The Rich Roll Podcast - Strength in Stillness: Bob Roth On The Power of Transcendental Meditation & Bringing Calm To The Center of Life’s Storm

Episode Date: June 11, 2018

Long-time listeners know well that meditation is a recurring topic of exploration on this podcast. Today I continue this tradition with a man who has played a very large role in pioneering meditation, specifically the practice of Transcendental Meditation (“TM”) throughout the West. Meet meditation legend Bob Roth. Bob first discovered meditation as a freshman at Berkeley during the height of the 1960's – ground-zero for the anti-war movement and the many cultural changes that were sweeping the country at that time. Once a skeptic, he was soon hooked, ultimately training under the tutelage of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the legendary albeit controversial meditation guru made globally famous by the Beatles. Every day since, he has meditated twice a day every day, devoting his life over the last 45 years to teaching what he has learned to millions of people across the world. Today, Bob is one of the most experienced and sought after meditation teachers in America. A proper meditation teacher to the stars, his student roster includes such recognizable names as Oprah, Russell Brand, Jim Carrey, Jerry Seinfeld, Martin Scorcese, Ray Dalio, Howard Stern, Tom Hanks, Hugh Jackman, and countless other notables. But Bob would much rather talk about his work as the executive director of The David Lynch Foundation, where he has helped bring TM to more than 500,000 inner-city youth in underserved schools in 35 countries, as well as to veterans and their families suffering from PTSD, and women and girls who are survivors of domestic violence. Bob is also the national director of the Center For Leadership Performance, another non-profit which introduces meditation to Fortune 100 companies, government organizations and non-profit charities. And he has spoken about meditation to industry leaders at such gatherings as Google Zeitgeist, Aspen Ideas Festival, Wisdom2.0, and Summit. In addition, Bob penned the authoritative text on the subject of TM, a book aptly titled Transcendental Meditation, and recently released his newest book, Strength in Stillness* – an accessible meditation primer that breaks down the science behind TM and provides a simple, straightforward roadmap for reducing stress, accessing inner power and building resilience. As you might expect, this conversation is a 360-degree primer on everything meditation. We delve into Bob's introduction to meditation as a young Berkeley student as well as his experience training under Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. We discuss how TM differs from other types of meditation. We talk about his work with the David Lynch Foundation, as well as his personal experience with the quirky, brilliant film director himself. And we cover the many scientific benefits of meditation, including how and why a consistent practice can transform your life by reducing stress and anxiety while simultaneously improving everything from focus, concentration, sleep, creativity, acuity, and productivity to emotional and physical resilience. But most of all, this conversation redresses the excuses that prevent you from meditating while empowering you with the tools and inspiration. Enjoy! Rich

Nobody wants to be anxious. Nobody wants to be stressed. So I think the more we understand about the deadly impact of stress, the more people are seriously looking at alternatives to just a pill. The trajectory that we are all on as a society, as a culture, as individuals, is not sustainable. It's just not sustainable. We're falling apart.

And so this is an intervention. This is my own intervention. I'm going to take 20 minutes from my morning, find it, get up earlier. I'm going to take 20 minutes in the afternoon for myself, and then the rest of the world will adjust. And the nice thing about this is so many people who come say, I could never close my eyes for two minutes, much less 20. And because this meditation is so enjoyable, the experience is so satisfying, 20 minutes flies by. That's Bob Roth, and this is The Rich Roll Podcast. The Rich Roll Podcast. Longtime listeners of this show know well that meditation is a recurring topic, a theme, a thread of this podcast.

It's something that I've explored in depth with many people over the years, really a litany of prominent teachers, practitioners, and advocates, people like Sharon Salzberg, Headspace founder Andy Pudicombe, Charlie Knowles, Dan Harris, Light Watkins, Guru Singh, and on and on and on. And today, I continue that tradition with a man, a pioneer, I think it's fair to say, who has played a very large role in mainstreaming meditation, specifically TM or transcendental meditation throughout the West. My name is Rich Roll. I am your host. And today my guest is Bob Roth. Bob is a man who first discovered meditation as a freshman at Berkeley at the height of the 60s. At the time, ground zero for the anti-war movement and the many cultural changes that were sweeping the country

at that time. And he's a guy who has meditated twice a day, every day, ever since. Today, I think it's fair to say Bob is one of the most experienced and most sought-after meditation teachers in all of America. And he's kind of popularly known as a meditation teacher to the stars. He's got this insane student roster that includes such recognizable names as Oprah, Russell Brand, Jerry Seinfeld, Martin Scorsese, Ray Dalio, Howard Stern, Tom Hanks, Hugh Jackman, and countless other notables. But I also think it's fair to say that Bob would much rather talk about his work as the executive director of the David Lynch Foundation, where he has helped bring TM to more than

500,000 inner city youth in underserved schools across 35 countries, as well as to veterans and their families suffering from PTSD and women and girls who are survivors of domestic violence. Bob is also the National Director of the Center for Leadership Performance, another nonprofit which introduces meditation to Fortune 100 companies, government organizations, and nonprofit charities. He is the author of Transcendental Meditation, which is considered the authoritative text on the subject. And he recently released his newest book, which is called Strength in Stillness. And what's great about this book is it really

breaks down the science behind TM in a very simple, straightforward, and accessible way, in a very simple, straightforward, and accessible way as this means of helping people understand how they can reduce their stress, access inner power, and ultimately build resilience. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life.

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When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how

challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. A problem I'm now happy and proud to share has been solved by the people at recovery.com who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, gambling addictions, and more. Thank you. I empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one,

again, go to recovery.com. Bob Roth, meditation legend. That's really the most fitting title for this man. I love this conversation. It's a little bit briefer than my typical chats. Bob was on a very tight schedule at the time, but do not be fooled by its brevity because it is packed with gems. We talk about his introduction to meditation

back at Berkeley. We talk about his experience training under the legendary, albeit controversial, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, made famous by the Beatles. We discussed the scientific benefits of meditation and how a consistent practice can help reduce stress and anxiety while also improving everything from focus, concentration, sleep, creativity, acuity, and productivity, all the way to resilience.

