The Transcendental Meditation technique is not just a practice of watching your breath, contemplating, concentrating or trying to be mindful. It's not guided imagery or common mantra meditation. It's a specific and unique process of meditation, distinguished by ease of practice, holistic benefits and extensive scientific validation. As the science has shown, all meditation techniques are not the same and do not produce the same results—and other forms of meditation have not been found by scientific research to produce the broad range of benefits associated with the TM technique.
This technique of effortless transcending had been lost to society—even in India—before Maharishi Mahesh Yogi introduced it to the world in 1955. To maintain the technique's original effectiveness and authenticity, and help ensure that it doesn't get lost again, it is taught in a systematic, standardized way by professionally trained certified instructors worldwide.
The course tuition covers your educational expenses of personal instruction and a series of comprehensive classes. Tuition for the TM course is determined by what it costs to make the program available—there are no added profit margins. The reason you can learn the TM technique today is because so many others before you have paid their tuition to sustain the program.
Non-profit: The TM technique is offered by a non-profit educational organization [501(c)(3)] called Maharishi Foundation USA, which exists solely to bring the benefits of fully effective meditation to people everywhere.
Lifelong follow-up and support: For everyone who learns the TM technique, personal meditation guidance, follow-up and support are available at no further cost—for the rest of your life. This follow-up and support is provided by experienced, highly qualified teachers who have thousands of hours of experience with the process of transcending. In addition to personal guidance with your meditation practice, the program includes ongoing advanced classes to deepen your understanding about the full awakening of human potential.
Why can't the TM technique be taught for free? Does one really need a certified teacher, personalized instruction, a seven-step course and follow-up to correctly practice this meditation technique and enjoy its benefits? The experience of thousands of TM teachers providing meditation instruction around the world for the past fifty years—along with hundreds of independent, peer-reviewed scientific research studies verifying the program’s effectiveness—tells us the answer is most definitely yes: this way of teaching is absolutely necessary and works marvelously well.
Dr. Sandeep Chaudhary: When you purchase anything of value, of course, cost is a consideration. But the TM technique is actually inexpensive if you consider what you're getting: a program you'll benefit from every day of your life—a program known to help prevent heart attack and stroke, to help people sleep better, to avert the harmful effects of stress. And those are just side effects. The real benefit is that you enjoy your life so much more.
TM instructor Robert Roth explains why there's a tuition:
This technique of effortless transcending had been lost to society—even in India—before Maharishi Mahesh Yogi introduced it to the world in 1955. To maintain the technique's original effectiveness and authenticity, and help ensure that it doesn't get lost again, it is taught in a systematic, standardized way by professionally trained certified instructors worldwide.
The course tuition covers your educational expenses of personal instruction and a series of comprehensive classes. Tuition for the TM course is determined by what it costs to make the program available—there are no added profit margins. The reason you can learn the TM technique today is because so many others before you have paid their tuition to sustain the program.
Non-profit: The TM technique is offered by a non-profit educational organization [501(c)(3)] called Maharishi Foundation USA, which exists solely to bring the benefits of fully effective meditation to people everywhere.
Lifelong follow-up and support: For everyone who learns the TM technique, personal meditation guidance, follow-up and support are available at no further cost—for the rest of your life. This follow-up and support is provided by experienced, highly qualified teachers who have thousands of hours of experience with the process of transcending. In addition to personal guidance with your meditation practice, the program includes ongoing advanced classes to deepen your understanding about the full awakening of human potential.
Why can't the TM technique be taught for free? Does one really need a certified teacher, personalized instruction, a seven-step course and follow-up to correctly practice this meditation technique and enjoy its benefits? The experience of thousands of TM teachers providing meditation instruction around the world for the past fifty years—along with hundreds of independent, peer-reviewed scientific research studies verifying the program’s effectiveness—tells us the answer is most definitely yes: this way of teaching is absolutely necessary and works marvelously well.
If learning the TM technique requires personalized instruction, the time of a rigorously trained teacher, a series of classes, an adequate teaching space and support and follow-up, obviously expenses will be incurred—thus the course tuition.
Anyone who wants can learn: There is a standard tuition for the TM course, with reduced rates for full-time students, couples, families, children and those under financial hardship. There are also payment plans, grants, scholarships and work-study options to help cover the tuition. Due to the program's non-profit and non-commercial structure, anyone who wishes to learn the TM technique can learn.
Additionally, a portion of everyone's course fee goes to support TM programs for people who cannot afford to pay—such as at-risk youth, military veterans with PTSD, the homeless, Native Americans on reservations, and inner city school kids—all of whom typically learn for free. With the help of private benefactors such as the David Lynch Foundation, 250,000 schoolchildren in the U.S. and abroad have learned the TM technique free of charge and practice meditation twice daily during in-school “Quiet Time” programs.
Tuition, payment plans & scholarships
• Why pay to learn the TM technique when you can learn other forms of meditation for free?
• Will other practices give the same results?
Anyone who wants can learn: There is a standard tuition for the TM course, with reduced rates for full-time students, couples, families, children and those under financial hardship. There are also payment plans, grants, scholarships and work-study options to help cover the tuition. Due to the program's non-profit and non-commercial structure, anyone who wishes to learn the TM technique can learn.
Additionally, a portion of everyone's course fee goes to support TM programs for people who cannot afford to pay—such as at-risk youth, military veterans with PTSD, the homeless, Native Americans on reservations, and inner city school kids—all of whom typically learn for free. With the help of private benefactors such as the David Lynch Foundation, 250,000 schoolchildren in the U.S. and abroad have learned the TM technique free of charge and practice meditation twice daily during in-school “Quiet Time” programs.
Tuition, payment plans & scholarships
• Why pay to learn the TM technique when you can learn other forms of meditation for free?
• Will other practices give the same results?
________________________________________________________
Dr. Sandeep Chaudhary: When you purchase anything of value, of course, cost is a consideration. But the TM technique is actually inexpensive if you consider what you're getting: a program you'll benefit from every day of your life—a program known to help prevent heart attack and stroke, to help people sleep better, to avert the harmful effects of stress. And those are just side effects. The real benefit is that you enjoy your life so much more.
There's also ongoing follow-up and personal checking of meditation to ensure correct practice, and there's continued knowledge and guidance, if desired, at TM centers everywhere for the rest of your life—and you get all that follow-up for free.
As a physician, I see the TM technique not only as lifesaving but also as a cost-savings tool. We know how much the average American spends on health care in a lifetime. I live with these statistics. And I see the cost of it everyday in human terms.
I've also seen the statistics on how the TM technique reduces health care costs. Let me tell you, anyone who says the TM technique is too expensive, just take a look at how much money America is spending on medical bills and health insurance every year. It's a lame argument.
The Transcendental Meditation program is the most powerful preventive medicine we have. It pays for itself many times over.
Dr. Sandeep Chaudhary is Medical Director of Wellspring Endocrinology at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla, California.
_______________________________________________________
TM instructor Robert Roth explains why there's a tuition:
Filmmaker David Lynch answers this question
