Vivid and charming! The Domes Revisited A Personal Essay About Meditating in the Golden Domes Fairfield is home to over 2,000 Transcendental Meditation practitioners and Maharishi University of Management. BY SHARALYN PLILER Silence. Many people think of silence as a problem—the awkwardness when conversation grinds to an embarrassing halt, a mother’ssense of trouble when the kids go quiet, the media announcer’s frantic attempt to fill up air time with anything other than nothingness. But as a meditator, I know silence as something altogether different.To call it bliss seems trite, but even as a writer I fail to find an adequate description for that sweet spot inside so still that even breath causes ripples in it, that oasis hidden on the dark side of the moon, that place inside us where we flirt with genesis. Whatever name we give to inner silence, I’ve learned that the best place to find it is in the domes in Fairfield. We didn’t have domes when I learned yogic flying in 1978 on the first MUM student’s course. We’d heard whispers about flying, but I don’t think we really believed it, not even when we saw sheets of foam spread on the pod-house floors. But on that magical summer, almost before we had time to close our eyes, the woman next to me popped up with an astonished “oh!” as if someone had goosed her. Like a pot at the boiling point, the room fairly steamed with intermittent stifled gasps and giggles as more of us experienced that sudden, bubble-like lifting into the air. We learned that the foam was to soften the landing.
After the course, we did programs alone. A few months later, a message came that Maharishi wanted everyone to meet in the fieldhouse. It felt like a secret-service mission as we almost tiptoed into that stodgy, dark building, finding the basketball court covered with foam. What an adventure! We seemed less about silence then than noise and exuberance.We were filled with a sense of wonder and daring as we made great leaps and wild sounds like fledgling giants testing their reach. We watched the stock market and world news go up and down, depending upon our numbers. I have never lost my sense of sadness that on the one day we did not do program together, the day of my graduation in 1979 when they took up the foam for commencement, an airplane crashed killing 271 people, the only such accident in months before or after. After graduation, I left Fairfield. While I was gone, Maharishi himself inaugurated the 22,000 square feet (approximately the size of a football field) dome, called the Maharishi Patanjali Hall of Knowledge, in 1980. On returning, the enormity of it, the sheer volume of space from floor to ceiling, reminded me of the mothership in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Tongue-in-groove wood ceiling, central skylights, red carpets, and gold velvet drapes covering more than a hundred arched windows all served to bring new heights to the depths of silence. I felt jealous because it had been built for the men, feeling only somewhat mollified when women got to use it on alternative months. At first, I felt traumatized by the segregation of the sexes. But the oscillation between dome and fieldhouse taught me what no amount of lecturing could have about why segregation was useful. It wasn’t for arbitrary puritanical standards but because we were different. Where the guys had been for a month, it smelled like a locker room. Nice smell, actually, but it had a different energy, a more forceful kind that I began to identify as distinctly masculine as compared to our softer, feminine energy. It left me with a greater appreciation for both sexes and a longing for the completion of the women’s dome, the Bagambhrini Hall of Knowledge, the twin to Patanjali. Looking up at the stars through its open rafters during construction, I was aware that, with every nail and board, history was being made. When we got to fly in it for the first time, in December 1981, it felt like coming home to a new level of silence. The pattern was clear—there was deeper silence in the fieldhouse than alone, more in Patanjali than the fieldhouse, and more for me, as a woman, in the women’s dome. But while inner silence had increased, the outer level had gotten out of hand. Before program, hundreds of us gossiped in loud whispers against a background litany of microphone announcements and security procedures. Noise may not be a barrier to meditation, but during program there was so much coughing, clanking of keys, and rustling clothing that when I had to leave again in 1987, I looked forward to doing program alone. The Power of Flying in a Group But on returning to Fairfield ten years later, it became obvious that the outward silence wasn’t what made the process work. At the Raj, where I stayed when I first arrived, program was obviously deeper. Then, when I moved six miles away, the quality of program dropped. The contrast