Analysis of the cover story about meditation and yoga in the news magazine DER SPIEGEL, issue 40, 2023
Bernd Zeiger and Wolfgang MoselleThe news magazine DER SPIEGEL from September 30, 2023 (issue 40) has meditation and yoga as its cover topic. However, as it turns out when reading the article, it is less about meditation and yoga in the authentic sense, but rather about the mindfulness exercises that have emerged in recent times.
The connection between these exercises and meditation in the sense of yoga is not directly discussed in the article. The reader is therefore faced with the challenge of untangling different threads of information.
Analyzing information is very necessary because even so it relates to certain facts, they are always prepared in some way. This “perspective weighting” gives the words and images a certain power. Information media uses this to arouse the interest of readers.
Press reports about yoga more or less clearly reflect people's growing desire to respond to the pressure of modern times in a constructive and precautionary manner. Yoga offers this opportunity because it enables direct access to the area that is responsible for the orderly interaction of all areas of life.
Through the direct experience of the connection between mind, body and environment, yoga shows that all problems and conflicts as symptoms of an imbalance in this interaction.
Each individual problem is then resolved by gradually cultivating and using the intelligence potential accessible through yoga.
1. Yoga meditation vs. mindfulness
“Completely detached” - this title of the SPIEGEL article analyzed here refers to the gap between the subject and the world and how much the whole person suffers from it.
Press reports about yoga more or less clearly reflect people's growing desire to respond to the pressure of modern times in a constructive and precautionary manner. Yoga offers this opportunity because it enables direct access to the area that is responsible for the orderly interaction of all areas of life.
Through the direct experience of the connection between mind, body and environment, yoga shows that all problems and conflicts as symptoms of an imbalance in this interaction.
Each individual problem is then resolved by gradually cultivating and using the intelligence potential accessible through yoga.
1. Yoga meditation vs. mindfulness
“Completely detached” - this title of the SPIEGEL article analyzed here refers to the gap between the subject and the world and how much the whole person suffers from it.
"The years of the pandemic were exhausting, the war in Europe triggers fears, as does the knowledge of climate change. Problems, crises, arguments, yes, even hatred, everywhere you look. Added to this are the many demands at work, in the family, even in their free time. It's clear that people see the problem and are doing a lot to counteract it, escape the stress and do something good for themselves." (DER SPIEGEL; Issue 40, 2023)
Wanting to create balance through mindfulness; according to DER SPIEGEL turns out to be deceptive. Since mindfulness increases selfish behavior this suggests that mindfulness does not really solve the problems of civilization; but rather strengthens them in the long term. To confirm this assumption, DER SPIEGEL presents research that establishes a connection between the socio-economic stress situation of people in industrialized countries and the mindfulness hype. A mindfulness researcher quoted by SPIEGEL sums up the connection: “Mindfulness meets the logic of capitalism.” The research quotated by the SPIEGEL leads to the following vicious circle:
-- Gap between subjective well-being and environment - Entrepreneurial egoism - Profit optimization - Social indifference - Stress in society - Mindfulness as a balance - Increasing the gap between subject and object --
Contrary to this, practitioners of yoga quoted by DER SPIEGEL paint a completely different, progressive picture of the effects of meditation:
Box 1
-- Gap between subjective well-being and environment - Entrepreneurial egoism - Profit optimization - Social indifference - Stress in society - Mindfulness as a balance - Increasing the gap between subject and object --
Contrary to this, practitioners of yoga quoted by DER SPIEGEL paint a completely different, progressive picture of the effects of meditation:
Box 1
DER SPIEGEL Issue 40, 2023Vedic Meditation and Yoga: Authentic yoga
1. Yoga and meditation
2 Unifying effects
3. Vedic heritage
1. Yoga and meditation
2 Unifying effects
3. Vedic heritage
Statements in DER SPIEGEL that refer to authentic meditation and yoga
Re 1. Meditation an aspect of yoga - relaxation - without stress and fear
Re 2. Yoga makes you more sensitive to the important things in life, not just the self, but is also aimed at others - Yoga makes you more open to bigger things - causes lasting changes in the brain - has a rejuvenating effec
Re 3. Meditation is one aspect of the extensive yoga teachings. Yoga, in turn, is rooted in the same tradition as Hinduism and includes various styles - most of which are united by the path to enlightenment.
To extend the scope of societal interactions, a risk analysis of mindfulness is not enough. This may even increase dependency or risk. A fundamental, qualitative expansion in the methodology is required, which is part of yoga teaching. Scientific research can help here. So far, academic science has not only been able to determine the requirements and limits in the application of mindfulness methods, but also determined the foundations of progress through which yoga contributes to the quality of life for everyone by promoting cooperation (coherence).
Mindfulness exercises only provide a short-term solution but in the long term actually increase the pressure of problems - this is what the precise analysis of the SPIEGEL article shows.
The modern mindfulness hype, which SPIEGEL is primarily and rightly examining critically, ultimately goes back to the teachings of Buddha, who around 3,000 years ago prepared the methods of yoga specifically for monks who consciously wanted to maintain a lifestyle turned away from the world. The regional forms of Buddha's teaching that emerged in the monasteries of East Asia over the following centuries now form the basis of modern mindfulness methods.
