General Degree Requirements
Forest Academies Courses for Bachelor’s Degree Students
A Forest Academy is a two-week period of study of particular themes of Vedic Science, where students will explore, through direct experience and understanding, the most vital element in creation — the field of pure consciousness that is the inner intelligence at the basis of every individual and the entire universe.
Click on course title to see course description:
- FOR 103 Health-Related Fitness
- FOR 419 Inspiration through Film
- FOR 421 World Art and Media
- FOR 423 Leadership for Community Building
- FOR 424 Professional Success
- FOR 432 The Philosophy of Action
- FOR 433 Women, Wisdom and the World
- FOR 434 The Creative Process
- FOR 438 Ideal Relationships
- FOR 446 Nobel Laureates
- FOR 462 Maharishi Yoga Asanas
- FOR 463 Ramayana
- FOR 469 Maharishi on God and Religion
- FOR 470 Maharishi Vedic Science and Sustainability
- FOR 4531 Reading the Vedic Literature and Gandharva Veda
FOR 103 Health-Related Fitness: Physical Activity to Promote Longevity and Fitness for Life
This course presents the latest knowledge from Western science and the Maharishi Consciousness-Based Health Care program concerning the optimum daily routine for establishing the foundation for lifelong excellent health and growing enlightenment. The major focus will be on the details of the ideal routine of sleep, diet, exercise, meaningful activity, recreation and the importance of the regular experience of pure consciousness for optimum health and evolution. This course will combine both lectures and physical activity labs. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: STC 108/109
FOR 419 Inspiration through Film: Exploring the Fundamentals of Entertainment
This Forest Academy course will focus on films that have created an uplifting influence on society and attempt to isolate the fundamentals of inspiration and entertainment. Students will view select films from the past 75 years and discuss their messages and the impact they have had in the context of Maharishi's theory of communication and their role in heralding the coming Age of Enlightenment. (2 credits)
FOR 421 World Art and Media: How Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, and Film Mirror Consciousness
In this course students discover how art and media from many cultures express the universal qualities, principles, and structures of consciousness identified by Maharishi Vedic Science. Topics explored in art and media include: transcending, self-referral, creativity, archetypes or structures of awareness, qualities of pure consciousness (the Unified Field of Natural Law), qualities of the Veda, principles such as how the coexistence of opposite values structures wholeness in art and life, and the art of living in higher states of consciousness. Includes a field trip to a meditating artist's gallery. (No field trip fee. 2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 423 Leadership for Community Building: Progressing Together to Enjoy Fulfillment Together
This course will focus on providing students with tools and techniques to be effective leaders and exceptional group participants. There will be a deep emphasis on improving communication skills and developing greater self-awareness. Students will learn about individual tendencies, team dynamics, mediation and facilitation. They will also learn how to recognize subtle body language in communication and how to recognize and address the needs and concerns of diverse individuals they are working with. Together we will explore what it means to be a leader within our communities, and specifically, in the Maharishi University of Management community. The class will be interactive and provide students with time to experience the lessons through various planned activities. All students interested in being part of the Peer Mentorship must take this course. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 424 Professional Success: Skills in Action
The goal of this course is to familiarize students with soft skills, intra-personal and interpersonal, which determine a person's ability to excel or at least fit in a particular social structure, such as a project team or a company. These skills include competencies in areas such as communication, personal habits, time-management, personal relations, etiquette, self-motivation, self-discipline, persuasion, etc. Furthermore, students will understand cultural orientation of the U.S. i.e., how people in the U.S. speak, act, negotiate and make decisions. Furthermore, students will learn how these skills arise from their common source in the eternal Laws of Nature as explained by the Science of Creative Intelligence. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 432 The Philosophy of Action: Transcending the Field of Activity as the Basis for Right Action and Fulfillment in Life
This course investigates the explanation in Maharishi Vedic Science of the role of action in the development of higher states of consciousness and how action performed from the level of pure consciousness spontaneously gains the support of all the Laws of Nature for maximum success. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 433 Women, Wisdom and the World: Exploring the lives of great women, including us
Through the writings of great women throughout time, and the knowledge of Maharishi Vedic Science, this course for women will look at those essential qualities springing from the deepest part of ourselves, and how developing them creates an innate and natural wisdom that becomes central to who we are as individuals. How we apply, and equally important, how we protect these qualities in the world is what makes a woman great and what brings her fulfillment in every area of her life. Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103, ladies only.
