Transcendental Meditation
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Guru Dev, Shankaracharya Brahmananda Saraswati
For the last twelve years of his life Brahmananda (1871-1953) was the Jagadguru Shankaracharya of Jyotir Math, which is traced back to Shankara. Some moments before Swami Brahmananda Saraswati passed away, he told his disciple Mahesh, "What I have taught you also contains the knowledge of the technique for the householder". [Maharishi] Mahesh later emerged to spread the TM technique and said about the Shankaracharya's core teachings, "His spiritual teachings are simple and clear and go straight home to the heart." Good quotations: [LINK]Maharishi
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi spent twelve or thirteen years as a disciple of Swami Brahmananda. Maharishi introduced transcendental meditation (TM) to the West from 1959, after his master, called Guru Dev, died in 1953. It was the idea of Mahesh Yogi's to make this easy technique available to all people in our time. The Beatles, Beach Boys, Mick Jagger, Donovan, and other celebrities learnt TM. The principles of transcendental meditation are discussed in the Maharishi's book The Science of Being and Art of Living. To Maharishi, meditation with its many splendid side effects, is also a path to enlightenment. Maharishi quotations: [LINK]Transcendental Meditation (TM)
TRANSCENDENTAL Meditation uses one of a variety of Sanskrit mantras. A mantra is a syllable or set of syllables in the form of sounds, words, or phrases that, repeated in the mind, helps the user still the activity of thought and find a subtler (deeper, higher) level of consciousness with enhanced inner joy, vitality, and creativity. Over six million persons have learnt TM.To practice TM, a person must be initiated by a teacher. This involves sessions of formal instruction, followed by a ceremony (puja) that first and foremost shows due respect to Guru Dev. The applicant makes monetary and other offerings and receives his mantra, selected by the teacher on the basis of the meditator's temperament and occupation. TM is taught to new practitioners in a standardized, seven-step procedure, comprised of two introductory lectures, a personal interview, and a two-hour instruction session.
The first teachings and practice of sound diving were mainly in the context of Hinduism. With time the propagation of TM was adapted to needs and methods of the West, and TM was recommended as a method to combat stress. Under the new heading "Science of Creative Intelligence" TM still has its foundations in the Vedas (ancient Indian literature). By TM there is a switching between rest and activity, and one's potential may shine forth to some degree, depending on how well the practice is done and other factors too. There may be very positive results: stress reduction, improvement in health, understanding, confidence, creativity, and a fundamentally positive relationship to the surrounding world.
Yet as time goes by, meditation may serve more as a retreat of recuperation and recharging the organism. That may work well too. There seems to be ample room for these two complementary focuses or balances. The crux of the matter is a promotion of deep happiness, and living in accordance with one's "deep mind" somehow.
TM is spread through closely co-ordinated organisations. Local centres organise public lectures on the principles and effects of TM.
Many studies evolved on TM - over six hundred.
Many physiologists and psychologists have recognized Transcendental Meditation's relaxing and vitalizing effects on the body and mind.
[Source: Ebu "Trancendental Meditation"]
Some Studies
The following sums up some studies on TM, as published with references in Wikipedia.Studies have reported finding a positive correlation between the Transcendental Meditation technique and various health-related conditions, including reduction of high blood pressure, younger biological age, decreased insomnia, reduction of high cholesterol, reduced illness and medical expenditures, decreased cigarette smoking, decreased alcohol use, and decreased anxiety.
Good for the heart and circulation
In 2005, the American Journal of Cardiology published a review of two studies that looked at stress reduction with the Transcendental Meditation technique and mortality among patients receiving treatment for high blood pressure. This study was a long-term, randomized trial. The study tracked subjects for up to 18 years and found that the group practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique had death rates that were reduced by 23%. Also in 2005, the American Journal of Hypertension published the results of a study that found the Transcendental Meditation technique may be useful as an adjunct in the long-term treatment of hypertension among African-Americans.In 2006, a study published in the American Medical Association's Archives of Internal Medicine found that coronary heart disease patients who practiced the Transcendental Meditation technique for 16 weeks showed improvements in blood pressure, insulin resistance, and autonomic nervous system tone, compared with a control group of patients who received health education.