The modern concepts of mindfulness are therefore the result of a development that took place predominantly in the monastic area. The experiences with mindfulness presented by SPIEGEL show that it promotes an indifferent and extremely individualizing attitude to life. The scientifically proven effects of mindfulness exercises confirm this spectrum of effects, in line with the historical development of mindfulness.
What is noteworthy is that in order to produce this effect in society as a whole, it is only necessary for a small percentage of the population to practice meditation and yoga. Yoga meditation reactivates neglected brain functions and taps into unused mental potential. This important contribution of yoga meditation research is completely ignored in the SPIEGEL article. The corresponding theory is now partially accessible in neurophysiological consciousness research, but in a highly developed form in the Vedic science that has been handed down in India, which includes
yoga and mediation.
Mindfulness exercises only provide a short-term solution but in the long term actually increase the pressure of problems - this is what the precise analysis of the SPIEGEL article shows.
2. The limits of the psychological view
Meditation and yoga - a legacy of the world's oldest living culture - have been practiced since ancient times; to keep the quality of life at a high level. Methods that have proven themselves for such a long time cannot be as unrealistic and risky as the title of the SPIEGEL article claims.
When reading the SPIEGEL article, it quickly becomes clear why this misjudgment occurs. The term meditation is also used in the article for mindfulness methods that have recently found their way into psychology.
When reading the SPIEGEL article, it quickly becomes clear why this misjudgment occurs. The term meditation is also used in the article for mindfulness methods that have recently found their way into psychology.
The modern mindfulness hype, which SPIEGEL is primarily and rightly examining critically, ultimately goes back to the teachings of Buddha, who around 3,000 years ago prepared the methods of yoga specifically for monks who consciously wanted to maintain a lifestyle turned away from the world. The regional forms of Buddha's teaching that emerged in the monasteries of East Asia over the following centuries now form the basis of modern mindfulness methods.
The modern concepts of mindfulness are therefore the result of a development that took place predominantly in the monastic area. The experiences with mindfulness presented by SPIEGEL show that it promotes an indifferent and extremely individualizing attitude to life. The scientifically proven effects of mindfulness exercises confirm this spectrum of effects, in line with the historical development of mindfulness.
Box 2
In contrast, yoga teachings support all lifestyles, life goals and areas of life through the direct experience of the common origin of all life phenomena that connects everything. According to their self-image, meditation and yoga promote the universal principles that apply to every path of development. Whatever a person strives for, which areas of their life need strengthening, whether they have leadership skills or prefer seclusion, everyone can find fulfillment on their personal path through meditation and yoga. Yoga always combines the individually specific with the all-encompassing general.
The relevance of yoga to life is already established in yoga scriptures that are more than 5,000 years old. Since yoga was taught worldwide again in the 20th century and became generally known, the old works have once again become standard textbooks that are studied and commented on. Because DER Spiegel ignores the findings of the yoga teaching, it is left with only the language and methods of academic psychology, which interprets both meditation and mindfulness as "looking inwards". The technical term is introspection.
In order for introspection to become an exact scientific method, an additional principle is required that establishes an absolute reference system. In contrast to yoga, psychology does not yet have a concept of an undifferentiated absolute state of unity that underlies the subjective colors, emotions and meanings of the mind.
The situation is reversed in the state of mindfulness, which is characterized as “completely detached”. Here psychology lacks the principle that establishes a connection between the neutral observer and the value-laden and content-related area of feelings and thoughts.
This missing principle is exactly what yoga teachings call meditation. Meditation combines two opposite processes: The transition to the state of unity, of being, and the stimulation of the state of being into the area of thinking, emotions and senses.
What psychology can currently only do is demonstrate relative differences. However, it fails when it comes to classifying these differences into an overall picture. As a result, 1. yoga, meditation and mindfulness are not clearly differentiated and: 2. the risks proven with mindfulness are transferred to meditation and yoga.
The psychological perspective used by SPIEGEL cannot clearly identify the authentic, life-relevant meaning of yoga and meditation. This prevents the urgent expansion of the range of experience through meditation in the sense of yoga.
The present analysis therefore comes to the conclusion that academic psychology needs to be expanded towards a general science of consciousness. Only then is a life-conform classification of all consciousness phenomena possible.
3. Mental techniques in a success-oriented society
DER SPIEGEL, Issue 40, 2023
Traditional mental techniques from a psychological point of view
1. meditation seen psychologically: Introspection
2. mindfulness from a psychological point of view
Traditional mental techniques from a psychological point of view
1. meditation seen psychologically: Introspection
2. mindfulness from a psychological point of view
3. effects and risks of mindfulness exercises
Features and risks of mindfulness exercises according to DER SPIEGEL:
re 1. Looking inward - regulating down the stream of thoughts.
re 2. Mindfulness means to perceive one's own thoughts and feelings in the respective moment without evaluating them.
re 1. Looking inward - regulating down the stream of thoughts.
re 2. Mindfulness means to perceive one's own thoughts and feelings in the respective moment without evaluating them.
re 3. Mindfulness can have a positive effect on anxiety; but can also intensify panic attacks - mindfulness promotes manipulative behavior - narcissistic personalities love mindfulness - the ego can become completely the center of attention - mindfulness excites the brain - fewer deep sleep phases - mindfulness is no substitute for empathy and self-criticism - responsible mindfulness trainers recommend therapeutic accompaniment for people with anxiety disorders or trauma experiences - mindfulness can lead to self-overestimation - society of "singularities".