It was an honor to spend an hour with Bob. So pull up a chair and let's break some bread. I met Dan originally at- I would think the two of you would hit it off really well. Oh, yeah, for sure. I met him at a conference several years ago and heard him tell his story. And then I just reached out to him and I said, I really want to share your story in my podcast. So I went over to his office at ABC News a couple of years ago, did the podcast. He didn't know who I was really, but we just hit it off and we've just become friends from there. Yeah, I think. I did his show, then he came back and did my show again, you know? And it's just,

it's cool that, I mean, you guys are very different people, but in a certain respect, that, I mean, you guys are very different people, but in a certain respect, you guys are both incredible ambassadors of this meditation movement that is exploding like crazy right now. It's very interesting times. It's like, I mean, I've been at for 45 years, I've never seen anything like this.

Right. It's like all the resistances, all from everybody, it's just changed. And what do you attribute, I have an idea of what you're gonna say, but I'm interested in your thoughts on what you attribute the timing to. Why now?

I think one generation dying. What did they say that science progresses one funeral at a time? No, I mean, a generation that was very resistant is passing. But I think there's three reasons. And the first reason has to do with stress and the understanding of the impact that what stress actually has on the brain

and the nervous system and the digestive system and the respiratory system. And I remember 20 years ago, someone said they were stressed and people made fun of them. And to try and say that there was said they were stressed and people made fun of them. And to try and say that there was a link between stress and high blood pressure was just like false science.

But I think it's more than that. I think there's this desire, increasing desire that people want to and need to perform at higher levels, the whole interest in brain, potential of the brain, and how you can optimize brain. So that's the first thing, stress and on the first thing, stress.

And on the other side, optimization of potential. The second is when it comes to stress, where do we go? You know, medicine cabinet, where do we go for ailments? Well, there isn't any drug on the market or off the market that addresses that. We mask it and manage it. And the third is science, science and more science and shows like yours, talking about meditation, making it more familiar. Lots of times it's just hearing about it, just hearing about it. And the third is science, science and more science and shows like yours, talking about meditation, making it more familiar. Lots of times it's just hearing about it, just hearing about it. What do you think is reason? Well, I think stress is probably number one. I mean,

we're in an epidemic of stress right now. It's a stress-fueled culture. Most people, when you ask them how they're doing, they're going to tell you they're stressed. And I think that goes hand in hand with depression, which is quickly becoming, you know, basically our number one disability. Yeah. And people are starting to wake up to the fact that the pills that they're popping are really not working.

Yeah. That's their temporarily masking symptoms that lead to side effects and other problems that compound. And when you say stress, would you throw in anxiety? Yeah, I would characterize that as a subset of stress. Because that's one thing that I was talking with some mothers, parents, and they said who are more and more people are learning, coming to learn to meditate as a whole family,

not just the kid or the parent, but the whole family. And they're very concerned about their kids because they're so anxious about everything. Which is insane. It should not be the situation. I know, but they're just, they're worried about school. They're worried about how many clicks they have, you know, just everything. And I gave a talk in New Jersey. I was giving a talk to some school teachers, and they said, well, come into our second grade classes.

They brought 60 second graders together, talked to them about meditation. I thought, okay, that's an interesting one. And my first question was, how many of you feel anxious? Every hand went up. That's heartbreaking. Second graders, how many of you have difficulty sleeping? Half the second graders. So I think genuinely we're in danger of losing a generation. I mean,

the generation spans from that all the way up to college kids. And I think that's a reason that's fueling the interest in meditation because there's got to be something else than just medicine. Well, it's got to be sort of not vindicating, that's the wrong word, has kind of a pejorative flair to it, but sort of interesting for you as somebody who's been in this for 40 years to see this mushroom cloud,

sort of expanding awareness and openness to these ideas that you've been talking about for so long. And it cuts across all demographics. It even cuts across left or right politics. Nobody wants to be anxious. Nobody wants to be stressed. And now we know when you have high levels of anxiety, then your body, the adrenals secrete cortisol.

And when you, cortisol is a stress hormone, it floods the hippocampus in the brain, which is a memory center. So when that's the reason why, if you're anxious about something, you can't remember, you know, a kid goes to school and they've studied hard and they go anxious and their hippocampus shuts down and then they can't remember anything. And it's the same with the athlete, you know, who's can hit the jump shot over and over and over again when there's no pressure, but when there's pressure, you freeze. So I think the more we understand about the deadly impact of stress, the more people are seriously looking at alternatives to just a pill. Yeah, the cortisol reduction aspect of it is super interesting.

aspect of it is super interesting. I was reading that sleep only reduces your levels 10 to 20%, but meditation specifically TM can reduce it 30 to 40%. And this is backed up by the studies that you guys are doing. Yeah, published research. And now it used to be complicated to get cortisol levels. You have to take saliva, but you can get it from hair. You can get it from a sample of hair. but you can get it from hair. You can get it from a sample of hair. And so we're looking at with kids to see, now we have a program going on in the Chicago public schools. Should I go into that?

Yeah. Yeah, so the University of Chicago Crime Lab, which is a premier research institution, three years ago or two years ago was very concerned about the number of the crime and the violence in these toughest schools in Chicago. And so they put out what's called an RFP, a request for proposals,

and to grassroots organizations in Chicago. And we have offices, David Lynch Foundation has offices all over the country. So 230 organizations submitted proposals, gardening and all these different things. And we submitted something called Quiet Time, a proposal where you begin and end each school day with 10 to 15 minutes of meditation.

