Through the Transcendental Meditation programme, we become more peaceful within ourselves and radiate a powerful influence of peace to the entire world.

Benefits for the World

Every individual can make an important contribution to world peace. When you practise the Transcendental Meditation programme, you increase the level of happiness and peace in your own life—and generate an influence of peace and harmony for your family, nation, and world.

A New Approach to Peace

The individual is the basic unit of world peace. As an example, when we look at a green forest, what we’re really seeing is a large number of individual trees that are green. In the same way, when we think of a peaceful world, what we are really considering is a world filled with individuals that are at peace themselves.

Maharishi predicted in 1960 that if just one percent of the world’s population practised the Transcendental Meditation technique, there would be an end to war. In 1974, scientists noted a growing number of cities where one percent of the population had learned the Transcendental Meditaition technique. They looked at crime statistics in these “one percent” cities, they found that when a city reached the one percent level there was a decrease in the crime rate. At the same time, matched control cities maintained an increase in crime rate—as did the United States as a whole. They named this phenomenon the Maharishi Effect.

Bringing Peace to the World

Scientists then began to study the positive effects on society of the more advanced Transcendental Meditation-Sidhi^SM programme, including Yogic Flying. They discovered that just the square root of one percent was required to produce the same positive effect.

One study showed decreased traffic fatalities, crime, and unemployment for an entire state. Another showed decreased homicides, suicides and auto accidents for a whole nation. A third correlated decreased inflation and unemployment to a large group practising the Transcendental Meditation-Sidhi programme together in one place.

For two weeks in 1984, a group of 7000 Yogic Flyers (at that time the square root of one percent of the world’s population) was able to create measurable effects worldwide. Researchers documented reduced international conflict, decreased terrorism, and increased harmony between nations during that two-week period.

Be a Peace Creator

When you learn the Transcendental Meditation technique, each time you sit to meditate you’ll be radiating waves of harmony to your surroundings. Without any other changes, it’s likely your family life will become more harmonious. Friends may comment how peaceful it feels in your home. You’ll be contributing to lower crime and accident rates in your city and state. And you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing that you are doing something important every day to make our world a more peaceful place.

“The advantage of this approach to conflict resolution is that it doesn’t require any intrusive intervention to resolve the conflict. It appears to make use of a fundamental level of interconnectedness among all members of the community to reduce stress and create coherence in the conflict area.”

        —John Davies, Ph.D., Research Coordinator for the Center of International Development and Conflict Management
at the University of Maryland, USA