In contrast, yoga teachings support all lifestyles, life goals and areas of life through the direct experience of the common origin of all life phenomena that connects everything. According to their self-image, meditation and yoga promote the universal principles that apply to every path of development. Whatever a person strives for, which areas of their life need strengthening, whether they have leadership skills or prefer seclusion, everyone can find fulfillment on their personal path through meditation and yoga. Yoga always combines the individually specific with the all-encompassing general.
The relevance of yoga to life is already established in yoga scriptures that are more than 5,000 years old. Since yoga was taught worldwide again in the 20th century and became generally known, the old works have once again become standard textbooks that are studied and commented on. Because DER Spiegel ignores the findings of the yoga teaching, it is left with only the language and methods of academic psychology, which interprets both meditation and mindfulness as "looking inwards". The technical term is introspection.
In order for introspection to become an exact scientific method, an additional principle is required that establishes an absolute reference system. In contrast to yoga, psychology does not yet have a concept of an undifferentiated absolute state of unity that underlies the subjective colors, emotions and meanings of the mind.
The situation is reversed in the state of mindfulness, which is characterized as “completely detached”. Here psychology lacks the principle that establishes a connection between the neutral observer and the value-laden and content-related area of feelings and thoughts.
This missing principle is exactly what yoga teachings call meditation. Meditation combines two opposite processes: The transition to the state of unity, of being, and the stimulation of the state of being into the area of thinking, emotions and senses.
What psychology can currently only do is demonstrate relative differences. However, it fails when it comes to classifying these differences into an overall picture. As a result, 1. yoga, meditation and mindfulness are not clearly differentiated and: 2. the risks proven with mindfulness are transferred to meditation and yoga.
The psychological perspective used by SPIEGEL cannot clearly identify the authentic, life-relevant meaning of yoga and meditation. This prevents the urgent expansion of the range of experience through meditation in the sense of yoga.
The present analysis therefore comes to the conclusion that academic psychology needs to be expanded towards a general science of consciousness. Only then is a life-conform classification of all consciousness phenomena possible.
As surveys have shown, readers of SPIEGEL are primarily interested in social and economic issues. SPIEGEL therefore primarily looks at meditation and yoga in terms of their relevance to the performance society:
Quality optimization, yes, but not too much. Criticism yes; but no self-criticism, ego yes, but not too big. Anything that exceeds the controllable performance framework is then a risk.
The cover photo of SPIEGEL illustrates the urge for perfection as a bubble that eventually bursts and causes the earth's gravity to collapse. Behind this is the assumption in psychology that people's ability to experience and develop is limited.
Box 3
DER SPIEGEL, Issue 40, 2023
Social effects of mindfulness exercises - focus on economy
1. economy - individual performance
2. entrepreneurial activity
3. influence in society
Social effects of mindfulness exercises - focus on economy
1. economy - individual performance
2. entrepreneurial activity
3. influence in society
Statements of DER SPIEGEL about the role of mindfulness in economy
re 1. A market worth billions has been created around mindfulness. - Mindfulness instrument for cost-efficient performance optimization - tool for self-optimization - stress and psychologically caused ailments are among the most frequent reasons for sick leave - workplace health promotion
re 2. Market niche mindfulness courses - mindfulness apps - mindfulness meets the logic of capitalism - mindfulness entrepreneurs
re 3. Narcissistic people love mindfulness - courses without spiritual, religious or ideological superstructure, but on a scientific basis - social problems are seen as individual problems
re 1. A market worth billions has been created around mindfulness. - Mindfulness instrument for cost-efficient performance optimization - tool for self-optimization - stress and psychologically caused ailments are among the most frequent reasons for sick leave - workplace health promotion
re 2. Market niche mindfulness courses - mindfulness apps - mindfulness meets the logic of capitalism - mindfulness entrepreneurs
re 3. Narcissistic people love mindfulness - courses without spiritual, religious or ideological superstructure, but on a scientific basis - social problems are seen as individual problems
According to the yoga scriptures, human development potential is as unlimited as the cosmos and the unfolding of the potential does not occur separately or detached from the world, but in constant connection with the world.
This is where yoga differs from mindfulness. Mindfulness cultivates the uninvolved witness As objective observer, he is also the ideal of modern science. In this respect, mindfulness is no different from objective science.
Yoga, in contrast, cultivates the experiencer - ego, I, experiencer, observer - up to the point of becoming an unbounded, independent, and complete mirror of the entire world. By expanding the range of experience and action, the ego gains more and more familiarity with the world, absorbs more and more of the environment and becomes an owner of the world in such a way that actions are in accordance with the whole world. This unlimited expansion of the ego is the purpose and result of yoga.
This can also be expressed as the individual ego expanding to cosmic ego. There is then no longer any gap between ego and world. Both are in constant exchange and enrich each other. In this way, the further development of the entire world will be accelerated.
