Is there a bottom to the TM rabbit hole?
So does anyone ever hit the bottom of the TM rabbit hole?
Some people do. You have hit the bottom of the rabbit hole when you are have a psychological crash due to some combination of dissociation, depersonalization, induced hallucination, and induced psychosis.
For those reading this who may have skipped some earlier material, I'll repeat some references:
- The "TM Victim List" in the Kropinski lawsuit.
- The various personal stories, including my own, on TranceNet.
- The allegations of a former MUM professor that "outright lies and deception, are used to cover-up or sanitize the dangerous reality on campus of very serious nervous breakdowns, episodes of dangerous and bizarre behavior, suicidal and homicidal ideation, threats and attempts, psychotic episodes, crime, depression and manic behavior that often accompanied roundings (intensive group meditations with brainwashing techniques)."
You may also be interested in the "The Report of Germany's Institute for Youth and Society on TM".
But does everyone hit the bottom of the TM rabbit hole? The answer is "No"...
Most begin TM and then quit again very quickly! These are the people who are not susceptible to trance induction, or who at least are not susceptible to the trance induction techniques used in TM. They therefore don't get anything at all out of TM and quickly drop it.
Others in fact do enjoy some "relaxation" benefit, but they do not internalize TM dogma and they never have problems with "unstressing." They may continue meditating "20 minutes twice a day" with no problems.
Other people experience some "unstressing" or "headache" difficulties from even the basic "twenty minutes twice a day" practice. In such cases the TM checkers and teachers will encourage them to continue with the TM practice even though they should really quit because they are experiencing toxic side-effects. However, I don't know that anyone who has completely limited themselves to "twenty minutes twice a day" has ever had dramatic psychological damage as a result. Still, these "unstressing" symptoms indicate that they shouldn't really be continuing the practice, and they probably wouldn't continue in the face of such difficulties if TM personnel didn't talk them out of quitting. As with the prior group, I believe that these people are susceptible to TM trance induction techniques but have not proven susceptible to TM dogmatic indoctrination. However, these people have proven sensitive to even the amount of trance, dissociation, and toxic suggestion that even the basic "twenty minutes twice a day" brings. Hopefully they will stop paying attention to the TM checkers and teachers and will quit the practice of TM entirely.
Other people internalize the TM dogma, fall down the rabbit hole, and continue to fall indefinitely without ever "crashing." Their fall down the rabbit hole never stops since they always "need" to purchase more and more TM offerings, and also since Mahesh is always coming up with more courses, more techniques, and more services for sale. Almost all such people will have to deal with "unstressing", but they manage to survive it. Falling down the rabbit hole becomes a lifestyle, possibly even to the extent that they move to a "sidha community", or that they become "TM monks" by joining the "Thousand-Headed Purusha Course", or they become "TM nuns" by joining the "Mother Divine Course." They also completely believe in some extremely strange things.
But others fall down the TM rabbit hole and do
end up hitting bottom, crashing and burning. What is the
response of Mahesh and his organization to such casualties? It is
something that I call "Spiritual Darwinism", which I discuss next.
