Well, I am at a distance. Once I lived in Fairfield.
I was experiencing some peculiar normalization that resulted in insomnia.
Going to the dome, even living at MIU as it was called then, was problematical
because of the weird sleep cycle.
When I moved into town, I never went back to the dome, a deliberate and
conscious decision, as it held no value for me.
Being in the dome had no effect on my experience and thus there was no natural
inclination to be there.
I now have a better idea why that was the case. I have no objection to people
who want to do group programs.
I actually prefer meditating with small groups of new meditators on occasion,
but am naturally disposed to solitude.
From: "dhamiltony...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife]"
<FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>
To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 16, 2017 1:34 PM
Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Importance Of Group Meditation
Archer, from a distance view that is fine, your philosophical of ‘no-doing
do-nothing’.
Some of us live in Fairfield, Iowa, though, with this amazing facility for
meditation that has just a couple hundred people meditating in it now. The
question, (..what can be done?) is operational, what can be done in the
community to better utilize the place by way of facilitating the meditating
community that came here to meditate. Some damages clearly were done to a
feeling of cohesion of the meditating community, what might the remediation
look like to have more people meditating collectively again in Fairfield, Iowa?
Archer Angel writes:
..that nothing need be done.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
Should we create a dispensation for the meditators who do not attend group
meditation in Fairfield, Iowa? What can we do?
One could correlate from what science that we do know about group meditation
that a large part of the tense psycho-spiritual problems we collectively face
is rooted in the absentee meditators living here, those who do not attend to
the collective meditation of Fairfield, Iowa. All those Art of Living people,
the Oneness people, the Amma satsang and others. They seem to not care that
they are given this opportunity, even at the weekday no-badge group meditation,
and they make no effort. Those satsangs don’t even show up to meditate with
others in collective group meditation as a practice where there is offered
invitation. It is like they have a spiritual aloofness, a type of arrogance
that keeps them from doing the spiritual work. What can be done to motivate
them to open their hearts to communal practice?-JaiGuruYou
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
In Transcendentalism, this becomes MMY’s great legacy along the line with
George Fox or Jesus Christ "Where two or more are gathered..". This modern
development, of natural sciences correlating with transcendentalism in modern
time as the practical role of collective meditation, not only an individual
experience is compelling in transcendental meditationism but now by virtue of
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's articulation there is the evident science of collective
practice of meditation on the whole.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
The evidence for the Maharishi Effect continues to mount up. Another
compelling, new study came out in February of this year, again based on
publicly available statistics. This is a scientific breakthrough that outstrips
all others in its power to do good for ourselves, our nation, and our world.Jai
Guru DevRaja John Hagelin
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
When a person waters the root of life, when they begin to experience the
transcendental field of their own existence, which is the treasure house of
inexhaustible energy, and intelligence, and harmony and bliss then that as we
know gets infused into their lives and their lives become so much better. They
evolve, they grow, and they start to live in such a way that automatically
their actions are in harmony with the laws of nature.
"The public are invited to experience some degree of the power of a group
meditation,"
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
" Meditators notice that even in a group of two there is a greater settling of
the mind, and this effect grows in accordance with how many people gather, says
Colin. "Regular meditators have reported much stronger experiences of silence
and bliss than they normally experience alone or in their usual groups of 2050
people...The public are invited to experience some degree of the power of a
group meditation," -explains TM teacher, Colin Beckley
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
Right from the beginning of his movement, Maharishi predicted that even a small
number of the world's population practicing his Transcendental Meditation
technique could neutralize the stress being built up in the world
consciousness, thus averting conflicts and wars.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
The Meissner-like Effect of Collective Meditation..
As early as,
“In 1960 Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, founder of the Transcendental Meditation
program, predicted that a transition in society toward a more orderly and
harmonious functioning would occur when a small fraction -on the order of one
percent- of a population practiced the Transcendental Meditation technique (6),
and in December 1974 we found that crime rate did decrease in four midwestern
U.S. Cities in which one percent of the population was practicing the TM
technique.”
Candace Borland, Ph.D., and Garland Landrith III, M.A., 'Improved Quality of
City Life Through the Transcendental Meditation Program: Decreased Crime Rate'
in Scientific Research on the Transcendental Meditation Program: Collected
Papers, Vol. I, eds. David W. Orme-Johnson, Ph.D., and John T. Farrow, Ph.D.,
West Germany, MERU Press, 1976
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
Yep, group meditations were always used as part of the mix but you are right as
to its relative promotion in the earlier ™ movement. Group meditations clearly
were an activating aspect for meditators in coming along in a deepening
experience with meditating.