Through inner unity with the world, a harmonious relationship with everything in the world develops; with nature and fellow human beings: Infinity of the ego is the basis of the principle of giving
Development through exchange or interaction leads in the social sphere to an ideal social behavior, everyone receives everything needed.
This is also the socio-economic ideal of entrepreneurial activity. As a political slogan it is referred to as “change through trade”. Cooperativity and mutual exchange is the engine of social progress.
However, the prerequisite is that the drive to act is not based on self-interest, but rather with an eye on the bigger picture: the whole which is more than the collection of parts.
Deviations from this ideal are an expression of a gap between the ego and the world. This gap determines the degree of selfish-interest and is expressed in the accumulation of possessions, the overexploitation of nature and the exploitation of fellow human beings. Such behavior is called selfishness or egoism.
In psychology, in the judiciary and also colloquially, selfishness is viewed as misconduct. The selfishness of a few leads to the poverty of many.
Religions and also naive spirituality derive from this the demand to keep the ego small or to destroy it completely. But that is a false conclusion, because it would only increase the gap with the world. What narrows the gap between ego and world is the cultivation of compassion, kindness, joy and other virtues described in yoga.
4. Mindfulness in teaching and research
The reception of yoga and the associated meditation in modern society began at the end of the 19th century with the great impression that important male and female yogis had on travelers to India. This led to Indian yogis increasingly traveling the world. A development that was slow but steady.
Despite their increasing popularity, yoga and meditation retained an exclusive and independent status.
However, under the influence of religions and state-supporting worldviews, governments remained very cautious about signaling state recognition.
The development of mindfulness was somewhat different. The first mindfulness exercise program developed around 1970 in the USA under the name Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction was quickly taken up by psychologists and other programs of this kind followed, giving rise to the so-called "mindfulness hype". At the same time, scientific criticism of mindfulness methods increased. The article in SPIEGEL summarizes the current state of academic mindfulness criticism. He relies on the knowledge gained in the academic field with the help of modern psychology.
Box 4
DER SPIEGEL Issue 40, 2023
Teaching and researching mindfulness - focus: psychology
1. Teaching and teaching method
2. Researchers and research institutions
3. Criticism of psychological mindfulness research
Observations from SPIEGEL on the teaching and research of mindfulness.
Re 1. Use of mindfulness in psychological practices - mindfulness camps - courses without a spiritual, religious or other ideological superstructure, but with scientific standards
Re 2. Sociologist A. Reckwitz (Berlin Humboldt University) - psychologist S. Schindler (Berlin University of Public Administration) - psychologist Th. Joiner (Florida State University), sociologist H. Rosa (Friedrich Schiller University Jena) - psychologist J. Gebauer (University of Mannheim), psychologist W. Britton (University of Wisconsin-Madison); Psychologist - R. Durvasula, psychologist U. Ott (Gießen Justus Liebig University), A. Lardone (Parthenope University, Naples)
Re 3. Most mindfulness studies are based on pure correlations - control groups are often missing
Re 1. Use of mindfulness in psychological practices - mindfulness camps - courses without a spiritual, religious or other ideological superstructure, but with scientific standards
Re 2. Sociologist A. Reckwitz (Berlin Humboldt University) - psychologist S. Schindler (Berlin University of Public Administration) - psychologist Th. Joiner (Florida State University), sociologist H. Rosa (Friedrich Schiller University Jena) - psychologist J. Gebauer (University of Mannheim), psychologist W. Britton (University of Wisconsin-Madison); Psychologist - R. Durvasula, psychologist U. Ott (Gießen Justus Liebig University), A. Lardone (Parthenope University, Naples)
Re 3. Most mindfulness studies are based on pure correlations - control groups are often missing
Because psychologists are increasingly integrating mindfulness into their practical work, academic psychology is faced with the challenge of justifying this expansion of psychology's conceptual and methodological tools. The fact that certain expectations placed on mindfulness are not scientifically confirmed raises a number of fundamental questions that require clarification.
Since the term meditation is often used for mindfulness exercises, this leads SPIEGEL to equate mindfulness with yoga meditation. This makes it necessary to distinguish between mindfulness and meditation more clearly. To transfer the risks demonstrated by mindfulness research to meditation and yoga turns out to be unjustified.
Willoughby Britton examined the effects of mindfulness on sleep in her doctoral thesis in clinical psychology. Contrary to expectations based on the results of meditation research, the test subjects slept worse, the brain was more excited and deep sleep phases occurred less often. For five years, the researcher did not dare to publish her results because they did not correspond to the findings from the meditation form. Mindfulness and mediation should not be so easily lumped together.
Research done by neuroscientist Ulrich Ott at the University of Giessen, Germany, shows how differentiated what happens during mental exercises can be assessed. DER SPIEGEL quotes U. Ott on this:
“When I put people in the magnetic tube and tell them to observe their breathing, I see how the attention networks are activated - but I also see when someone is drifting. Then the so-called “faulted mode network” in the brain takes over and the thoughts wander.”
During a mindfulness exercise, two processes work together, similar to yoga meditation, one stimulating and one relaxing, only with different emphasis.
