Transcendental Meditation

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Transcendental Meditation or TM is a form of meditation developed in 1955 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a disciple of Guru Dev. There have been some studies showing positive effects from Transcendental Meditation but critics have raised questions about the integrity of the scientists who conducted the studies, and the possible negative effects of Transcendental Meditation.

History

In 1957, at the end of a great "festival of spiritual luminaries" in remembrance of the previous Shankaracharya of the North, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati, his disciple Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (or simply "Maharishi" to followers) announced the formal beginning of TM. In the movement's initial stages, Maharishi operated under the auspices of an organization he called the "Spiritual Regeneration Movement".

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. Since 1990, Maharishi has co-ordinated his global activities from his headquarters in the town of Vlodrop in the municipality of Roerdalen in the Netherlands.

The TM Movement founded a nationally accredited university in Iowa, USA, the Maharishi University of Management in 1971; a number of schools around the world; a city in south-east Iowa, Vedic City (founded 21 July, 2001); political parties in many countries around the world known as the Natural Law Party, the US branch having closed on April 30, 2004 (see [1]) in favour of the Global Country of World Peace, founded in 2002.

Procedures and theory

TM is a meditation technique which is practiced for fifteen to twenty minutes twice daily while sitting with the eyes closed. In essence, the TM technique comprises the silent mental repetition of a simple sound known as a mantra. The goal of this meditation, according to practitioners, is called pure consciousness (in Sanskrit: turiya or samadhi). The TM organization emphasizes in its teaching that the procedure for using the mantra is very important, and can only be learned from a trained teacher of TM.

Theory of Consciousness

According to Transcendental Meditation theory there are eight states of consciousness, of which the three first are familiar to non-TM meditators:

waking state of consciousness
dreaming state of consciousness (REM)
dreamless sleeping state of consciousness
Transcendental state of Consciousness (TC)
Cosmic Consciousness (CC)
God Consciousness (GC)
Unity Consciousness (UC)
Brahman Consciousness (BC)

Learning TM

The technique has been taught to people in a variety of formats over the years. Currently, it is taught in a seven step process, which include an introductory lecture, personal interview and instruction, and checking afterwords to verify the technique was learned properly. [2]

Other components of TM

Beyond the initial technique, the Trancendental Mediation program includes numerous other programs, retreats and even healthcare.

The TM Siddhi program is a program which is claimed to deepen one's meditation, and eventually lead to levitation.

TM also offers its own version of Ayurveda, Indian Medicine, called Maharishi Ayurveda. It also practices Vedic Astrology which the movement calls Maharishi Jyotish, and also has its own trademarked brand of food Vedic Organic Agriculture. [3]

Criticisms and controversies

TM and religion

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 fact that various portions of TM are drawn from Hinduism: the puja, a Hindu ceremony that everyone who learns TM must go through [4], its reference and use of Hindu scriptures and terms (see below), use of the Hindu Astrology (jyotish) [5], use of Yagya Hindu fire ceremonies [6], that the TM organization celebrates Hindu holidays [7] and that in the Puja, people are asked to get on their knees and bow before a picture of Guru Dev, Maharshi's teacher. [8] The published works of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi include the long devotional poem Love and God and a translation of the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita. He has also stated in his lectures that the purpose of meditation is to help the individual reach God-consciousness and eventually Enlightenment.

In the TM-Sidhi Program, selected Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, considered one of the classics of Hinduism and Yoga are mentally recited [9] immediately following the period of meditation, and those who practice the TM-Sidhi program are encouraged to end their practice by listening to recorded excerpts from the ninth and tenth mandalas of the Rig Veda, one of the foundational texts of Hinduism, in the original Sanskrit, in which the names of Vedic-Hindu deities are recited.

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 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, but whose practice is intended to cultivate spiritual enlightenment. Hindus have criticised the movement for selling traditional Hindu knowledge through fee-based courses such as The TM-Sidhi program.

The U.S. District Court ruled in Malnak v. Yogi (1979) that under the Establishment Clause [10] of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, TM was too religious to be taught in public schools. This ruling though was referring not to the TM practise itself, but to the theoritical part, termed Science of Creative Intelligence^{[citation needed]}, which was designed to go along with it(Malnak v. Yogi, D.C. Civil Action No. 76-0341).

Mantra

In the teaching of 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. Ex-TM teachers have asserted that the mantras used in TM are based on the age and gender of the initiate.[11], [12]. Maharishi's biographer, Paul Mason says in his book that that the TM mantras are bija mantras, one or two syllabled sounds, which are related in Hinduism to different Gods or Goddess. [13]. He also quotes the Maharishi as saying - to an exclusively Indian audience at the initial stage of the movement -, "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." [14]. Such a relation though is not taught to neither TM practitioners nor TM teachers.