And they accepted. We were one of three. So they gave us $300,000 for us a lot of money for something maybe not. It was so successful last year, they increased it to a million dollars. And it was so successful this year, they increased it to another $2.6 million.

And the findings have been so marked in terms of reducing arrests among meditating school kids, improving attendance, and other school programs have found improved academic performance, test scores, closing of the achievement gap between people of color and the white population. So huge transformation.

And I really think, and I never would have thought this a few years ago, I think within a few years, quiet time or meditation is going to be, it's about voluntary, but it's going to be offered in schools. That's remarkable. Wow, that's crazy. What is the sort of onboarding process of trying to just acclimate kids in that scenario to just being open to the idea of even doing it to begin with? Well, I have learned and I know you do, what type of, you do a mindfulness technique. So there are, and at some point we can talk about, but there's three basic types. But after this conversation, I'm probably going to be signing up for my

DM class with you, but go ahead. Yeah. The thing is, is there's three different, according to research, there's three basic types of meditation, because we know that every experience changes the brain in a distinct way. You listen to classical music, it has a different impact than if you listen to electronic music. Or you watch a horror movie or a romantic comedy. So they know now from research that the three basic types of meditation based on what you do, one is called focused attention, and that's a concentration types of meditation based on what you do, one is called focused attention. And that's a concentration form of meditation. That's your classic, clear your mind of thoughts

or concentrate on your breath or the mantra, but it's a focus, it's hard work. And that creates something called theta, I mean, excuse me, gamma brainwaves in particularly the front left prefrontal cortex. And that is, this is too much detail. No, no, please. 20 to 50 cycles per second means you're concentrating.

When your kid is studying hard for an exam, a lot of gamma brand waves, you hope he's studying hard. Second is called open monitoring. And there are many mindfulness techniques in this. And that is an observational tool where you observe your thoughts. You observe, you do a body scan. You observe sensations in your body. You observe, you do a body scan. You observe sensations in your

body. You observe the environment. You have a dispassionate stepping back, witnessing. And in that witnessing, there's an equanimity. You're not caught up in the moment. That creates something called theta brainwaves, which is a pre-onset dream. That's six to eight cycles per second. And the third is self-transcending. And that is no effort, completely effortless. And that is accessing, not minding the thoughts, but accessing a field of calm that already exists within everyone. That's the hypothesis. So perhaps this would be a good moment to just define transcendental meditation in the context of that

and what it is about that practice that allows you to enter that self-transcendent state. So I like to use an example of an ocean where you're stuck, you're on a little boat and you're stuck on the middle of the Pacific ocean and you get these humongous waves, 30, 40 foot high waves, and you could think the whole ocean is in upheaval. But if you could do a cross section of the ocean out there,

you'd realize you got these little itty bitty 30 foot waves, but the ocean in reality is over a mile deep. And while the surface of the ocean may be turbulent, the depth of the ocean is by its nature silent. And that's analogous to the mind. So the surface of the mind is this active thinking mind, gotta, gotta, gotta monkey mind, all that. And every human being thinks that sometimes I'd like to have some inner calm, some inner quiet, some inner ease, some inner silence, some inner focus. And the operative word there is inner. And the question is, is there such a thing as an inner?

And if so, how do you get there? So, Rick, when we talk about transcendental meditation, as I said a moment ago, we hypothesize, because there's no belief, there's no philosophy here. The deep within you and your wife and every other person you know and everyone in the world, right now there's a level of the mind, deep within, a transcendent level of the mind that is already calm, quiet, peaceful, and yet the source of our creativity, intelligence, happiness. And transcendental meditation gives effortless access to that.

How? Should I answer that? Yeah, how? Because I'm thinking when you're describing the other methodology of kind of noticing your thoughts and being the dispassionate, neutral observer of the meanderings of the mind. That probably best describes my experience.

So what are we doing? So in that, it's a cognitive process. It's attending and adjusting to, you could say, the waves. So focused attention is stop the waves. The idea is that thoughts- But you're on the surface. You're on the surface. And the same with this,

when you're stepping back and observing the thoughts, But you're on the surface. You're on the surface. And the same with this, when you're stepping back and observing the thoughts or you're still on the surface. In transcendental meditation, we recognize or we identify that there's a vertical dimension to the mind, that we feel things deeply. You love your wife deeply. You don't wanna do something profoundly.

There's that feeling of a sign, an athlete, you're an athlete. There must be moments of the zone that goes way beyond what's up here. And there's just this pervasive silence. And so that quiet calm that we access in during meditation, transcendental meditation. And I'll tell you how we do that effortlessly. Yeah, please do. meditation. And I'll tell you how we do that effortlessly. So other approaches to meditation, see thoughts or the wandering mind as not the enemy, but sort of the obstacle to a calm mind.

So if you could control the mind, it's a monkey mind, it just wanders and you've got to rein it in, or you've got to give more space between thoughts. And Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who was a physicist who became a great meditation teacher, his insight was the mind is not wandering aimlessly. Your mind is not just a monkey mind. Your mind is in search of something more satisfying. You sit in a room and you listen to some wretched music, and some beautiful music comes on in the other room. Your attention is drawn to that music. You bring two books on vacation

and one book is terrible and you can't read it. Another book is great, absorbed in it for hours. It is not, people say, well, it's an acquired skill to meditate, to do this mindfulness. It's not an acquired skill to listen to the most beautiful music you've heard in your life. It's not an acquired skill to listen to the most beautiful music you've heard in your life. It's not an acquired skill to see the most beautiful sunset you've ever seen in

your life. You're drawn to that. And the idea or the hypothesis, again, I use that term, is that inside of everyone in that transcendent level of the mind is a field of satisfaction, quiet, bliss, peace, happiness. All the people have talked about it forever. In transcendental meditation, you learn how to give the attention. I know this is abstract, but you learn how to give the attention of the mind in inward direction. Like you want to teach a child how to dive. You say, honey, stand like this, bend over like that.