From the holistic view of yoga, which includes all possibilities of mental and emotional experiences, mindfulness and yoga meditation can be classified as follows:
While meditation supports the relaxation mechanism, mindfulness focuses on stimulating attention. But in both cases the opposite process also plays a role, just with a lower priority.
In the traditional understanding, yoga is the dynamic unity of opposing tendencies. Calmness and alertness, stillness and dynamism. Since psychology does not yet know this integrating, unifying approach that is characteristic of yoga, it needs to be expanded towards a universal science of consciousness that applies to all people.
5. Vedic Heritage: Knowledge, Language and Techniques
One message of the SPIEGEL article is that established academic science and technology, despite its global acceptance does not yet have the practical knowledge necessary to solve the problems it has created.
DER SPIEGEL writes right at the beginning of the article.
"After moments of relaxation, many people ---- more than one in four Germans, this is the result of a study by the Techniker Krankenkasse, often feel stressed. And stress can promote or worsen many physical and mental illnesses. Back pain, stomach pain These include intestinal problems and migraines, but also sleep disorders and certain forms of depression. Psychological illnesses were among the most common reasons for sick leave in 2022" (DER SPIEGEL; Issue 40, 2023)
Many millions of people around the world are therefore taking the initiative and practicing meditation and yoga. In doing so, they draw on the wealth of knowledge from the oldest culture of humanity that has been handed down and is still alive today. In addition to yoga, this wealth of knowledge includes many other individual systems, which all together form the Vedic heritage. The most compact linguistic representation of the Veda is the Rig Veda. It represents the holistic quality of consciousness in a condensed form, which is omnipresent as transcendence.
UNESCO recognizes the Rig Veda as an intangible world cultural heritage worthy of protection. “Rig” denotes the process of emergence of knowledge in consciousness “Veda” means “complete knowledge”.
Box 5
In psychology, yoga meditation expands the scope of mental and spiritual techniques both in terms of the psyche towards consciousness and neurophysiologically towards the body and environment.
The exploration of consciousness - in its entire life-relevant range - is therefore the actual purpose of yoga, understood as a system of direct experience.
Knowledge and its associated organizing power arise in consciousness. This is called Veda. Yoga is the key to the Veda. Yoga therefore enables direct access to the area of life that is the prerequisite for recognizing, experiencing and acting in the first place. This reality has been called transcendence since the German philosopher Immanuel Kant.
All the risks that DER SPIEGEL erroneously assigns to meditation and yoga are overcome through the experience of transcendence:
1. Transcendental is the reality that makes everything possible because it is connected to everything, i.e. not completely detached from it.
2. Transcendent is the fully developed state of the experiencer (ego): The small ego's greed for more and more finds its fulfillment in transcendence. The ego stops trying to take over everything because it can give from abundance.
3. Transcendence makes all fears disappear because there is nothing strange anymore.
4. There is no such thing as too much transcendence because it is already constantly present and ready
to eliminate any defect.
5. Transcendence prevents delusions because every delusion is recognized for what it is: a consequence of inadequate knowledge.
6. Transcendence is not purely subjective, but the reality that underlies subject, object and the subject-object relationship.
Narayana (absolute being) - Padmabhava Brahma (creator of relativity)
Vashistha (influence of being into relativity
Re 2. History up to 5000 years ago::
Transcendental Meditation is scientific because it is 1. systematic, 2. does not contradict scientific research, 3. is universal in application, 4. can be confirmed by personal experience, and 5. produces the same results in everyone
This scientific nature is already visible in the way a basic course in Transcendental Meditation is structured:
1st meeting: Effects of Transcendental Meditation. - Scientific studies
2nd meeting: The basic principle of Transcendental Meditation
3rd meeting: Personal interview with the Transcendental Meditation teacher
4th meeting: Personal introduction to the meditation technique by the Transcendental Meditation teacher
5th meeting: Review of experience with independent practice of Transcendental Meditation at home and further instructions
6. meeting:: Understanding the meditation process based on personal experience
7th meeting: Outlook for further development through regular 15 to 20 minute Transcendental Meditation
From a practical point of view, the Transcendental Meditation developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and the program of consciousness development based on it are of a user-friendliness that can hardly be surpassed and of the highest possible simplicity and naturalness.
Not only is the personal instruction structured in a highly scientific way, but also the checking procedures, which allow you to check the smoothness of the meditation at any time and, if necessary, to restore it. Each instruction is individual and personal. As experience grows, in-depth courses and advanced courses are offered, as well as yoga techniques to improve mind-body coordination and to harmonize the social environment.
What is consciously experienced during Transcendental Meditation is 1. the calming of mental activity into a state of minimal activity, which is experienced as "glorious alertness" and 2. how new thoughts spontaneously emerge from this basic state. This change is repeated several times during the 20-minute meditation period.
Scientific research has shown that the calm experienced during Transcendental Meditation is much deeper than that of deep sleep. Also typical is the high orderliness of the electrical brain activity during transcendental meditation. These and other effects are the automatic result of the natural and effortless alternation of rest and activity during meditation.
This type of meditation has been practiced in Vedic culture for thousands of years. The modern term transcendental explicitly indicates that the state of consciousness is cultivated, which is the condition for the possibility of every kind of knowledge and experience.
