when I learned we had to move, I scrambled to find another hotel room and paid for it myself so I wouldn't have to go to Noida. It turned out to be a smart decision since I was one of the few who didn't get seriously ill. I did, however, come back with intestinal parasites, which took months to get rid of.
When mistakes were made that affected people adversely, they were covered up. Once, while at MIU, I got food poisoning. Since I hadn't eaten anything other than cafeteria food, I knew it was a result of something that happened in the campus kitchen, so I informed the kitchen staff. They denied anything was wrong and insisted I must have vomited in the middle of the night because I had the flu or ate something off campus. There was absolutely no interest in identifying the source of the problem and correcting it. They were only interested in avoiding trouble and the local authorities.
Reflecting back, the prevailing mindset of the Movement was to get the most out of people while giving them the least. I still cringe when I think about those days.
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