Jul 1, 2024

July 2024

Dear Friend,

Here’s to delighting in the hazy lazy days of July, from your first blissful bite of a juicy strawberry to that long-awaited chance to lie in the hammock and read a great book. Be sure your Summer to-do list includes the deepest relaxation you can get: TM twice a day. 🌞

  • Last month’s blog written by women for women
  • Articles
    • American Holistic Nurses Association Features Presentation on TM for Nurses
    • Beach reading: Celebrities we love to quote talk about Transcendental Meditation
    • Take the TM course and learn about consciousness in our six-night women’s retreat
    • Online course: deep principles that connect each of us to the universe
  • Q&A: At what age do we stop giving our children advice?
  • What women say: overcoming fear and becoming happy again

Have you had a few minutes to read the articles posted on our blog in June? If you haven’t, the links are below. You can also visit our blog homepage at any time to use our search feature for topics as diverse as How to Help an Emotional Teenager and Proof of Heaven.

Meditation and the Ideally Tranquil Journey Into Motherhood

“A mother’s life is the expression of the creative power of nature.” – Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

Pregnancy, while often sweet and joyful, can also be a time of exhaustion and increased vulnerability. It is a delicate balancing act, to navigate the intricacies of your own self-care with the challenges of pregnancy. Women can suddenly face various risks that can affect their own health and well-being as well as that of their unborn child.

Read MOre

Meditation for Millennial Moms

In 2021, 2,000 women in the U.S. who were between the ages of 25 and 35 were surveyed about their health and wellness experiences. The response from 64% (three out of five women) showed a preference for health solutions beyond those recommended by their physicians.

Millennials (aka Generation Y, born between 1981 and 1996) comprise the most populated generation in American history, even surpassing baby boomers. Millennial women now consider that the top three health issues to address early on—in order to prevent issues later in life—are stress, low energy, and significant changes in weight.

Read MOre

TM for Nurses at the June AHNA Conference

TM for Nurses, a division of TM for Women, gave well-received inspiring presentations in June at the National American Holistic Nurses Association Conference in Rochester, Minnesota, the hometown of the Mayo Clinic. The conference was attended by more than 400 nurses and more nurses attended virtually. Hundreds of nurses then stopped by our exhibit table (pictured) for more information.

Transcendental Meditation for Nurses: Developing Capacity for Improved Judgment, Decision Making and Resilience Under Stress is peer reviewed and endorsed by the American Holistic Nurses Association.

Guilty Pleasures Beach Reading: Women Celebrities Talk TM

A note from the writer of our mini-magazines: I tend to avoid much name dropping of celebrities because many women feel that serious endorsements from science are more persuasive and reliable. However, it’s Summer now and we’re keeping it light and breezy.

So here are some remarks describing their experience with the Transcendental Meditation technique from women who are… just that!—women, like you and me—but celebrated and famous. Enjoy!

CNBC reported that at Oprah’s 2020 Vision Your Life In Focus Tour, Lady Gaga and Oprah Winfrey spoke about their shared love of the Transcendental Meditation program. Describing her first experience, Oprah had once said, “It [TM] was a powerfully energizing yet calming experience. I didn’t want it to end. When it did, I walked away feeling fuller than when I started.”

Jennifer Lopez told Us Weekly that she learned Transcendental Meditation in 2023 because, she said, “It’s overwhelming sometimes, doing all of the things I do at once. 20 minutes a day in the morning and at night. It was necessary.”

Katy Perry has been often spoken publicly or in interviews about the benefits of the Transcendental Meditation technique. She says that TM helps her to clear her mind and focus on the present moment to stay calm and centered, even when she’s feeling stressed or overwhelmed. She points out that it’s not a religion but is the most powerful rest you can have, giving moments of peace. “This is an incredible, simple, useful tool that has made such an impact on me.”

Amy Schumer reported “[TM] totally changed the game for me—energy, focus, a general bettering of life and feeling just physically and mentally better.”

Eva Mendes: “I’m actually huge into meditation, Transcendental Meditation, and that really helps create not only a sense of balance, but all the other stuff—this is gonna sound cliche—but serenity and kind of a calm state of mind. And not that I’m like that all the time, but it helps me deal with life’s ups and downs, coming from more of a centered place. It helps [me] with creativity. … I can give you a list of things I think, but it’s tapping into something so deep that when I reap the rewards, I do not even know I’m reaping them.”

From journalist Soledad O’Brien: “I feel healthier and have fewer stressful days and more energy and clarity of mind. TM allows me to experience a state of deep rest and relaxation that can be game changing and sometimes a lifesaver in a crazy world.”

And a sweet, talented women whom I had the pleasure of teaching, Liv Tyler, said, “After I did the first week of Transcendental Meditation where I did it twice a day…. from that moment on, I’ve never been that frazzled or that tired ever again. It was like it sort of restored my body on such a deep level.”