The Shankeracharaya tradition, from which Transcendental Meditation comes, is known for cultivating mind and heart or intellect and feeling, theory and experience in equal measure
7. Need for analysis of information media
Yoga seeks to eliminate the conditions that allowed the situation in the world to reach such a critical state. From the perspective of yoga, these conditions consist of deficits in the use of the brain's mental potential and cognitive ability.
The increasing appreciation of yoga is the reaction to the incompleteness of the knowledge and methods of knowledge of modern science, especially psychology. For yoga, the first step in overcoming the limits of knowledge is expanding the range of experience.
The analysis of the information about meditation and yoga in DER SPIEGEL revealed that the special nature of yoga's approach to problem solving is not presented clearly enough. This blurs the essential differences between authentic meditation and mindfulness. This leads DER SPIEGEL to view the risks observed with mindfulness, to be valid for yoga meditation, aswell.
Excluding facts changes the quality of the information. Such modifications of information can occur at several points: at the originator of the message, at the mediator and at the recipient (reader, listener and viewer). The purpose of information modification is to confirm expectations, to produce a certain effect or to specifically assert one's own interests. There are therefore diverse alliances between information media on the one hand and government, social groups and nationally or internationally active organizations on the other. All of these influencing factors must be taken into account when analyzing information.
The multitude of chronic global problems that dominate the news at the beginning of the 21st century call for a development step that includes all areas of life and cultural traditions. The reports in the information media are therefore indicators of both the status of development and how development is continuing or should continue. This is particularly true when it comes to information from science and technology, the health sector, art and impulses from far-sighted personalities.
8. Vedic heritage as a univeral frame of reference
The fact that DER SPIEGEL - as an influential information medium in the German-speaking world - devotes a cover story to the subject of meditation, yoga and mindfulness shows the growing importance of spiritual techniques in modern society. Which methods are compared and how this is done is characteristic not only of the development in this field, but also of the level of development of modern society as a whole.
With yoga meditation and mindfulness, proven tradition on the one hand and innovative adaptation on the other are compared.
Technical innovation and enterprise are the hallmarks of the European cultural impulse that has created modern global civilization over the last 500 years. The limits of the viewpoint on which this cultural impulse is based - the strict separation of subject and object - can be seen in the risks of mindfulness methods that transfer this separation to the mental and spiritual realm.
Mindfulness means, according to SPIEGEL:
"Being aware of your own thoughts and feelings in the given moment without judging them."
However, this is also the characteristic mindset of classical science - the uninvolved observer - which has led humanity to the brink of self-destruction.
The objective observer's dominance over external nature is transferred to the mental-spiritual realm through mindfulness methods, including the manipulative attitude. Mindfulness and objective research share the same risk
This risk exists until the individual ego expands into the cosmic ego. Then the world and the observer meet like two parallels in the infinite.
Modern psychology can recognize the risks of mindfulness, but it does not know how to prevent them, because it does not yet have access to the cosmic dimension of consciousness.
The need to expand the ego into cosmic consciousness is a central insight of the yoga teachings. It was therefore a pioneering step for the UN to establish an International Day of Yoga on India's initiative. India has thus assumed patronage of the holistic Vedic cultural heritage, which overcomes the subject-object division through yoga.
Vedic Heritage: Rig Veda
1 ऋचो अक्षने परमे व्योमन् यस्मिन्देवा अधि विश्वे निषेदुः
यस्तन्न वेद किमृचा करिष्यति य इत्तद्विदुस्त इमे समासते
ṛco akṣare parame vyoman yasmindevā adhi viśve niṣeduḥ
yastanna veda kimṛcā kariṣyati ya ittadvidus ta ime samāsate
2 यो जागार तमृचः कामयन्ते
yo jāgāra tamṛicaḥ kāmayante
3 निवर्तध्वम्
nivartadhvam
“Rig” denotes the process of arising knowledge in consciousness “Veda” means “complete knowledge”. The Rig Veda says:
Re 1. Everyone's life is only in balance when they have access to the transcendental reality that encompasses all knowledge and all organizing power.
Re 2. To realize this, it is only necessary to be conscious, that is, naturally awake.
Re 3. The method is to let go of everything for a short time each day and to be only what everyone essentially is: the transcendental consciousness that encompasses all possibilities. Transcendental consciousness is not detached from everything, but the essence of everything.6. Authentic meditation and yoga.
Re 2. To realize this, it is only necessary to be conscious, that is, naturally awake.
Re 3. The method is to let go of everything for a short time each day and to be only what everyone essentially is: the transcendental consciousness that encompasses all possibilities. Transcendental consciousness is not detached from everything, but the essence of everything.6. Authentic meditation and yoga.
The Transcendental reality, the meaning of which is explained in more detail throughout the Vedic literature, belongs in European culture to the realm of philosophy and not to psychology. That is why, from an academic perspective, yoga is considered one of the systems of Indian philosophy. Through yoga, all contemporary methods of thinking – phenomenology, linguistic analysis, axiomatics and reduction – gain a common absolute foundation. Yoga therefore enables a reconstruction of all sciences, not just psychology.
In psychology, yoga meditation expands the scope of mental and spiritual techniques both in terms of the psyche towards consciousness and neurophysiologically towards the body and environment.
