Transcendental Meditation Is Explained
At An Introductory Lecture

This page continues from
Transcendental Meditation Part 1

Very soon after my attempt at yoga meditation, I was in the smallest room in the house with the daily newspaper in hand. My eyes fell on a blocked advert for an introductory lecture on Transcendental Meditation^TM. My mind immediately thought: "Those two words again! (transcendent; meditation)"

This was in February 1975. At that time I had never heard of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi or his deep meditation technique, which is also known by its abbreviation, TM.

I thought to myself, oh well, why don't I go along. Perhaps someone can actually show me in person how to do this meditation thing. So off I went to the free public lecture.

The TM teacher is but a youngster!

We sat there in the audience - an elderly man and I who made up the entire audience - and then this young fellow with rosy cheeks walked in with papers and charts and stuff under his arm.

My first thought was: Good heavens! He is wet behind the ears. How could he possibly have any experience or wisdom. And he's European, not even an Indian guru! :-)

But hang on! He's talking sense!

Well, he took up his position up-front and started to speak. His manner was captivating - gentle and cheerful, apparently not at all fazed by the fact that his audience was only two males.

The words that came out of his mouth just resonated with me; they made sense. After a while he started with the charts of scientific research on Transcendental Meditation^TM - graphs and diagrams.

Quite frankly, that part didn't really resonate with me at all. That wasn't what I was there for. I'm not one for waiting for science to catch up and dissect experience into little boxes to explain what the experiencer already knows inside. Anyway, I continued to listen.

On to the 'preparatory' lecture

At the end of the intro talk he said that, if we wished, he would continue with the next phase, the 'preparatory talk that is normally given a day later. As there were no other people to vote against the two of us in the audience, we succeeded in voting to continue to the next part of the evening. He was more than happy to oblige.

The source of thought - an ocean of energy and intelligence

The young teacher of Transcendental Meditation^TM described thought as being and impluse of energy and intelligence. Through energy a thought flows. And because of its quality of intelligence it flows in a coherent way, not just as random energy.

He also said that from our own observation we can see that thoughts flow continuously from somewhere inside us. So, by inference, the source of our thoughts must be a limitless reservoir of energy and intelligence.

Okay, that sort of made sense too - as an analogy at least. He used another analogy, saying that thought is like a bubble rising from the bottom of the ocean. It starts from the silent bed of the ocean floor and as it rises to the surface, the bubble gets bigger and bigger until it pops at the surface of the ocean.

from TM Intro Talk to
TM - A Means To Transcend Thought

Home Page

TM - A Meditator's Experience
This series of pages is about my own personal experiences of the TM and TM-Sidhi programmes - an insider's view, so to speak.

TM Is Explained To Me By A TM Teacher
My experience at a TM Introductory Lecture where TM is explained by a rosy-cheeked young TM Teacher.

TM - A Means To Transcend Thought
The TM teacher explained to us how TM leads the mind to transcend the finest level of thought, to experience the source of thought - pure consciousness.

Learning TM - What I Experienced
Learning TM was a very structured and throrough process, and an interesting experience to say the least.

Transcendental Meditation and Yogic Flying
From my personal experiences of TM and the Yogic Flying technique, part of the TM-Sidhi programme, I can offer some interesting insights and comments.

The Purpose of The TM-Sidhis Including Yogic Flying
The Yogic Flying technique may seem a bit strange, but its intended benefits are actually quite specific in terms of brainwave coherence.

Other TM Courses I Have Attended
My comments about some of the other TM courses I've attended, including residence weekend, world peace assemblies and the Science of Creative Intelligence course.

TM - My Personal Views
TM elicits rave reports from many of its practitioners, and also some criticism from others. Here are my own views based on my years of experience with TM and the TM-Sidhis.

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