Institute Media Team Continues to
Generate Extraordinary Coverage

During the past six months, the Institute’s dynamic media team has generated unprecedented national and international coverage of all Maharishi’s programs in thousands of newspapers and journals and on radio and television shows around the globe.

These reports included coverage by ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, PBS, and MSNBC; the Associated Press, Reuters, UPI, and Agence France-Presse; the Washington Post, the Washington Times, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, Forbes, the Chronicle of Higher Education’s Journal of Philanthropy, Newsday, the Boston Herald, the Seattle Post, the Des Moines Register, the Miami Herald, the San Diego Union-Tribune, and the Denver Post; and internationally, the Jerusalem Post, the Guardian, the Irish News, the Scotsman News, the Montreal Gazette, and India Abroad, among countless other local newspaper articles and local television and radio shows. In addition, television crews from BBC, the Biography Channel, and the Hallmark Channel have visited Fairfield and Maharishi Vedic City recently to film documentaries for worldwide distribution. Below are a few media highlights from the past few months.

Consciousness-Based education. The highly respected PBS news show To the Contrary recently aired a powerful report about the benefits of Transcendental Meditation practice for children with attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), based on the success of the Institute’s Washington, D.C., school projects. To view this video clip and related coverage, please visit www.adhd-tm.org/video. Similarly, in August, National Public Radio aired an education clip titled “Transcendental Meditation Appears in the Classroom,” which covered the impact of TM in elementary schools.

Russell Simmons, one of the originators of hip-hop music and co-founder of Def Jam Recordings, recently made a short video supporting the David Lynch Foundation and the power of TM practice. To view the clip, visit www.youtube.com and search for “Russell Simmons Message to Students.”

The media team is currently developing two new websites, one specifically on Yogic Flying and one composed of more than 100 interviews with TM and TM-Sidhi practitioners about the benefits of the practice in their lives. Many of these interviews are already posted on YouTube as well. To view these clips, visit www.youtube.com and search for “TM and Yogic Flying.”

David Lynch. In the past few months, David Lynch has been making headlines around the world. In October 2007, accompanied by Institute media team director Bob Roth, David met with Israel president Shimon Peres in Jerusalem at a national press conference in which he promoted the Institute’s proven approach to peace through large groups of meditating experts. Shimon Peres agreed to support the creation of a 500-strong peace-creating group in Israel, and later commented that the meeting had been “the most satisfactory meeting of my life.” The press conference was attended by 35 international media crews, and the Associated Press coverage was quickly picked up by thousands of media organizations around the world.

Just days earlier, David had received France’s highest civilian honor — Officer of the French Legion of Honor — from President Nikolas Sarkozy, who described David as a “genius” and a “profoundly normal guy.” This award ceremony likewise received worldwide coverage, as did David’s talk at France’s most prestigious film institution later in the week.

The media team has also been instrumental in generating many excellent in-depth newspaper and magazine articles about David and his Foundation, most recently in the Journal of Philanthropy, a highly respected publication of the Chronicle of Higher Education, and in the international arts magazines Soma and Anthem. The team also dynamically promoted the second annual David Lynch weekend, held at Maharishi International University on May 25–28, with hundreds of out-of-town guests flooding the campus. For more information about the weekend, please visit www.lynchweekend.org.

Dr. Hagelin’s National Lectures.  Dr. Hagelin continues to be a renowned and much sought-after speaker at national conferences examining the nature of mind and consciousness, especially after his thought-provoking appearances in the hit movies What the Bleep Do We Know?! and The Secret.  In February of this year, he spoke on “A New Science of Peace: The Effects of Group Meditation on Crime, Terrorism, and International Conflict” at the prestigious Institute of Noetic Sciences conference in Tucson. And in November, he will join a distinguished faculty at the “Manifesting a Rich Life” Prophets Conference in Los Angeles, where he will speak on “The Secret Behind The Secret: How to Unleash the Power of Thought.” 

Fairfield/Maharishi Vedic City. In the last few months, five national and international television and film crews, including teams from BBC, the Hallmark Channel, and the Biography Channel, have visited Maharishi International University and Maharishi Vedic City to film full-length documentaries for worldwide distribution. The documentary topics include brain chemistry, “supernormal” abilities, science and meditation, meditator family life, and Maharishi himself. In every case, the film crews arrived with many questions about the Transcendental Meditation program and our community and left inspired and transformed by their experience. One director was so enthusiastic about his visit to Maharishi School that he is returning next month to film a new documentary there called School of Thought. These powerful documentaries will be seen by tens of millions of people around the world and are sure to bring profound knowledge and great inspiration to viewers everywhere.

Towers of Invincibility. Last summer, a 40-foot-tall Tower of Invincibility was erected on the Maharishi University of University campus to celebrate the success of the Invincible America Assembly in bringing peace and invincibility to the nation. Now real estate developer and University trustee Jeffrey Abramson wants to build an even taller Tower of Invincibility in downtown Washington, D.C. — preferably on the Washington Mall (see www.TowerofInvincibilityDC.org).

On October 5, Mr. Abramson held a national news conference in Washington to announce his plans to build the Tower. “The Tower of Invincibility will fulfill the highest ideals of America as expressed by our nation’s founders and by other great heroes of our country — freedom, sovereignty and peace,” Mr. Abramson said. He invited all Americans to visit the Tower of Invincibility website and cast their votes for where the Tower should be located in Washington.

The press conference resulted in extensive, very positive media coverage, including articles in the Washington Post, the Washington Times, and the Washington Examiner, as well as reports by United Press International and ABC-TV News (see www.TowerofInvincibilityDC.org to read these reports). Mr. Abramson’s real estate development company, The Tower Companies, had already won the D.C. Chamber of Commerce “2007 Business of the Year” award, and as Mr. Abramson said at the press conference, “I'm a builder. I know what to do.”

Mr. Abramson also said that similar Towers of Invincibility are now being planned for all 192 nations of the world as permanent monuments to peace and invincibility in the family of nations.