Rest is automatic. There's no forcing, gravity takes over. So when you learn TM from a teacher, you learn how to just allow the attention of your mind to be drawn inward and without any effort, as a matter of fact, any effort stops the process. Without any effort, your mind is just gently settles down. And when that happens, then you have alpha one brainwaves

completely different than mindfulness. And I wanna happens, then you have alpha one brain waves, completely different than mindfulness. And I wanna talk a little bit more of that, some of the other brain research. Your body gains this deep state of rest, cortisol levels are reduced and you feel rejuvenated. Do I think there's a role for other, do I think TM is the only way?

Of course not. Of course not. But in TM, so what I gather from this description is that on some level, it's about attenuating that effort, right? Because the mind is always searching to do. You give it something more satisfying to go for. If you're going, if you're sitting in front of a TV

and you got 20 horrible shows, you're just clicking, you can't. But if there's a great show and someone says, oh my God, you can't stop. So that's the mind with nothing satisfying on that horizontal level. Nothing is that satisfying. But the transcendent just beneath the waves

and increasingly so, there's just that calm, that silence that is very attractive. And how do you access that? And that's where the personal instruction. TM is never taught just out of a book. Because if I teach you or a teacher teaches you, it's how do you have that innocence? How do you just let your attention turn within? And then afterwards, people go, oh, my God, I had no idea.

And 20 minutes goes by quickly, not like painfully. So then how, what is your perspective then on all of these apps that are popping up that are introducing people to meditation? They do that, they introduce people. Yeah, but on some level, I mean, I would imagine there's good in that, right? You're sort of co-opting this device of distraction and getting people to use it in a more positive way. I think everything has a role. And I teach a lot of people who've done Headspace or Calm or these things, and it was a big help.

And then they did it for a while and they said, well, is there something more? Because mine looks for something more. Right. So I think their entry, and if it works for a person, it works for a person. But there's something about that relationship with a teacher.

It's never gonna be transcendence, yeah. And even we've tried teaching it online or something like that. There's something about you're in the room with a teacher one-to-one for that first hour. And then I'm with, and there's nobody else in the room. And then when I'm with that person, and it can be yourself,

it could be CEO of a company, it could be a professor, it could be a homeless kid, and they have the same experience. Every one of them can transcend equally well. Right. And the distinguishing thing here, or one of the distinguishing things here is that rather than focusing on your breath or noticing your thoughts as they come and go, your intention is on this mantra that you repeat. It's actually the mantra is the vehicle. The difference is you're sitting in the, you're sitting in Los Angeles and it's hot and horrible.

Mantra is like a car that takes you to the beach. So the car is not the end in itself, concentrating on a mantra. The mantra is a vehicle that takes you to the ocean. The mantra is a vehicle that takes you to your inner calm. So the transformations that take place in TM and the changes in brain is not from the repetition of the mantra,

is from accessing those realms within, those calm, settled levels of the mind, which we occasionally, rarely access. You know, again, when you're running, or when you're listening to music, or you hold a newborn baby in your arms and time slips away, or you're with your partner and there's just a moment of unity. It's got nothing to do with breath, thought, anything.

It's just silence. Let's track back to how you got into this to begin with. It all goes back to like, flower power age in 1968 at Berkeley, right? Well, the funny thing is, is I tell people, when you think of what a meditation teacher would be, a traditional, I ain't that guy. No, I know.

That's why we were talking about Dan Harris, like how I kind of see you sort of like him as a natural skeptic. I'm a skeptic. Yeah. Right. So I grew up, I was born in Washington, DC. I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. My father had been in, this won't be long, when I was two years old.

We can go as long as you want, by the way. So my father, well, for you putting your audience to sleep. My father was in World War II. He was an injured war veteran. He got a job in San Francisco at the VA hospital, Fort Miley. So we moved out at the age of three. And I had a very political family. My parents talked politics all the time and I debated issues. And I tell people that when I was growing up, I knew I was a Democrat before I knew I was Jewish. Cause that's, we just talked about that all the time. Now I vote for the person, not the party.

And I had, I remember in high school, I worked for Bobby Kennedy, 50 years ago today, I was working for Bobby Kennedy to get the Democratic National, the part presidential nomination. And I had a column in my high school newspaper in Marin County in Redwood High School. And I was a co-editor of my paper

and the column was called The Gripes of Roth. So that was the 60, that was 68. He was complaining about everything. So Bobby Kennedy, he was assassinated and it like destroyed my life. He was my hero. He was whatever as a 17 year old kid. I went to Berkeley in October, September, 1968

with the intention of going to law school to become a US Senator like Bobby Kennedy. I want to Berkeley in October, September, 1968, with the intention of going to law school to become a US Senator like Bobby Kennedy. I want to change the world. I was interested in social transformation. I was interested in equal access. You know, just everybody should have an equal shot. It shouldn't matter what gender, what color. You get an equal, what you do with it is your own doing.

So I go to Berkeley and it's insane. Right, it had to just be bananas. Insane. And I wasn't crazy person. I wasn't a druggie. I was just a guy who, an activist who wanted to do good. And suddenly I realized that politics wasn't going to heal the soul of the country, just going to be more divisive. So then I thought, what am I going to do? And my mother was an educator. So I thought, I'll write educational curriculum and work with kindergartners and build up from there.

It's interesting that you had that reaction because it could have gone the other way and just confirmed your resolve to get even deeper into politics. It was too much compromise. By that time there was this thing of, I had to be absolutely true to myself. What was most important was authenticity.

