How does the Transcendental Meditation technique differ from lower-cost alternatives—and why can't it be learned from a book, CD, online, or without personal guidance?
The Transcendental Meditation technique is taught in-person by rigorously trained, certified instructors. In addition to personalized, one-on-one instruction, the TM course includes a series of group classes that give you comprehensive knowledge about the mechanics of the practice and the unfoldment of higher consciousness. The TM course also comes with a lifetime of individual guidance and support—offered complimentarily, as needed, to everyone who learns.
If the TM technique could be adequately learned from a book, CD, online, or without personal instruction and follow-up, rest assured it would be taught that way. Selling CDs or prepackaged instructions might reduce educational expenses, but such teaching methods would compromise the learning process and reduce the technique’s effectiveness.
Why Personal Instruction and the Seven-Step Course?
Learning how to effortlessly transcend is a subtle, delicate process, so delicate that the technique had been long lost to society even in India, the land of its origin.
If the TM technique could be adequately learned from a book, CD, online, or without personal instruction and follow-up, rest assured it would be taught that way. Selling CDs or prepackaged instructions might reduce educational expenses, but such teaching methods would compromise the learning process and reduce the technique’s effectiveness.
Why Personal Instruction and the Seven-Step Course?
If the TM technique is such a natural practice, so easy and simple, why does learning it require personal instruction and classes?
Because the process of learning it is interactive. When you learn the TM technique, every step of knowledge is given in sequence, only after the previous step is understood. A book or CD can't do that. An expert teacher can.
Because the process of learning it is interactive. When you learn the TM technique, every step of knowledge is given in sequence, only after the previous step is understood. A book or CD can't do that. An expert teacher can.
Learning how to effortlessly transcend is a subtle, delicate process, so delicate that the technique had been long lost to society even in India, the land of its origin.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi revived the technique and structured a systematic, standardized course of TM instruction—so teachers could be trained to teach it and the technique would give consistent results. This comprehensive training and certification of teachers helps ensure that everyone who learns the TM technique can practice correctly and enjoy all the benefits of effective meditation.
The TM organization's purpose is not to make money or sell a product at the most marketable price point, but to bring the full benefit of meditation to everyone who wishes to learn. This is accomplished through teaching procedures that preserve the technique’s effectiveness. The experience of thousands of certified instructors, successfully teaching the Transcendental Meditation technique around the world since 1957, confirms that personalized instruction, the seven-step course and follow-up is a reliable way to preserve the technique’s purity and ensure maximum results. Otherwise, due to inadequate teaching methods the technique's full effectiveness would soon be lost once again.
“Low-cost alternatives”
Perhaps with good intentions, various meditation practices have been developed as lower-cost alternatives to the Transcendental Meditation technique. These practices typically involve minimal time spent with an instructor and are sometimes taught from books, CDs or online. While those who promote these practices may claim that their meditation practice is similar to the TM technique and will produce the same results, such claims are unsupported by scientific research. Four decades of research on the various meditation practices shows that different practices produce different effects. No other meditation practice has been found to produce the same empirically verified benefits as the TM technique.
When you learn meditation from a certified TM instructor, the TM organization will stand behind the results. But the organization cannot vouch for practices offered as lower-cost alternatives.
When you learn meditation from a certified TM instructor, the TM organization will stand behind the results. But the organization cannot vouch for practices offered as lower-cost alternatives.
Getting the right mantra:
Practices promoted as alternatives to the TM technique commonly use “made up,” computer generated, or randomly chosen mantras or sounds, selected without knowledge or consideration of the sound’s effects. Because of the natural, intimate connection between mind and body, a mantra used mentally affects the system in ways the user (or teacher) may not be aware, especially if used consistently over time.
No medicine has proven to have the range of positive effects known to result from TM practice—with 50 randomized controlled trials and hundreds of peer-reviewed studies verifying the TM technique’s holistic benefits. Surely no pharmaceutical company should be allowed to offer an experimental drug as a low-cost alternative to a proven medicine without proper testing. Similarly, meditation practices and sounds used mentally will have real and subtle effects. It is wise to use only a mantra proven to have an entirely positive and life-supportive influence on mind and body—and only a sound known to be suitable and effective for the individual.
The short- and long-term positive effects of the mantras used in the TM program—upheld by the oldest tradition of meditation on earth—have been verified by millions of people, and modern researchers in leading universities and medical schools have also proven the TM technique to be all-positive in its effects.
For maximum benefit it is also important that the mantra is specifically suitable for transcending or settling the mind inward to experience subtle states of thought. It is equally necessary that the mantra be used correctly—in a way that allows the mind to effortlessly and systematically transcend.
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How TM practice differs from:
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How TM practice differs from:
