McCartney, Donovan Concert to Raise Funds for David Lynch Foundation
Legendary rock musician and former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney will headline the David Lynch Foundation's benefit concert, “Change Begins Within,” at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on Saturday, April 4. The concert will launch a global initiative to teach one million children the Transcendental Meditation® technique.
Sir Paul, who is co-chairing the event, learned the Transcendental Meditation technique in 1967 and attended a course with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in India in 1968.
Sir Paul will share top billing with Donovan, Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam, Sheryl Crow, Ben Harper, Moby, jazz flutist Paul Horn, and Mike Love of the Beach Boys.
David Lynch, Russell Simmons, Laura Dern, and other surprise guests will fill out the star-studded slate as presenters.
The concert will raise funds to teach one million at-risk children to meditate, giving them the life-long tools to overcome stress and violence — and promote peace and success in their lives. Over 60,000 children in various countries have learned the Transcendental Meditation technique in the past two and a half years thanks to the David Lynch Foundation.
“Teach one million kids to meditate — and we will change the world overnight,” Mr. Lynch said. “This will be a celebration of Maharishi’s life-transforming knowledge.”
Mr. Lynch, an award-winning filmmaker, inspired Sir Paul and his fellow artists to honor Maharishi and help the David Lynch Foundation spread peace.
More information can be found online at http://www.davidlynchfoundation.org/concert.html.
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Student Projects Include “Living Machine,” Wood-Fired Oven
Sustainable Living students created a range of Earth-friendly projects last block, including a “living machine,” a brick oven capable of making 20–30 loaves of bread at a time, a solar collector, a website that monitors the energy performance of their classrooms, and a solar hot water heater.
The living machine, or aquaponic system, illustrates how a natural, living system can filter waste water. The self-contained system includes a tank for goldfish and circulates their wastewater through a system of edible plants, which use the waste as food, and then circulates the fresh water back into the tank. Among the plants to be grown in the system will be duckweed and others that will supply food for the fish.
The system is a small-scale model of the sort of living machine that could be used to purify a home, office complex, or an entire city.
“The goal is to create living buildings that give back more than they take from the environment,” said student Joy Salmon. “You get food, you get fresh water, you get the sound of flowing water, and you get the ambience of plants. It’s like having nature inside with you rather than having it be ‘out there.’ It helps us realize we’re part of the cycle.”
A different group of students applied their best masonry skills to build a large wood-fired brick oven that will eventually be moved from their workshop to a location outside, likely near the Sustainable Living wing.
Student Marco Sunseri said the oven will be capable of baking 20–30 loaves of bread at a time, and more importantly, will foster a local baking economy. The students were inspired in part by their class in artisanal foods and the book The Bread Builders, which explores the process of baking bread and teaches how to make masonry ovens. They also visited a deli in Ann Arbor that specializes in baking via such an oven.
Yet another group is installing a gizmo called a Hobo data logger, which tracks the amount of energy coming into the Sustainable Living wing from the wind turbine and solar panels and how much is being used by each of the six classrooms. The group is also setting up a website that will let them monitor the energy usage online.
“If you’re going to use renewable energy, you can’t waste it,” said student Tom Lassota.
That group is also continuing work on a solar hot water heater begun in an earlier projects class.
And a fourth group built a “sunspace,” a sort of lean-to on the south side of the building that consists of a wood frame covered with plastic, and like a greenhouse, collects heat — which is circulated into the classroom to provide warmth without the use of fossil fuels. When the temperature was recently zero outside, the sunspace was 97 degrees.
Eventually the space will also become, in the words of student Jason Lanning, “an artsy lounge where students can hang out.”
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Study Shows Students Reach Higher Stages of Development
By Patricia Boland
Research completed by faculty member Susan Brown using standardized measures of human development indicates significant overall growth among the University’s undergraduates — with growth to higher stages more frequent than in the general population.
Dr. Brown’s dissertation using Loevinger’s Sentence Completion Test for ego (self) development found that nearly 30% of students were at advanced stages, called “post-conventional development,” by the time they graduated whereas about 10% of the general population is at these levels.
“Studies have been done with senior executives showing similarly high levels of development, but it’s unusual to see this in a group of young people just finishing college,” Dr. Brown said.
Dr. Brown said individuals who exhibit post-conventional ego development are more integrated and have more autonomy and self-directed goals and values. They also have more wisdom, more ability to both recognize differences in people — different viewpoints, lifestyles, and so on — and be tolerant of differences.
Ego development is defined as how one views the world, including one’s concept of oneself and one’s relationship with the outer world. “It is not the same as development of higher states of consciousness, but it is getting at something deep in our character,” Dr. Brown said.
Even as freshmen, an unusually large percentage of students was at higher levels of development than in the general population, indicating the quality of students being attracted. But there was a wide range, with significant growth at every level by the senior year, including those starting out at higher stages. “Our older students also showed significant growth. It’s quite rare,” Dr. Brown said.
Dr. Brown’s research covered 140 undergraduate students from freshman to senior years. By way of comparison, she looked at 24 studies of students at other universities and found that it’s unusual to see the same sort of statistically significant growth for large groups of students as was seen in the M.U.M. students.
Dr. Brown also used Epstein’s Constructive Thinking Inventory, which she said measures a kind of practical intelligence and skill in action, such as getting on well in the workplace or classroom and having good problem-solving skills. Students also showed significant growth in this area.
Self-rated experiences of growth of consciousness through transcending were also reported, again finding significant positive change.
“I included in the paper descriptions of students’ experiences of transcending, which showed that here is a group — mostly of young Westerners — experiencing qualities of inner unity and bliss talked about in ancient texts such as the Bhagavad-Gita and Yoga Sutras,” Dr. Brown said. “And the beneficial results of this in their lives can be verified through standardized measures of growth.”
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New Study: Meditation Buffers Students against College Stress
A new study done at American University in Washington, D.C., found that students who practice the Transcendental Meditation technique are more resilient to the acute academic, financial, and social pressures of college life.
Published in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Psychophysiology, this is the first randomized, controlled study of the effects of the Transcendental Meditation technique on brain and physiological functioning in students, said M.U.M. researcher Fred Travis, first author of the study.
“We’ve done many studies of M.U.M. students, but this was the first opportunity we’ve had to do a well controlled experiment,” Dr. Travis said. “It was quite impressive that these differences showed up in just 10 weeks.”
The 50 subjects were randomly assigned to a Transcendental Meditation group or a control group. Physiological and psychological variables were measured at pretest, before the students were assigned to their groups. The posttest was 10 weeks later — just before final exam week.
At posttest, the meditating students had higher Brain Integration Scale scores, more alertness, and faster habituation to a loud tone — they were less jumpy and irritable.
He said that college is a time of considerable challenge for the student: most students are making major lifestyle decisions — and academic, financial, and social pressures mount up.
The control data from the study showed the detrimental effects of college life. “The nonmeditating control group had lower Brain Integration Scale scores, and an increase in sympathetic reactivity and sleepiness,” said Dr. Travis, who directs M.U.M.’s Center for Brain, Consciousness, and Cognition.
Practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique appeared to buffer effects of high stress. “Brain Integration Scale scores increased, sleepiness decreased, and sympathetic nervous system reactivity did not change from pretest to posttest,” Dr. Travis said. “These results suggest that the practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique can be of substantial value for those who face the rigors of an intense and challenging learning/working environment.”
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Dr. Travis Tours Major Israeli Universities
By Lee Leffler
In November and December, faculty member Fred Travis addressed academic departments at all major universities in Israel on how the Transcendental Meditation technique reverses the adverse effects of stress and fatigue on the brain.
Dr. Travis also spoke to 65 senior researchers in the Weisman Institute, equivalent to the National Institutes of Health, on the fourth and fifth states of consciousness: transcendental consciousness and cosmic consciousness.
“The audience listened intently, intrigued with the concept that Transcendental Meditation could be a scientific tool to explore states of consciousness beyond waking and sleeping,” Dr. Travis said.
The head of the neuroscience department met with Dr. Travis after the talk and asked if the Transcendental Meditation technique results in cosmic experiences. Dr. Travis said “yes.” The department head said, “I want to learn the Transcendental Meditation technique because I want cosmic experiences.”
“This suggests that, after all the materialistic scientific questions are satisfied, top-level scientists look beyond to something bigger,” Dr. Travis said. “It also indicates that some very good scientists are not lost in the materialistic paradigm. When they hear that they can go beyond materialism, they are interested in examining the data.”
Dr. Travis spoke at the University of Del Hai, located on the Lebanese border. The town has been bombed eight times in the last 10 years, and incidence of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is very high. Researchers at the trauma center in this school discussed with Dr. Travis how the Transcendental Meditation technique could be used as a treatment.
“The Middle East problems have a long history,” Dr. Travis says. “They cannot be solved on the surface level of talk and treaties. The only answer is to raise collective consciousness.”
University staff members Joshua and Phalya Cohen, who are from Israel, raised the funding for Dr. Travis’s travel, and practitioners of the Transcendental Meditation technique in Israel hosted him during the two-week tour.
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Professor Ken West Exhibits Photos at National Center for Nature Photography
By Livia Cole
“The Sweet Light,” a solo exhibit of 33 landscape and nature photographs by professor Ken West opened in January at the National Center for Nature Photography at Secor Metropark, Ohio.
The Center hosts the only gallery in America that is solely devoted to nature and landscape photography and has presented the work of some of the country’s best-known nature and landscape photographers. Mr. West has also been invited to teach a workshop on high dynamic range photography at the center.
A fourth-generation photographer, Mr. West learned the trade as a child from his father and grandfather. He has worked professionally in both photography and graphic arts and currently teaches business classes and digital photography.
He began actively taking nature photographs about seven years ago. “While walking on the Jefferson County Trail System, I came to appreciate the natural beauty that surrounds our Fairfield community,” he says.
The advent of high-quality digital cameras helped Mr. West in his quest to capture nature’s beauty because it allows much greater control over the reproduction of color than traditional film. “The camera captures a much smaller range of brightness than what the human eye sees,” he says.
With high-definition photography, however, the artist can take multiple exposures, then combine them into one image with a greater range of tones than traditional color photography.
Most of his photographs show the forests, meadows, and wetlands along the Fairfield trail system. “I like early morning or late afternoon light when the sun is low,” Mr. West says. “The backlighting creates interesting shadows and textures. While walking on the trails I experience the silence and organizing power of nature and try to record it.”
Mr. West’s work can be viewed at http://www.ioscapes.com.
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Youth Conference To Be Part of South Africa Rotating U
An international youth conference is being planned for the last day in February as a feature of the Rotating University course to South Africa.
As part of the visits to Johannesburg, the course participants will help organize and hold an international youth conference with the 120 students from South Africa’s Maharishi Invincibility Institute.
The conference will focus on developing cooperation and exchange agreements between the Institute and the University, as well as on developing student associations and networks that will promote national and international development projects in the U.S. and South Africa.
Part of this cooperation will include ways of promoting the development of Consciousness-Based(SM) education projects in both countries. Another part will be to help promote student internships, exchanges, and student teaching opportunities for both groups.
Helping to organize the conference are course leaders Chris and Ellen Jones, together with Institute administrators and teachers Taddy Blecher, Richard Peycke, and Gift Serero, and the “I Am Universal” student association, led by M.U.M. student Austin Ayer and David Nayan. All traveling students will also be involved in organizing the conference.
“I’m very excited about this upcoming conference and the possibilities it presents for raising consciousness among the South African youth,” Mr. Ayer said.
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