was remarkable. I didn’t want to spend the money or have all that hassle of getting dressed on cold mornings or rushing to be on time, but who can argue with direct experience? I signed up for the dome. Inside, I was thrilled (and, admittedly, chagrined!) to learn that the pre-program announcements and gossip sessions had ceased. But now it was more than a settled atmosphere. After the doors closed, the first thing that struck me was the awesome silence. I was so stunned by it that long after everyone else had gone inward, I sat, open-eyed, soaking up the feelings, amazed by the tangible power generated by the hundreds of people sitting in that warm, softly lit sanctuary, together in Silence. Beyond the power of those present, I could feel the accumulated effects of thousands of people meditating there over nearly three decades. They had imbued the place with an energy greater than the sum of the parts.What amazed me most of all, when I finally closed my eyes, was how much deeper my experiences were. I liked it so much I moved onto campus. I estimated that program in the dome was worth three in my room on campus, worth four or five in town, and worth at least ten elsewhere in the world. I heard Maharishi say that casual programs produce casual results. It appears to be true. The silence was so sweet, I felt inspired to go for even more of that wonderful feeling by doing whatever I could to aid it—even going to bed early. The more serious I got about it, the deeper my programs became. When I had to leave again, I hoped I could preserve the depth of silence. But “out there,” I finally had to face the fact that as good as life was in a beachfront home in Florida, life was flat compared to the matchless minds and hearts of Sidhas … and to being in the domes. While others were going south for the winter, in January 2003, I moved north, to stay. Silence Revisited On returning, dreading Iowa winters, exhausted from packing and driving a moving van for three days, I was surprised to feel that tangible freshness, a renewal of wonder beginning as far away as Hannibal, Missouri. What had changed—was I more sensitive or had the domes gotten more powerful? I was soon to decide that it was the latter. By the second program, more clearly obvious by the third and unquestionable by the fourth, the dome’s awesome power begin to distinguish itself. It was so gentle, so quietly soothing and nourishing as it seeped through me, cell by cell, relaxing, nourishing, healing. The domes, I realized, are the powerhouses that radiate the energy I felt over 100 miles away, felt more strongly as I walked around town, felt stronger yet on campus and in interactions with old friends, long-time TMers. Everywhere I turned, their timeless beauty humbled me. Many long-time residents appeared to be so accustomed to the effects as to actually not know how enlightened they were. But having the contrast for comparison, I could see that the domes were the twin suns that were making everyone’s life's shine brighter than if they were alone. The domes were the hot spots for silence, the ground zero of bliss. The Domes Today Thanks to donors and volunteers, the domes today have many improvements, including a place for newcomers set up with backjacks and blankets, new roofs, new bathrooms, new curtains. New foam and deep cleaning have removed the dust and mold. Thanks to sensitive regulations, whispers, clanking thermoses, and even coughing have all but disappeared. During the Taste of Utopia course in 1983-84, when 8,000 of us packed every available space, the domes were full of gasps of delight and ripples of spontaneous laughter as by the hundreds we found ourselves lifted up simultaneously from the power of coherence. What an amazing sound that laughter is—you can hear the essence of the dome in it—such purity, such surprise, such innocent joy. Today, with more flyers coming in to help protect America and the world, we are again feeling those waves. There’s an excitement today much like the Taste of Utopia course and those early days of flying, the feeling that something important is happening. How I wish you would come here to live with us and join us in the dome. With new Maharishi Sthapatya Veda buildings popping up everywhere, the campus of Maharishi University of Management and the surrounding area is rich with a lively, energetic peacefulness. If you came here, you would feel it too—the tangible results when inner silence gets manifested into concrete expression. The place where you can find the most silence is the same place you can help create peace for the world. From home to dome, this is the best place, possibly the safest place, in the world, the place where you can find the most silence. Whether it’s for a week or a lifetime, please come join us. Write to Sharalyn Pliler shara...@windstream.net; For course information, visit http://www.invincibleamerica.org/