FOR 434 The Creative Process: Tracing Human Creativity to the Infinite Creativity of Natural Law — Developing the Unbounded Source of Your Own Creativity
From the standpoint of the Maharishi Science of Creative IntelligenceSM program, creativity expresses the fundamental characteristic of Nature itself — to expand through the process of evolution and find full expression. In this course, students explore the full range of creativity, from the creative dynamics within the pure, self-referral level of consciousness, through self-expression in the arts and other fields, and culminating in Self-expression in unity consciousness. This rich and stimulating course, developed by faculty in the Departments of Fine Arts and Literature, includes beautiful tapes of Maharishi speaking on the creative process and a wide range of other creative activities. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 438 Ideal Relationships: Improving Your Relationships by Exploring the Principles of Natural Law That Operate in All Relationships
We live our lives in relationships, beginning with our mother, father, and family, expanding to our friends, spouse, and children, our business associates, our fellow citizens, and on to all the people of the world. Handling these relationships with wisdom, appropriateness, and love is central to our good fortune. The Science of Creative Intelligence and Maharishi Vedic Science provide insights into how all relationships have their source in the self-referral dynamics of consciousness, our own Self — and guidelines for ensuring that our relationships are in accord with the natural evolution of life in accord with Natural Law. The course features tapes of Maharishi, guest presentations, group projects, and practical knowledge of etiquette. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 446 Nobel Laureates
In this course, students hear presentations from a range of faculty on the latest and most exciting discoveries in each of their fields — discoveries that either have won a Nobel Prize or are worthy of one. Students learn more about the discovery process by exploring, with leading University faculty, the cutting edge of knowledge and the people behind it in a variety of disciplines ranging from physics to the visual arts. Students' own self-referral creative process will be enlivened through multimedia presentations, lively discussions, readings, and creative exercises. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 462 Maharishi Yoga Asanas
The goal of this course is to enhance physiological balance and mind-body coordination through simple Maharishi Yoga Asanas program postures and breathing exercises. This course gives a comprehensive understanding of the nature and attainment of Yoga, which is the unification of individual and cosmic life. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 463 Ramayana
In this course students will study the Ramayana, one of the great epics of the Vedic Literature. Students will read the Ramayana in Sanskrit and English, and will see videos of the Ramayana created by Ramanand Sagar. Students will see videotapes by Maharishi on topics related to the Ramayana, and will participate in presentations on the Ramayana. (2 credits) Prerequisite: instruction in the TM-Sidhi program, and for undergraduates FOR 103
FOR 469 Maharishi on God and Religion
This two-week course will focus on Maharishi's knowledge on the nature of God, religion, prayer, ritual, scripture, spiritual development, devotion and service, the relationship between science and religion, right and wrong, the kingdom of God on Earth, and the state of God-realization. The course includes extended group practice of Maharishi Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs, including Yogic Flying. (2 credits) Prerequisite: instruction in the TM-Sidhi program, and for undergraduates: FOR 103
FOR 470 Maharishi Vedic Science and Sustainability
This advanced course presents the knowledge of Maharishi Organic Agriculture from the Vedic perspective and is for everyone who wants to know about truly healthy food and how it is produced. Participants learn Maharishi's profound insights — that gardening and agriculture are the natural expression of "agreeing with the culturing intelligence of natural law." From Unified Field theory, agriculture is studied as the science of transformation. The nutrition cycle is studied in terms of the Veda. The course includes an in-depth review of the latest, most practical and profound principles and techniques of organic agriculture and gardening. These include soil science, composting and preparation of compost teas, no-till, no-dig, shallow-till, pasture cropping and no-kill cropping. Students will learn how modern chemical-industrial agriculture is being superseded by these more life-supporting methods. Maharishi's 'Poverty Removal Program' to create health, affluence, and national invincibility from the unused dust of any country will be reviewed.
FOR 4531 Reading the Vedic Literature and Gandharva Veda
This Forest Academy explores Gandharva Veda, the Vedic Literature that deals with music, dance, and theater. Students will read in Sanskrit excerpts from the principal Vedic text — the Natya Shastra; and from one of its commentaries — the Sangita Ratnakara. Included is regular listening to Maharishi Gandharva Veda music, both recorded and live, as well as study and discussions on the powerfully harmonizing and integrating effects of music on the physiology and environment. (2 credits) Prerequisite for undergraduates: FOR 103