As I look around now for teachings that speak to the value of meditating in
groups the quotes that I do readily find are from other sages about the
spiritual practice of group meditation as an adjunct to individual or isolated
practice. Maharishi evidently employed the value of collective meditation
practice but I am not finding earlier comments from Maharishi related to simple
group meditation of the pre-sidhis ™ movement before the TMO went
Sidhis-centric. He probably did speak to it, like at the time of calling
meditators together during the Cuban missile crisis with the Soviet Union.
..
The quote below concerned a special event in which "The saints and Mahatmas of
Uttarakhand" gathered together. This does not address the claim that there is
some special value to ordinary lay meditators practicing in groups in golden
domes or elsewhere.
I was very much involved in the TM movement for several years in the mid-1970s
and I do not recall a single instance in which any special value was placed on
group meditations. The emphasis was always on rounding in the privacy of your
own room. I must have watched several hundred video tapes of MMY and I do not
recall a single one in which he spoke about this.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com> wrote :
He was employing group meditation as part of the mix from early on in his
teaching. The call for meditators to come together [ Catalina Island retreat]
during the 1962 US Cuban Missile crisis with the Soviet Union. Again in 1965
in the triangulation of ramped up and extremely incendiary rhetoric and between
the Soviet Union, The People’s Republic of [Maoist] China, and these United
States over an invasion of South Vietnam by communist North Vietnam that was
happening right then.
These calls to group meditation were each particular calls for meditators to
come together as a spiritual practice in group meditation. Read the
description below from 1965 for his interpretation of it. That practiced
[effective] meditators have a societal responsibility to sit in groups
meditating/ for the world. The science is pretty convincing on this now.
Certainly a failure of the ™ movement in the last few decades was to have let
it go so badly for itself and have separated so many people from the meditating
movement and its group meditations.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <authfri...@yahoo.com> wrote :
I learned TM in 1975 at the Manhattan Center. As I recall, we were told there
was a group meditation (20 minutes) every evening that we were welcome to
attend.
It wasn't pushed on us, nor was there any dogma about how it would have greater
benefits, but it was clearly presented as an opportunity to be taken advantage
of if we could.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meditations were very much part of what was offered in learning
meditation in the old days of TM. Group meditations were definitely a feature
at the ™ Centers that were doing well initiating a lot of people. The group
meditations were important to that for all the reasons [spiritual and then
scientific] listed further below.
I find it telling that the encouragement to meditate in a group came only AFTER
the emergence of the Siddhi flying program.
Prior to that there was no such encouragement
Those meditator group meditations became overlooked whence the TMO became
Sidhis-centric and as the teaching of ™ fell apart once the more honed TM
teaching movement based on initiating, group meditations, and residence courses
got displaced by the ‘teams of four’ around 1977 that came everywhere to take
over the local teaching of ™ and administrate the sidhis.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Is it necessary to meditate with the group?Meditating as a group creates a more
powerful spiritual vibration than meditating alone. Amma has designed each
session of the meditation retreat to increase the spiritual benefits to each
participant. She asks that we all attend every meditation together, and not
meditate alone in our rooms. If you would like to start meditating before the
first session, you are welcome to come to the main meditation room and start
early. -Karunamayi
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
The 'Collective Meditation'
-Spiritual Regeneration Movement NEWSLETTER
May 1965Maharishi Concludes Five World Tours
"His Holiness returned to India on 20th March, 1965 after a successful
nine-month world tour.
..A special feature of this tour was the keen interest generated in scientific
circles in England, Germany and America, where scientists are now conducting
experiments to assess the effects of Deep Meditation.."
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
"An event of unique importance tookplace on the 28th of March, at
Shankaracharya Nagar,Rishikesh. The saints and Mahatmas of Uttarakhand
assembled on theground of the Academy of Meditation to invoke the benign grace
andthe almighty power of the gods to right the wrongs of today's worldsociety."
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
..in "Duty-bound"
The "collective meditation" of "Deep Meditation",
"In welcoming the saints and Mahatmas,Maharishi said that the world today
needed the intercession of thesaints who are established n themselves and are
therefore, nearer tothe almighty power. The situation of the world now demanded
of thepeople a powerful invocation of the grace of gods to fill theatmosphere
with peace and purity. This, he said, can be effectivelydone by those who by
long practice of meditation and variousspiritual disciplines, had gained the
privilege of being nearer tothe seat of divine power and mercy. The saints of
Uttarakhandtherefore were in duty-bound to intercede on behalf of the people
andinvoke the grace of gods to alleviate human suffering."
