TurquoiseB wrote: > On my last trip back through Hartford, Connecticut > some time ago, I ran into by chance several people > who had attended the free meditation classes I once > taught there for Rama. That was 10 years previously. > Three of these people had attended only one session, > in which they were taught to meditate -- by me, not > by someone with a shitload of darshan or tradition > going for them -- for free, and then never came > back for any followup sessions. The last two actually > liked the meetings, and kept coming back for several > weeks, even though it was the same intro material > and free meditation training every week. All five > claimed to still be practicing what we taught them. That might be accurate if you had just learned the Rama meditation a couple weeks before and HAD NOT learned any other type of meditation. ;-) But when you taught them you have the shakti or darshan from your years of doing meditation. If you were teaching them a mantra meditation then you enlivened that mantra due to your shakti. Anyone who has meditated a few years will impart an enlivened mantra. It's that simple. MMY couldn't wait for a corps of enlivened meditators to teach TM so he had us do the puja prior to imparting the mantra to enliven it. The difference with your Rama technique may have been that it was not as disruptive and more calming than the TM techniques. That would especially be true if it was a shanti mantra which are Rama mantras. They may not be as flashy as TM techniques but very relaxing and people probably would tend to enjoy them and not abandon them. They probably however didn't turn it into a religious practice that come hell or high water they HAD to practice every day.
I also had a similar experience teaching someone a mantra determined by their horoscope and not a TM mantra. They became very spiritual (I had determined they were that way latently though) and started excelling in their work. Even one of my Indian employees started remarking about the change in the person. The difference with me was that I by that time (a little over ten years ago) I had enough knowledge to know why it worked.