The exploration of consciousness - in its entire life-relevant range - is therefore the actual purpose of yoga, understood as a system of direct experience.
Knowledge and its associated organizing power arise in consciousness. This is called Veda. Yoga is the key to the Veda. Yoga therefore enables direct access to the area of life that is the prerequisite for recognizing, experiencing and acting in the first place. This reality has been called transcendence since the German philosopher Immanuel Kant.
All the risks that DER SPIEGEL erroneously assigns to meditation and yoga are overcome through the experience of transcendence:
1. Transcendental is the reality that makes everything possible because it is connected to everything, i.e. not completely detached from it.
2. Transcendent is the fully developed state of the experiencer (ego): The small ego's greed for more and more finds its fulfillment in transcendence. The ego stops trying to take over everything because it can give from abundance.
3. Transcendence makes all fears disappear because there is nothing strange anymore.
4. There is no such thing as too much transcendence because it is already constantly present and ready
to eliminate any defect.
5. Transcendence prevents delusions because every delusion is recognized for what it is: a consequence of inadequate knowledge.
6. Transcendence is not purely subjective, but the reality that underlies subject, object and the subject-object relationship.
The Transcendence is accessible through authentic yoga meditation, which is therefore called transcendental meditation.
6. Authentic meditation and yoga
DER SPIEGEL uses the term meditation in connection with yoga, but does not explain what that means specifically. Numerous male and female Indian yogis contributed to the worldwide popularity of meditation and yoga in the 20th century. They are not named in the SPIEGEL article, nor are the organizations they founded nor the extensive research into the changes during meditation and the life-enhancing effects afterwards.
The yoga system uses meditation to describe the area of life that connects transcendental reality with the area of thought and perception and vice versa.
This connection cannot be learned from books but, like any technique and craft, requires the guidance of an experienced teacher or master. The masters of the Vedic tradition have passed on the relevant techniques in an uninterrupted teacher-student-teacher sequence.
The illustration shows the Vedic Shankaraycharya tradition, from which comes the technique of Transcendental Meditation taught by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Box 6
Genealogy of Vedic Masters of the Shankarachariya Trad
Genealogy of Vedic Masters of the Shankarachariya Tradition
Shankarachariya Tradition
1. Prehistory
2. History up to Adi Shankara
3. History from Adi Shankara
2. History up to Adi Shankara
3. History from Adi Shankara
Names of the Masters of the Shankaracharya Tradition
Re 1. PrehistoryNarayana (absolute being) - Padmabhava Brahma (creator of relativity)
Vashistha (influence of being into relativity
Re 2. History up to 5000 years ago::
Shakti - Prashara - Vyasa - Shukadeva
History up to 2500 years ago:
Gaudapada - Govinda Yogindra - Adi Shankara
Re 3. History from Adi Shankara through his four students in the west, east, north and south
Padma padam - Hasta-Malaka - Trotaka - Vartikakara
in the 20th century:
Swami Brahmananda Saraswati (1871 – 1953) Shankaracharya of the North from 1941
History up to 2500 years ago:
Gaudapada - Govinda Yogindra - Adi Shankara
Re 3. History from Adi Shankara through his four students in the west, east, north and south
Padma padam - Hasta-Malaka - Trotaka - Vartikakara
in the 20th century:
Swami Brahmananda Saraswati (1871 – 1953) Shankaracharya of the North from 1941
his student Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (1918 - 2008) taught Transzendental Meditation
This scientific nature is already visible in the way a basic course in Transcendental Meditation is structured:
1st meeting: Effects of Transcendental Meditation. - Scientific studies
2nd meeting: The basic principle of Transcendental Meditation
3rd meeting: Personal interview with the Transcendental Meditation teacher
4th meeting: Personal introduction to the meditation technique by the Transcendental Meditation teacher
5th meeting: Review of experience with independent practice of Transcendental Meditation at home and further instructions
6. meeting:: Understanding the meditation process based on personal experience
7th meeting: Outlook for further development through regular 15 to 20 minute Transcendental Meditation
From a practical point of view, the Transcendental Meditation developed by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and the program of consciousness development based on it are of a user-friendliness that can hardly be surpassed and of the highest possible simplicity and naturalness.
Not only is the personal instruction structured in a highly scientific way, but also the checking procedures, which allow you to check the smoothness of the meditation at any time and, if necessary, to restore it. Each instruction is individual and personal. As experience grows, in-depth courses and advanced courses are offered, as well as yoga techniques to improve mind-body coordination and to harmonize the social environment.
What is consciously experienced during Transcendental Meditation is 1. the calming of mental activity into a state of minimal activity, which is experienced as "glorious alertness" and 2. how new thoughts spontaneously emerge from this basic state. This change is repeated several times during the 20-minute meditation period.
Scientific research has shown that the calm experienced during Transcendental Meditation is much deeper than that of deep sleep. Also typical is the high orderliness of the electrical brain activity during transcendental meditation. These and other effects are the automatic result of the natural and effortless alternation of rest and activity during meditation.
This type of meditation has been practiced in Vedic culture for thousands of years. The modern term transcendental explicitly indicates that the state of consciousness is cultivated, which is the condition for the possibility of every kind of knowledge and experience.