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
"..After Maharishi had stressed theimportance and purpose of the assembly of
the Saints and Mahatmas..Then the party entered the 84 caves ofShakaracharya
Nagar, where collective meditation was held for onehour. So soon as everyone
had taken their seats in the caves, themeditation started with a recitation of
Vedic hymns, and as everyonesank deep within, nature herself was absorbed in
silence. There wasutter stillness for one solid hour, at the end of which,
themeditation was broken by a recitation of vedic slokas. The saintswho are
accustomed to long meditation felt the powerful intensity oftoday's collective
meditation. It was decided to continuecollective meditation regularly every
Sunday until atmospherictension abates.”
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Anybody have short quotes from the TM movement about the value of group
meditation? Doing TM in a group. Something from the old days of Maharishi in
the time before the siddhis?
There are plenty enough of charts and pronouncement of a value for practicing
the TM-Siddhis in a group. How about for pre-siddhis meditators and group
meditation? It seems that some portion of the meditating community is not
interested in practicing the TM-Siddhis, at least for that long as they do in
the Domes now.
Is there a value to just meditating in a group. Evidently Fred Travis has data
that shows that there is a spiritual value related to proximity and numbers of
meditators meditating.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meditation is a castle that protects the new spiritual aspirants as well
as the veteran meditators. Meditating together increases the degree of
Self-realization of each member of the group by the law of invisible vibratory
exchange of group magnetism. —Paramahansa
Yogananda in Seeking God Together
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
..Group meditations strengthen the individuals. When you're in meditation with
other devotees you don't know how much you help one another. It gives you
strength. There is a vibration that is created that strengthens, and supports,
and encourages each one. So when you sit to meditate just remember this.—Sri
Daya Mata on the SRF tape Karma Yoga
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meetings to practice the techniques of meditation are vitally important.
Group meetings strengthen the individual Self-realization that one has acquired
in private at home. -Paramahansa Yogananda
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meditation helps to disperse the dark clouds of man's obliviousness to
the Sun of All Life, that its warm, liberating rays may burst forth in his
soul. -Self-Realization Fellowship in Meeting For Group Meditation
"In welcoming the saints and Mahatmas,Maharishi said that the world today
needed the intercession of thesaints who are established n themselves and are
therefore, nearer tothe almighty power. The situation of the world now demanded
of thepeople a powerful invocation of the grace of gods to fill theatmosphere
with peace and purity. This, he said, can be effectivelydone by those who by
long practice of meditation and variousspiritual disciplines, had gained the
privilege of being nearer tothe seat of divine power and mercy. The saints of
Uttarakhandtherefore were in duty-bound to intercede on behalf of the people
andinvoke the grace of gods to alleviate human suffering."
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
"..After Maharishi had stressed theimportance and purpose of the assembly of
the Saints and Mahatmas..Then the party entered the 84 caves ofShakaracharya
Nagar, where collective meditation was held for onehour. So soon as everyone
had taken their seats in the caves, themeditation started with a recitation of
Vedic hymns, and as everyonesank deep within, nature herself was absorbed in
silence. There wasutter stillness for one solid hour, at the end of which,
themeditation was broken by a recitation of vedic slokas. The saintswho are
accustomed to long meditation felt the powerful intensity oftoday's collective
meditation. It was decided to continuecollective meditation regularly every
Sunday until atmospherictension abates.”
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Anybody have short quotes from the TM movement about the value of group
meditation? Doing TM in a group. Something from the old days of Maharishi in
the time before the siddhis?
There are plenty enough of charts and pronouncement of a value for practicing
the TM-Siddhis in a group. How about for pre-siddhis meditators and group
meditation? It seems that some portion of the meditating community is not
interested in practicing the TM-Siddhis, at least for that long as they do in
the Domes now.
Is there a value to just meditating in a group. Evidently Fred Travis has data
that shows that there is a spiritual value related to proximity and numbers of
meditators meditating.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meditation is a castle that protects the new spiritual aspirants as well
as the veteran meditators. Meditating together increases the degree of
Self-realization of each member of the group by the law of invisible vibratory
exchange of group magnetism. —Paramahansa
Yogananda in Seeking God Together
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
..Group meditations strengthen the individuals. When you're in meditation with
other devotees you don't know how much you help one another. It gives you
strength. There is a vibration that is created that strengthens, and supports,
and encourages each one. So when you sit to meditate just remember this.—Sri
Daya Mata on the SRF tape Karma Yoga
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meetings to practice the techniques of meditation are vitally important.
Group meetings strengthen the individual Self-realization that one has acquired
in private at home. -Paramahansa Yogananda
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote :
Group meditation helps to disperse the dark clouds of man's obliviousness to
the Sun of All Life, that its warm, liberating rays may burst forth in his
soul. -Self-Realization Fellowship in Meeting For Group Meditation
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