The term meditation, although common, is often used inaccurately as people do not understand its true meaning. Moreover, as the stress in the workplace and academic institutions increase, the tension among people also subsequently increases. To help enlighten the students and staff on meditation, specifically the Transcendental Meditation (TM) and its benefits, an online talk titled “The Power of Meditation” was organised by Centre for Foundation Studies of Sungai Long Campus lecturer S K Dilashni Serilharan on 21 August 2020 via Microsoft Teams.

The online talk was given by Phang Nan Zi, a certified TM teacher, who has been actively teaching Transcendental Meditation for the past two years, while moderating it was Dilashni. The talk aimed to inform and educate the participants on four topics, namely the concept of consciousness, the benefits, definition and steps of TM.

Dilashni kick-started the session by introducing Phang and her past achievements. Phang began her part by explaining the concept of consciousness. “We humans are always stressed, struggling and suffering because we constantly want more and more. If we do not achieve our wants, we become unfulfilled and our stress increases. Thus, we need to take action to try and achieve the things we want, but before that, we need to have the thoughts to do so. The basis for thoughts is our knowledge and understanding on that particular subject matter, but to further expand our understanding and knowledge, we must increase the consciousness of our mind, which is another word for our awareness,” said Phang. She added an analogy of her own, stating, “Think of it as standing at the base of a mountain. When we look up, we have an extremely limited view, which represents our limited understanding. However, when we stand at the top of the mountain, our view becomes widespread as we can see everything, indicating that our understanding has become wider. This shows that the position we are in represents our level of consciousness. So, in essence, TM can help us to reach and expand our pure consciousness, or let us reach the ‘top of the mountain’, if you like.”

She continued the talk by explaining the benefits of TM, during which, she also showed several videos to further describe her points. According to her, there are three main advantages in applying TM to our daily lives and these advantages have been scientifically proven. “The first benefit of TM is that it helps with the development of the brain and mental activities. Research has found that TM produces a unique kind of brain functioning orderliness known as an EEG coherence. The next reason is it leads to improved health. A lot of diseases, including high blood pressure, depression and heart attacks are a result of excessive stress. Soldiers and veterans can also suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder due to the stress of being on the battlefield. Thus, TM can help to decrease our stress, consequently lowering the likelihood of suffering from these illnesses,” said Phang. She added, “TM can help with developing our personal and professional relationships too. Research found that after practising TM, there is an improvement in people’s personal and work relationships. Their appreciation and tolerance towards others improved as well.”

Phang moved on to explain what TM is. According to her, TM is simple, natural, effortless, easy to learn and enjoyable. It can be done while sitting comfortably with eyes closed for 15 to 20 minutes twice daily, and anyone can practice it, regardless of religion or belief. She also enlightened the participants on the process of TM, “During Transcendental Meditation, we go into a state of ‘transcendence’, whereby our mind taps into something called the ‘source of thought’ which is our total inner potential. In this state, our thoughts become finer and finer and we go beyond the active thinking level. Many practitioners found that after practising TM, their thoughts became more powerful and clearer.” She concluded the session by comparing TM with two other categories of meditation. “The first category is the concentration meditation technique, in which, you are given a topic to think about while meditating. This technique is not very effective in helping you to reach the state of transcendence, since it restricts your mind to only one thing. The second technique is the contemplating technique. For this technique, you would normally be given a life quote or scenario to ‘contemplate’ about, so your mind will stay on the active level. With this, the mind does not have the opportunity to go into a deeper level. Thus, it can be said that no other meditation techniques can be done as vigorously, and this technique [TM] is proven as a lot of people who practised it saw the effects immediately,” said Phang.

Lastly, she talked about the steps of learning TM, whereby she broke it down to seven simple steps. She said, “The first step is the introductory talk, which is what we are doing now. The second step is the 15-minutes preparatory talk. The third step involves having a personal interview while the fourth step involves receiving instructions from a TM teacher. Step five to seven requires participants to attend three-day group checking session. And step three to seven are held over four consecutive days.”

The talk ended with a brief Q&A session.