The Shankeracharaya tradition, from which Transcendental Meditation comes, is known for cultivating mind and heart or intellect and feeling, theory and experience in equal measure
7. Need for analysis of information media
Yoga seeks to eliminate the conditions that allowed the situation in the world to reach such a critical state. From the perspective of yoga, these conditions consist of deficits in the use of the brain's mental potential and cognitive ability.
The increasing appreciation of yoga is the reaction to the incompleteness of the knowledge and methods of knowledge of modern science, especially psychology. For yoga, the first step in overcoming the limits of knowledge is expanding the range of experience.
The analysis of the information about meditation and yoga in DER SPIEGEL revealed that the special nature of yoga's approach to problem solving is not presented clearly enough. This blurs the essential differences between authentic meditation and mindfulness. This leads DER SPIEGEL to view the risks observed with mindfulness, to be valid for yoga meditation, aswell.
Excluding facts changes the quality of the information. Such modifications of information can occur at several points: at the originator of the message, at the mediator and at the recipient (reader, listener and viewer). The purpose of information modification is to confirm expectations, to produce a certain effect or to specifically assert one's own interests. There are therefore diverse alliances between information media on the one hand and government, social groups and nationally or internationally active organizations on the other. All of these influencing factors must be taken into account when analyzing information.
The information disseminated by the media and linked to expectations attracts attention, but does not necessarily improve knowledge of the facts or understanding of the context. This is only possible through an information analysis that penetrates to the unity of subject, cognitive process and object, which determines the truth content, the correctness of the presentation and the meaning of the information.
The multitude of chronic global problems that dominate the news at the beginning of the 21st century call for a development step that includes all areas of life and cultural traditions. The reports in the information media are therefore indicators of both the status of development and how development is continuing or should continue. This is particularly true when it comes to information from science and technology, the health sector, art and impulses from far-sighted personalities.
The upcoming development step is responsible for the increasing interest in mental techniques such as meditation or mindfulness exercises. Mental techniques have a development-promoting effect when the unity of subject, observation process and object comes into play as a fourth independent factor. Only then does the interplay between the three have an absolute basis and a holistic view develops; in which the quality of intelligence is the determinant of progress.
Extensive scientific research has found that meditation and yoga develop the qualities of stability, flexibility and integration in individuals and society, which in turn catalyzes problem solving and advancement.
The SPIEGEL article does not report on the future-oriented aspects of meditation and yoga, so it does not really make a contribution to solving the problems. Ultimately, the SPIEGEL article only documents how limited knowledge and understanding of meditation and yoga still is in society at the beginning of the 21st century.
Extensive scientific research has found that meditation and yoga develop the qualities of stability, flexibility and integration in individuals and society, which in turn catalyzes problem solving and advancement.
The SPIEGEL article does not report on the future-oriented aspects of meditation and yoga, so it does not really make a contribution to solving the problems. Ultimately, the SPIEGEL article only documents how limited knowledge and understanding of meditation and yoga still is in society at the beginning of the 21st century.
8. Vedic heritage as a univeral frame of reference
The fact that DER SPIEGEL - as an influential information medium in the German-speaking world - devotes a cover story to the subject of meditation, yoga and mindfulness shows the growing importance of spiritual techniques in modern society. Which methods are compared and how this is done is characteristic not only of the development in this field, but also of the level of development of modern society as a whole.
With yoga meditation and mindfulness, proven tradition on the one hand and innovative adaptation on the other are compared.
Technical innovation and enterprise are the hallmarks of the European cultural impulse that has created modern global civilization over the last 500 years. The limits of the viewpoint on which this cultural impulse is based - the strict separation of subject and object - can be seen in the risks of mindfulness methods that transfer this separation to the mental and spiritual realm.
Mindfulness means, according to SPIEGEL:
"Being aware of your own thoughts and feelings in the given moment without judging them."
However, this is also the characteristic mindset of classical science - the uninvolved observer - which has led humanity to the brink of self-destruction.
The objective observer's dominance over external nature is transferred to the mental-spiritual realm through mindfulness methods, including the manipulative attitude. Mindfulness and objective research share the same risk
This risk exists until the individual ego expands into the cosmic ego. Then the world and the observer meet like two parallels in the infinite.
Modern psychology can recognize the risks of mindfulness, but it does not know how to prevent them, because it does not yet have access to the cosmic dimension of consciousness.
The need to expand the ego into cosmic consciousness is a central insight of the yoga teachings. It was therefore a pioneering step for the UN to establish an International Day of Yoga on India's initiative. India has thus assumed patronage of the holistic Vedic cultural heritage, which overcomes the subject-object division through yoga.
India taking responsibility for this is so important because the Vedic heritage is constantly being adapted to the local conditions and requirements of the time as it spreads globally. The representatives of mankind's oldest culture have proven for thousands of years that they have the necessary expertise to do so.
The yoga experts of the Vedic tradition are now called upon to ensure that the authenticity and high quality of yoga remain permanently guaranteed.
The yoga experts of the Vedic tradition are now called upon to ensure that the authenticity and high quality of yoga remain permanently guaranteed.