One more? Kate Hudson reported, “I started practicing Transcendental Meditation a year and a half ago. Meditation has saved my sanity–not that I was crazy, but in this world of hyperspeed, overstimulation, no escape from technology, and constant emotional stress, it’s very hard to stay centered and grounded.”

July or August: Learn TM in a Women’s Residential Retreat

Join us for a women’s in-residence retreat to learn the Transcendental Meditation technique at The Raj in Fairfield, Iowa from July 13th to 18th or August 13th to 18th.

Fee: Room and Board $1000. The TM instruction course fee is additional and is income-based. Determine your fee at: https://tm-women.org/course-fee/

Devote a few days to your own well-being and self-development. Gain profound relaxation to dissolve deep-rooted stresses and awaken deeper, more fulfilling values of your own inner Being.

You will enjoy:

  • The complete course of instruction in the TM practice.*
  • Introduction to easy-to-practice simple Yoga Asanas and Pranayama (a relaxing, neuro-respiratory breathing technique). These practices help remove surface stress and strain, and smooth the way to deeper experiences in meditation.
  • Presentations on Maharishi Ayurveda, the principles of our Ties to the Universe, Ayurvedic Self-Pulse reading, Good Health through Prevention, and architecture in accord with the laws of nature.
  • An introduction to, and tour of, Maharishi International University.
  • Beautiful, single en-suite accommodations in a renowned Ayurvedic spa hotel.
  • Delicious organic, vegetarian cuisine.

* Prior to participation in this course, you will have the opportunity to learn more about the TM practice through a free two-part prerequisite presentation and short personal interview.

To register for your free presentation and interview, and to begin your course application process, click here.

Ties to the Universe Online Course

Do you ever wonder how you are connected to the universe? In fact, there are profound laws of nature that structure and guide life everywhere, from within our own consciousness to our body to the solar system to the ever expanding universe.

These principles are beautifully presented and illustrated in our online Ties to the Universe 16-lesson course. Beginning the last week of September, the class will meet for two evenings each week for 75 minutes each meeting. The schedule will be determined by a poll of course participants.

“The genius of this course is how the principles are stitched together, each building upon the last, so that when the final one arrives—that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts—it becomes an “ah ha” moment that “yes!”—while I was enamored with each individual principle and how deep and meaningful it was, when tied together and presented in this way, they offer much, much more: a roadmap I will have forever to better comprehend both the vastness of the universe as a whole, and the simplicity and genius of each part.” – past course participant

The prerequisite to taking this course is a free 40-minute introductory meeting which will be offered on Tuesday evening, July 30th at 7 PM central time, and will help you decide if you wish to enroll in the course. Register for this meeting by emailing to jhoffman@tm-women.org

Course fee: $200.

Note: If you haven’t yet learned the TM technique, you’ll need to do so and complete your TM instruction by September 10th.

Q: Maharishi, at what age, if at any age, do we as parents stop telling our children what to do?

Maharishi’s answer:

Good sons and daughters always, even if they are 60 or 80, sit with their parents and talk to them and take their advice and always, always benefit from their advice, always, always, whatever the son has grown to be. Even if the son becomes very highly educated and becomes a president of the state, he would come—with all his activities leaving behind—and come and sit with his mother, 90 years old mother, and chat with her this way and this way and the mother will sometimes say one word here and one word there.

All the advisers of the state giving him all kinds of specialized knowledge. From mother he receives some specialized kind of knowledge. This is one department from where he can benefit from the experience of 90 years of living. And one word from mother could be so helpful for the whole nation. Because the advice that a 90-year-old person can give, mother or father, to his son—to someone who thinks a part of his life and someone of whom he’s proud—he would like to give him some advice and the son just blooms.

This is the relationship of mother and father. So [one’s] whole age is there to learn something from father and mother, to learn something. There is that learning—and it is not of any special subject of geography or physics—but it’s the impulse of life that one receives from mother and father. It’s impulse of life. They may be talking something here and there which may be completely irrelevant to your field of interest, but sometimes they are quiet and silent and not even talking. That silence is full of love which your heart can only nourish—it can only be nourished. It can only get life from that silence, just sitting with them. It’s a very, very enriching experience of life at every age and all age.

“I had a lot of stress and was filled with fear and tension. I was glad to learn Transcendental Meditation and I found big changes in my life. My mood has improved, and my fears and tensions have decreased. On a 1st of June children’s day event I could finally even dance with my three year-old boy and was happy. I meditate regularly.”

— Nare Babajanyan, 22 year-old refugee from Artsakh, now living in Yeghegnadzor, Armenia. (Pictured here with her mother.)

Editor’s note: We’d love to hear your comments on the benefits you’ve received from the TM practice. And, with your permission, we’ll publish them here for other women to enjoy. Send your comment to info@tm-women.org