Possible adverse effects

Critics of TM refer to a paper that reviews 75 studies on various meditation techniques [15]. The study found that 63% of meditators experienced negative side effects, including panic, depression, increase in tension and loss of motivation, among other. One methodological challenge this review faced was that "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, found 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." Otis also found that "the longer a person stays in TM and the more committed a person becomes to TM as a way of life, the greater the likelihood that he or she will experience adverse effects." He also noticed that it appeared that those who stuck with TM had more problems than those who started it and dropped out, and that the probability of occurrence of these adverse effects is higher among psychiatric populations. ("Meditation: Classic and Contemporary Perspectives" , ed. Deane H. Shapiro and Roger N. Walsh, New York, Aldine Publishing Co.)

TM-Sidhi Program and the Maharishi Effect

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).

Publications on TM in the Journal of American Medical Association

In May 1991, an article on the benefits of Maharishi Ayur Veda was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). When JAMA's editor, Dr. George D. Lundberg learned that the journal was misled about the authors' financial involvement with the TM movement, he assigned associate news editor Andrew A. Skolnick [16] to investigate and write an expose on the movement's efforts to promote its trademarked line of Indian remedies [17]. "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," Skolnick wrote. "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 also countered the article's claim that Maharishi Ayur-Veda was more cost effective than standard medical care. In July 1992, Dr. Deepak Chopra and two TM organizations filed a $194 million libel suit against Lundberg, Skolnick, and the American Medical Association. The suit was dismissed without prejudice in March 1993.

The article raised questions about the integrity of at least some of the reports from scientists involved in the TM movement[18]. It also quotes a former TM teacher and chair of the TM center in Washington, DC, as saying: "I was taught to lie and to get around the pretty rules of the 'unenlightened' in order to get favorable reports into the media. We were taught how to exploit the reporters' gullibility and fascination with the exotic, especially what comes from the East. We thought we weren't doing anything wrong, because we were told it was often necessary to deceive the unenlightened to advance our guru's plan to save the world." [19]

Nevertheless articles on the benefits of TM and Maharishi Ayurveda products have continued to be published in medical journals, for example: The American Journal of Cardiology [20], which was funded in part by a grant from the controversial National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine and in the American Journal of Hypertension [21].

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 both TM and Maharishi's far-reaching political goals at all levels of society. The Party ran Dr. John Hagelin, former physics professor at Maharishi University of Management, for president of the United States in the 1992, 1996, and 2000 elections, without notable success. The Natural Law Party did not run a candidate for president in the 2004 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 [22] and crowned Dr. Tony Nader as Raja (Vedic king) [23] 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. In many of his most recent weekly press conferences, Maharishi has repeatedly expressed his strong opinion that democracy is an ineffective and weak form of government. He is advocating a parallel system of monarchical government based on Vedic traditions and knowledge [24] in which the leadership is selected by him.

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. Discrimination against women is evident in the organization's failure to include women as ministers of its Global Country of World Peace (all of the 40 appointed ministers were men) or as spokespersons for Maharishi’s weekly televised press conferences. Women are rarely included in the organization's globally publicized ceremonies. When a token woman is included, Bevan Morris has been known to address her by first name, for example, "Susie" for Dr. Susan Dilbeck, while reserving "Dr. Dilbeck" for her husband (also present).

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi has explicitly 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, women are patronizingly referred to as "ladies," and men simply as "men" (not "gentlemen").

Over the years, the TM organization has implemented a deliberate policy of segregating the sexes in its parochial schools, course facilities, assemblies, etc. In its elementary schools, the TM organization requires students to wear uniforms--dresses for girls (no pants). In official photographs, female TM teachers are often seen wearing Indian-style dress called "saris" (never pants), while males are allowed to wear Western-style suits.

TM emphasis of Vedically correct buildings

In his televised press conference of November 16, 2005, Maharishi stated that he believed that it was vital for everyone in the world to live and work in buildings constructed according to Sthapatya Veda, an Indian philosophy that resembles Feng Shui, a belief that the arrangement and layout of one's home has important effects on all areas of one's life. In Sthapatya Veda, the main entrance of all structures must face the east, and all the rooms in a Vedically-correct building must be arranged around a central "Brahmastan" or seat of divinity. Maharishi said in his November press conference that it was very important that all members of the organization quickly move into dwellings constructed according to Vedically-correct principles, and that he would no longer talk or deal with any member of the TM community who lived in structures not built according to Vedic principles.