The American Heart Association has published two studies on the Transcendental Meditation technique. In 2000, the association's journal Stroke published a study that found that, on average, the hypertensive, adult subjects who practiced the Transcendental Meditation technique daily experienced reduced thickening of coronary arteries, thereby decreasing the risk of heart attack and stroke. After six to nine months, carotid intima-media thickness decreased in the group that was practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique as compared with matched control subjects.
The association's journal Hypertension published the results of a randomized, controlled trial in which a group of older African-Americans practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique had reduced blood pressure.
A meta-analysis, conducted at the University of Kentucky, found Transcendental Meditation was associated with approximate reductions of 4.7 mm Hg systolic blood pressure and 3.2 mm Hg diastolic blood pressure. The study was published in the March, 2008, issue of the American Journal of Hypertension.
Good for the mind
A 1985 study in the British Journal of Educational Psychology, and a 1989 study in Education showed improved academic performance.A paper published in 2001 in the journal, Intelligence, reported the effects on 362 Taiwanese students of three randomized, controlled trials that used seven standardized tests. The trials measured the effects of the Transcendental Meditation technique, a contemplative meditative technique from the Chinese tradition, and napping, on a wide range of cognitive, emotional and perceptual functions. The three studies ranged in time from six months to one year. Results indicated that taken together the Transcendental Meditation group had significant improvement on all seven measurements compared to the non-treatment and napping control groups. Contemplative meditation showed a significant result in two categories, and napping had no effect. The results included an increase in IQ, creativity, fluid intelligence, field independence, and practical intelligence.
A study in the American Journal of Managed Care indicates that there are no known side effects associated with the Transcendental Meditation technique.
A relaxation method does not ask for faith
Official Transcendental Meditation websites state that the Transcendental Meditation technique is a mental technique for deep rest that is associated with specific effects on mind and body. These sites state that the Transcendental Meditation technique does not require faith, belief, or a change in lifestyle to be effective as a relaxation technique.The Transcendental Meditation technique, yoga, and other forms of meditation have been described as "spiritual" but not religious, and as coping strategies for life.
David Orme-Johnson, former faculty member at Maharishi University of Management, cites studies by Schecter, Alexander, and Pelletier showing greater autonomy, innovative thought, and increases in creativity, general intelligence and moral reasoning in those who practice the Transcendental Meditation technique. These studies indicate the ability of those who practice the Transcendental Meditation technique to make mature, independent, principle-based judgments.
The price to pay
In 2008, fees for learning the Transcendental Meditation technique were changed. Fee for a single person is now $2,000 rather than $2.500, and family rates and group rates are available.In response to what they feel is a high course fee, some former teachers offer instruction independently, while other former teachers have published what they claim to be the mantras used in the practice. The organization that teaches the Transcendental Meditation technique recommends that it be learned from an authorized teacher only.
Head and Heart
Uniting "head and heart" is one goal of TM (Transcendental Meditation). In this context 'head' can represent both mind, thinking and assessing, that is, using the head. And 'heart' may signify deep state of mind. ideally, though, it refers to an inwardly perceived effect of doing TM. You are to get aware of it and focus on it in order to access it deeply.On Transcendental Meditation
"Transcendental Meditation makes the active mind fully silent, . . . that silence remains when one comes out of meditation." [Maharishi]"Needed today is a technique to harmonise the qualities of the head with those of the heart." [Maharishi]
The Science of Being and Art of Living . . . addressed a multitude of subjects and pointed to meditation as a practical means to their fulfilment. [Paul Mason]
The master sits cross-legged. "Offer to me bagfuls of your vices," he says. [About Shankaracharya Brahmananda, Guru Dev]
"Every individual is setting forth influence in his surroundings." [Maharishi]
"Maharishi . . . Mahesh Yogi owed much, if not all of his spiritual understanding, to his teacher Shankaracharya Brahmanand Saraswati." [Paul Mason]
"Dive deep within . . . profited by undisturbed, regular, and deep meditations." [Maharishi]
Literature
Mahesh Yogi, Maharishi.
The Science of Being and Art of Living. New York: Plume/Penguin,
2001.
Paul Mason, author of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi: The
Biography of the Man Who Gave Transcendental Meditation to the World. Earlier on-line: [Link]
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