And it was already, I saw on both sides, left and right, too much violence, too much destruction on the left, destruction towards women on the right. I mean, just destructive behavior. Do you see parallels with what's going on right now? Yeah. Yeah. And we have an office on Capitol Hill, the foundation where I teach people on Capitol Hill. We can talk about that. But so I'm, I'm stressed. And I had a friend who was like a normal guy who said, you should

learn transcendental meditation. And I said, first of all, wasn't a word in my vocabulary. And I also said, I got enough issues with my own religion. And he said, no, you don't have to believe in anything because I'm a skeptical person. You don't have to believe in anything. Try it. And I learned it and it was so marked. It was because I tried other things and it was such a deep relaxation and such a transcendent moment, completely awake. I didn't go anywhere. And one of my first thoughts was, oh, I'd like to teach this to inner city school kids. Wasn't I want to get enlightened? Yeah, I mean, from the way you describe it in the book,

which I love, by the way, I just got, I just started it, but I skipped to the last chapter to read, you know, where you tell your personal story. It seemed like you had that response right from the get-go. Like this was from the very, very first experience with this. And I don't, it was an innocent sort of thought. It wasn't like, oh,

now in my five-year plan for my life, I was in this gap. Politics, I wanted to make a difference in the world. That was classic vintage 68 behavior. Politics wasn't it. Education, I thought,

okay, instead of sweeping reform, I'll do one at a time. And then I thought, the thought was, oh, I like to, kids, little one at a time. And then I thought the thought was, oh, I like to teach, kids, little kids could use this. They could use this. So it was one of my first thoughts.

People learn to meditate. Oh, I wanna get enlightened. Wasn't my thought. Right. It's interesting how the light switch just went on. And in that moment, you just knew immediately. June, 1969. So it's like all those years later, 49 years later.

And it began with it, you were working in an ice cream shop, right? This guy comes in, he seems pretty chill. No, no, there was a guy who was working at, if anybody of your listeners know Berkeley, on the north side of Berkeley, there's a Swenson's ice cream. I think it's still there.

Probably it is, yeah. And on the south side, they had one near the dorm and a top dog they had. So I used to work there and there was this guy named Peter Stevens, who was the one chill guy who was normal, who wasn't crazy. And he was a kind person

and he was working on a master, I mean, he had a master's. Anyway, I went to see him one night at 10 o'clock in the middle of studying to get ice cream, which only a kid can do. Get ice cream at 10 for helping my studies. And I said, where's Peter? And he said, he's in the back meditating. And get ice cream, which only a kid can do. Get ice cream at 10 for helping my studies. And I said, where's Peter? And he said, he's in the back meditating.

And it was like, what, what? Because meditation, if I'd even heard it, was just kind of strange. And he was not that way. So I asked him about it. And he said, I'm not gonna tell you if you want it. There's a TM center across town. So I went to a lecture.

And I remember at the end of the lecture, it made sense. And I said to the woman, how much of this stuff do I have to believe in for it to work? Because I was very skeptical. And she held up a piece of chalk and she said,

you don't have to believe in gravity for the chalk to fall. And I dropped it. Same with meditation. Was this before the White Album? White Album was, it's very interesting, that was October 68. Right. Right now, this is being recorded February 11th, 12th.

Yeah, and the Beatles had just arrived or just arriving in India to be with Maharshi. And so, 50 years ago, they were there writing the White Album, and then they recorded it in, I think, it came out in September, October. Right, right as you're being introduced to this. And then fast forward to you going to spend time with him in Spain in 72, right? Became a teacher, loved it. Maharishi had been trained as a physicist in college, and unlike how he was portrayed in the press, he was just a wise man who had smart new physics and he was surrounded by Nobel laureates and he was talking about there's this field inside that anyone, doesn't matter what your religion or philosophy, it's there.

And one of the first things he did when he came to the United States is he went to UCLA and Harvard Medical School and said, you got to study this, the effects. Because look at me, no one's going to trust me. I'm a guy from India wearing a dodi. Right. But he became a mainstream cultural figure after the Beatles went and visited with him. And then there's all this controversy swirling around whatever may or may not have happened there. But my understanding is that, you know, this guy learned how to do this from the great Guru Dev. Yeah. And, you know, this comes from the Vedas and the Upanishads.

Ancient, that's right. Bhagavad Gita. And it was sort of bestowed upon him by Guru Dev, like, look, go forth into the world and, you know, be amongst the people and, you know, propagate this message for the betterment of all. And, you know, it's kind of, when you think of 1958 and 59, you had Sputnik. I mean, you had just, the world was so materialistic. It was none of this.

There was no yoga. There was, in fact, Time Magazine recently did some retrospective and said Maharshi was responsible, not only for bringing meditation, but yoga and even organic, all that stuff that came out at that time came from that period. And he built up a huge organization, nonprofit organization. And one of the most amazing things is I meet a lot of interesting people who I'm not, you know, I mean, celebrity types, but I got to know Paul and Ringo quite well.

And I taught member of their kids. And that was quite a thing. Tell me about that. Well, okay. So I'm gonna tell you one other story. So there was all this talk about John Lennon and, you know, he didn't like- Right, there was a little bit of a falling out.

That's right. Turned out it was like for an hour, but it got in the press because I was teaching. I was in New York City and I got a phone call one afternoon about four or five years ago. And it was this young man on the phone and he said, I'd like to learn to meditate. And he didn't give me his name. It was fine. So we just talked, why do you want to learn?

And he said, well, you know, I'm a little anxious and my friends thought it would be very good for me. And then we're talking and he said, well, actually the reason I want to learn is I grew up in, both my parents meditated from when I was born, my whole life, twice a day they meditated and it was great for them. And I think it'd be good for me. And I said, oh, do I know them?