The TM movement demolished a Christian chapel on the campus of Maharishi University of Management because it was not constructed according to Vedically "correct" principles [25], and has encountered public resistance to its plans to tear down historic buildings in order to replace them with Vastu-compliant structures, including a former Christian monastery in the Netherlands. [26]

Fees and finances

Initiation into TM is not free. In the late 1970s, the fee for basic initiation was $75 in the United States. Since then, the price has risen to $2,500 Course Requirements (the fee is lower for students, additional family members, and financing is available). Initiation into the advanced TM-Sidhi program costs thousands of dollars per person in the United States. More recently, the TM organization has added astrological readings (Jyotish) for additional fees, and Vedic Yagya ceremonies to relieve the individual of karmic obstructions for thousands of dollars per ceremony. The fees for learning TM are not uniform throughout the world. Far higher fees are charged in the United States and Europe to provide funds for TM projects in India and other countries.

Many people feel that a course fee of $2500 USD to learn TM is unreasonable, in view of Maharishi's longstanding claims that the technique is everyone's birthright and that he feels that everyone should practice it. As evidence of this unreasonableness, TM initiations have declined to a trickle and some of Maharishi's TM teachers have broken with him to offer a comparable technique at considerably lower prices. They include TM Independent in the UK and Natural Stress Relief in Italy and the USA.

TM initiates are sometimes approached by TM teachers and "sidhas" who need sponsorship in order to afford advanced courses and programs, such as the Purusha program for men and the Mother Divine program for women. Sponsorship may be requested in the form of a pledge to provide a given amount of money per month or year. These requests are sometimes made during rounding courses, when critics claim the course participant may be particuarly susceptible to suggestion.

Although the finances of the TM organization have been kept secret, at least some of the funds are used to support the organization's many tax-exempt facilities and the TM teachers who administer the programs, many of whom have never been employed outside the TM organization (and related companies) since they became TM teachers in the 1960s and 1970s.

Murder at Maharishi University of Management

The Observer said that the recent murder of a student by another student who stabbed his victim several times in the chest during dinner in the main dining room at Maharishi University of Management (MUM) undermines the credibility of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and the idea of the Maharishi Effect. Dr Craig Pearson, executive vice-president of Maharishi University, said: 'Maharishi Mahesh Yogi has made one comment regarding this event. He said that this is an aspect of the violence we see throughout society, including the violence that our country is perpetrating in other countries.' [27] However, the University administration failed to report to the police an earlier, less serious stabbing of another victim on the same day by the same perpetrator.

Questions on the validity of TM research

Some studies 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.

One study showed that TM had positive effects on arterial wall thickness in African-American people with high blood pressure. (PMID 10700487)

Some organisations, however, have remained skeptical about TM, and meditation in general. In a report for the U.S. Army Research Institute, a National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council committee concluded that Transcendental Meditation is no more effective in lowering metabolism than are established relaxation techniques.NRC 1991

The TM organization claims to have conducted over 600 studies through 200 independent universities that have verified the positive effects of TM. However, a large-scale literature review published by the Middle European Journal of Medicine in 2003 reported that "of 700 studies on TM spanning 40 years, only 10 were conducted in the clinical tradition of using strict control groups, randomization and placebos." Peter Canteer, a researcher from Peninsula Medical School concluded in TM research, "there is a strong placebo effect going on which probably works through the expectations being set up." [28] Quantum physicist Heinz Pagels, accused the TM movement of committing fraud through its scientific claims: "I would like to be generous to the Maharishi and his movement because it supports world peace and other high ideals. But none of these ideals could possibly be realized within the framework of a philosophy that so willfully distorts scientific truth." [29]

In his capacity as executive director of the New York Academy of Science in 1986, Pagels submitted an affidavit on behalf of a former TM member who was suing the movement for fraud. "There is no known connection between meditation states and states of matter in physics," he wrote. "No qualified physicist that I know would claim to find such a connection without knowingly committing fraud. ... To see the beautiful and profound ideas of modern physics, the labor of generations of scientists, so willfully perverted provokes a feeling of compassion for those who might be taken in by these distortions." [30]

Allegations that TM is a cult

Different people, groups and former members have alledged that TM is a dangerous cult. The Cultic Studies Journal has published two articles about TM and lists them as a cult, along with noting that four articles have been published about TM in the Cult Observer. [31]. The Cult Awareness Network lists TM as a cult [32], as does Steve Hassan, editor of two books on cults. [33]. An entire book on TM as a cult has been written called "TM & Cult Mania". [34]. Former TM teachers, such as Joe Kellet [35] and Curtis Mailloux [36] have also claimed it is a cult.