And he said, John and Lennon and my mom, Yoko. And I said, yeah, I kind of know them. But he made the point that they meditated together. So what was in the press was just sort of nonsense. And Paul and Ringo continue to meditate, continue to support Maharshi's work. They've been big. I run this foundation, which has brought- Right, we're going to talk about that. Yeah, but George was like the main guy.

George was the main guy. He was all in. Yeah, from the beginning and he brought the others and George was also very close. I mean, they just saw Maharshi for who he was, a person who was a simple man, not self-aggrandizing, had learned from his teacher, this meditation technique of effortless transcending.

It was very annoying when he started traveling in India saying that this was good for everyone. There's no caste, just everyone. Some people like the hierarchy and the elites. And he built it until it's now thousands of centers all over the world. And what was it like when you were studying underneath him in that guy's presence?

There was one time I remember to this day, it was like 1975. And I was in a meeting where you had, Maharshi was in the middle. There was one time, I remember to this day, it was like 1975. And I was in a meeting where you had, Maharishi was in the middle and he was sort of overseeing this conference on religion. He had all these great religious leaders on one side and all these great Nobel laureates on the other. And they were just talking

about these universal principles of life. And it struck a chord. And I thought, this is a conversation you could have had during the times of Plato or of Lao Tzu, anybody, any time, wise people without an agenda, wise people who were just interested in exploring and plumbing the deepest truths of life, whether it's from the perspective of science or religion or philosophy or art or music and very universal feeling, timeless. And I loved it. Is there something specific that you think you gleaned from learning from him directly that you could have not learned

from reading his teachings in a book or? I think the way it's a good, cause I was around him at different times for over 40 years. So I saw him in 1970 at a course at Humboldt State College and then trained with him in 1972 to become a teacher with thousands of other people. And then periodically over the years for meetings and conferences. And the way he was, the way when I was around him, the way he sort of managed me is like a lot of room, a lot of space, use your own creativity, figure it out.

Never told me what to do. You know, oh, I went to my guru and he never just use your common sense. Be true to yourself. Those lessons. Be true to yourself. Listen to yourself. to yourself, listen to yourself. And there was one lesson that I heard that I've never forgotten where a person,

a reporter one time asked Maharishi, they said, what's the single most important quality any person needs to have in order to live a healthy, have a better chance of living a healthy, successful, happy life. And, you know, I'm thinking love, compassion. And he said, discernment. The ability, you have to have a quiet intellect

and a good intellect and a good intuition. How do I spend my choices? Who do I spend my life with? What do I eat? Where do I invest my time? Because those choices are what brings back happiness, those deep, simple choices. So I never forgot that.

Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I think discernment goes hand in hand with intentionality. And sort of sits at the opposite end of the spectrum from reactivity, which is the sort of function of the monkey mind. You know, we're all living our lives reflexively, reactively, and it's that white space in between, you know, what's going on in your head and the behaviors that you choose to engage that define

what your life is going to look like, right? And discernment means that moment, that moment of pause and perhaps deeper reflection that allows you to make a better choice for yourself. In the ancient meditation texts, they call it the Bhagavad Gita, they call about like a flame in a windless place. So the intellect is just nothing outside. You know, you're not emotion. You're just like calm and clear

and you just see into the reality of things. And they also used to say an enlightened person he defined as a cool mind and a warm heart. And I like that. So you have that, you know, wind led intellect that just sees into the reality is not swayed, but also has a huge compassion and kindness and loving kindness for others. Yeah. I've noticed in people that have well-honed discernment that they almost appear omniscient. They can see so clearly where they need to go and what they need to do and what's right and what's wrong. There's no hesitation in their perspective.

And truly, I mean, the purpose of meditation or transcendental meditation is not just to get rid of the stress that you get from driving on the FDR, the 405, it was always full self-realization. I mean, they talked about that or enlightenment. And now today, when you're looking at the research on people who've been meditating for five years, 10 years, 20 years, 30, 40, 50 years,

you start seeing connections in the brain that start in meditation, but because of the neuroplasticity of the brain, those connections, that communication between the front of the brain and the back of the brain and left and right hemispheres lasting in activity. So you don't lose that resolute intellect. You don't lose that kindness and compassion.

You're not overshadowed by anything small outside. It's, that's why, I mean, originally, Transcendental Meditation was the domain of the warrior classes, because you couldn't fight with anger, revenge, pettiness, any of those things. And you didn't want to fight. It was a failure if you fought. Right.

Yeah, that's super interesting. As a natural skeptic, how do you personally reconcile, on the one hand, the Vedic traditions that are steeped in Hinduism and the like, and whatever you may have learned from Maharishi directly versus the scientific studies and the kind of predicament of the modern human and what they're trying to deal with as a communicator of this. Well, first of all, Maharishi repeatedly emphasized that Vedic knowledge predates Hinduism is like 2,500 years old, that Vedic knowledge has no Hinduism, it's like 2,500 years old, that Vedic knowledge has no geography, has no culture, has no, it's just knowledge.

It's just like the theory of relativity is not a German Jewish reality because Einstein discovered it. Einstein was a voice in a culture at a time who cognized that. And I think that Vedic, when you talk about Ayurveda, that's not a religious thing that if I eat this food, it strengthens my immune system.

Or if I take that herb, it's just, or if I bend this way and bend that way. So he really went out of his way to really say, someone used the example, if you saw a Catholic school kids doing jumping jacks, jumping jacks aren't Catholic, it's just being used. So I would say that Hinduism or Buddhism adopted these practices, but in their essence,

they're devoid of all that philosophy, all that sort of cultural baggage. And I think, and Maharishi also said that every single thing, if it's true from Ayurveda or, you know, Sthapachyaveda, which is like feng shui, it will be able to be documented by modern science. There's not a division. Right.

You start experiencing the benefits of this immediately. And what I think is interesting about you is, you know, there's a lot of hype about all the fancy people that you teach. You know, like that makes for good clickbait or what have you. And there's some super interesting people that you've had the opportunity to teach meditation to. people that you've had the opportunity to teach meditation to. But I think what's really cool about what you do is that your heart is really in trying to help people that fall outside of this elitist rubric. And it's something that you did immediately. Like your dad was volunteering at San Quentin, right? And that was kind of like the first place that you took this. Yeah. I don't know whether it's just sort of a hopeless 60s idealist or something,

but I've never been, from the beginning when I learned this, I always thought this is something that should be made available to everyone. There should be no obstacle, whether money or access or time. This is something that should be every human being's birthright. And particularly since the way I was brought up with my parents, whether it's prisons or working in the schools in Marin City, which was such a diversion where you have Sausalito on the one side, which is this fancy schmancy, and then just across the highway, Marin City,

which was the, at the time used the term ghetto, you know, in 1968. And I was always drawn to that, to bring to those kids. And not because I'm this do-gooder who has to work out something and I want praise. It's like, here's a tool. Use it on your own. You know, it takes me an hour a day over four days to teach it to you. It's yours, buddy, or whoever, take it, make what you want of it. And that's always has been my interest. And the funny thing is all these different people, because I get asked, well, how about this person? I thought, okay, let's say I taught 30 well-known people. I've taught thousands of inner city, no, inner city school kids, veterans, regular moms and dads,

but it's just one of those things. But I don't mind because those people that I get to teach- Well, they become mouthpieces. They become ambassadors in their own right. And they're good people. Tom Hanks is a really good person. You know, Jerry Seinfeld, very good person. And they, on their own, I don't ask them on their own. They say, how can I help? And so, they help raise the funds so that we can bring this to people who need it. So, you have this opportunity then to begin to really scale this when you end up connecting with David Lynch, right? Who I would imagine is somebody you probably know for a long time, but you guys formalized your relationship in this foundation that you created in 2005. 2005.

So tell me a little bit, I mean, like I'm obsessed with this guy. Like what, one of the most unique creative voices walking planet earth. I mean, what an original human being David Lynch is. So how did this all come about? He's more true to himself than anybody I've ever met. More true to himself, most self-referral.

I look to him as a sort of a reference point. He's an original, I mean, all those things are just sort of, but the best thing about him is he has a huge heart. You know, a lot of people start foundations and they disappear and they put their name. You know, David traveled around the world. He's been meditating since 1973, beginning of Eraserhead. He traveled around the world many times in support of meditation. And he wrote a book and he did a-

Catching the Big Fish. Catching the Big Fish. Which you should listen to on audio book. The only way to do it. Because it is like, yeah, don't read it. You got to hear him read it. It's just priceless. It is unbelievable. It really is. Unbelievable.

So what I've learned from him is originality. And he always says in life, you have to have final cut. You got final cut. Yeah, his conviction for his own creative voice is unparalleled. No, there's nobody like him. And uncompromising completely. No, and he, it's just final cut.

You just can't, he said, if a painter was painting something and at the very end, some guy in a suit came in and said, I want some blue in there. You'd think, get out of here. Well, why can somebody do that when you're working on a film? And he said, his only biggest mistake that he ever made was in the movie Dune, where he gave up final cut to Dino De Laurentiis. And he said- Man, it became a disaster.

Yeah, a disaster. And he said, you die two deaths when you give up. He said, if it fails and you did your best, fine. But if it fails and you weren't true to yourself, it's impossible to deal with. So what do you think is, what is it about him that makes him such a powerful voice? Fearless, he's fearless. He's fearless. In his life.

He loves and is fascinated by, let's just say a hamster, this little baby hamster growing up to its full life. And he's just as fascinated by the laws of nature to watch that dead hamster decay. Now it sounds crazy. I think I saw a video once where he took like a raw piece of meat and put it on the floor in his garage and he just filmed it or, you know,

I wanted to talk about it. Well, he says it's laws of nature. It's laws of nature that create and the laws of nature that destroy. But those are laws of nature with that little hamster that is dead. And so why is it okay? You know, there's light in a day.

There's light and darkness. That's a full day. Why is it they'll only look at this and not look at that? And so when some people have called him on, you know, his films and he's a meditation guy and what's Mr. Bliss doing making films like this? He said, first of all, an artist reflects the world around him or her. And we change the world, I'll change my art. And the other thing that is great that he says is you don't have to suffer to show suffering. You know, like you don't have to die to do a death scene. You just have to be empathetic and intuitive

and be able to show scenes. But he's not, he's fearless. I'll be watching a film with him and my natural inclination when something really horrible comes on is to just sort of like glance away. And he's just, and not in a weird way, he just loves the whole thing.

Right. And one thing he said, someone was on him about his films and he said, have you read the Old Testament? You know, a million times worse than everything I'm doing. Well, he's funny. Yeah. He's really funny.

Love to get him on your show sometime. Oh, I would kill for that. That would be amazing. And what I loved about the way you described how you created this foundation was how easy it was. Like you just said, hey, let's do this. And he was like, okay. And then it just kind of happened without any grand design or plan.

It was like it had been my desire for a very long time. You know, I've worked in businesses and I worked in schools, but always for 30 years teaching TM. I've taught TM for 45, 46, almost 46 years doing all this, but always was kids, kids, kids, kids, kids. And so at one point it just, I was reading about the horrors

that children face in schools. And you can focus on the under-resourced schools, but it's really across the board. We're losing a generation. And so I just, it had built up and I just said, David, I really wanna start it. We should really start this foundation. And he said, fine. And I said, I wanna put it in your name. I don't, David, I really want to start it. We should really start this foundation. And he said, fine.

And I said, I want to put it in your name. I don't think he thought anything was going to come from it. He said, fine. And then I said, can I write a press release about it? And he said, fine. And then two days later, it was like in papers all over the world. And I say in the book, he called up, he said, what's a 501c3? And I said, I don't really know.

That's a 501c3? And they said, I don't really know. That's a nonprofit organization. So now today you guys are, I mean, you have millions of dollars in grant money that are being allocated to not only helping kids, but what I love is you're helping inmates in prisons and also specifically veterans with PTSD. I think that's super interesting. So can you talk a little bit about those programs? Yeah, I mean, when you look at veterans and I've taught many, I mean, when you look at inmates and they've done research and across the board, almost every one of them has suffered some trauma in their sustained or moments of huge trauma in their life.

Nobody just kills somebody for no good reason. But if you grow up in a violent community and they call it ACE, which is acute childhood experiences, which means some traumatic experience. And if a child has three or four of them at an early age, they see the father beat the mother, they witness it, then they are on a pipeline to prison because it just skews them.

And when we bring the transcendental meditation, again, because the body gets this deep rest, it heals the body in a profound way. It unknots those stresses. And there's research that shows a 50% reduction in recidivism rates when inmates leave prison. 80% of all crimes are repeat offenders because some kid at the age of 18 ends up in an adult prison.

It's penitentiary for doing something bad. And then it's like a college for criminals, criminal behavior. So 50% reduction in recidivism rates. When it comes to veterans, my dad was a veteran. I grew up around veterans. Those are a completely different story. A lot of these were just kids, 17 years old, 18 years old. They go off to Iraq or wherever they go. And then one day there's a, they're in a tank and everybody gets killed, but them, and they come back like a shell of a human being and they can't sleep for months because of nightmares and cold sweats. And then they learn to meditate. And it's not an exaggeration to say that within a few days, the first thing that happens is because they've gotten this deep rest, they start sleeping through the night.

And we have the Department of Defense, just to lock this down to some science, the Department of Defense several years ago gave us $2.4 million to do a study on the effects of TM on post-traumatic stress on post 9-11 veterans, comparing it to what's called prolonged exposure, which is the gold standard of treatment. And the study showed that TM was as good,

if not a lot better than prolonged exposure for healing, reducing symptoms. And one of the big differences is prolonged exposure is they show videos or films of people getting, tanks getting blown up and people, as the veterans don't like doing that and they love meditating. Long answer to a short question.

No, but I mean, it's amazing that the benefits are so dramatic. And also second to that, that you have like the DOD on board who's seeing this and is willing to fund it to the tune of millions of dollars, which is huge progress, especially in the face of the opioid crisis that we're looking at right now

and how many of these poor veterans who come back and are suffering are just hopelessly addicted to these pills that are just, you know, creating, wreaking havoc. Well, I think one reason why veterans like TM, like anybody does is a year and a half ago, they were healthy. They were like, it's not like they've been living and building up some, they were just normal kids. And then all of a sudden they're not,

and they know it and they're embarrassed because they're weakened and they're taught as a military personnel to be tough and not to show any weakness. And so rather than seek out help. Yeah, they just internalize it. And they commit suicide. You know, 21 veterans commits because they can't admit.

And when they go to the VA, if they get diagnosed, and people don't know this, if they get diagnosed with post-traumatic stress, it's like a black mark on their record. They can't get a job as a police, as a security guard. They can't even get a job as a crossing guard at a public school. So a chilling effect on even addressing it to begin with. And then, or else they're given a handful of drugs and they're drugged out of their mind. That's not what they want. They remember still two years ago when they were fine.

And the beauty about TM is they learn a technique and they just go, you never see them again. They just meditate on their own. They can come back for follow-up, but they don't need to. Yeah, I think I read also in the prison context, at some prison you taught TM and the prison guard or the warden said to you, I've never seen these guys sit together in the same room quietly,

like with their eyes shut, like you just couldn't even believe it. Yeah, that was at San Quentin Prison where I was there when we were working with men on death row and men who were in shackles. So when they came to, you learn one-to-one from a teacher. And so one-to-one in order to do that, he was in chains and shackles because he's a violent person. And every one of them, because it's not hard. Even that guy, it's the nature of the mind

to be drawn to something more satisfying. And so people say, well, why did they take a drug? Because for that moment, there's a relief from the pain. It doesn't say afterwards, but there's a relief for the pain. And so they have that experience. You don't have, it's not an acquired skill and you teach them to turn the attention within and effortlessly everything happens. The transcendence takes place on its own, settles down. And it doesn't require a belief system. It works whether you're skeptical of it or not. No, you don't have to be. If I didn't believe in gravity, I'm still sitting here.

I don't have to believe in electricity. I can turn on a light switch. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the beauty of it. Like how the 12 steps work, whether you are dismissive of them or not. If you do them, they will work for you. I actually like it when, you know,

it's often one person in a partnership, one person learns to meditate and then, oh, I really want my husband to learn. I really want my wife to learn, but she's so negative and she's so skeptical and, you know, she won't believe it. And I say, I don't care. Right.

If they wanna come and take four days and I say to them, do the four days, hour a day. If you don't like it after the four days, don't do it. There's no loss here. Try it. And if people say, well, I do mindfulness or I do vipassana, I say, we have to stop siloing.

Oh, I do this and therefore I don't do that. There's many tools in a toolbox. And these three different approaches, focused attention, open monitoring, mindfulness and transcending. They have different outcomes. They have different purposes. You don't say, well, I eat protein, so I don't eat leafy greens.

Right. It's like, it's a balanced life. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What if, has there been long-term studies on the impact of this on people that struggle with addiction? There was a study that just came out. Big problem with addiction is relapse. So they go away for a 30-day, $8 zillion something, but they go away for 30 days or they get off alcohol or drugs

or any other addiction, food, sex. And then it was a high proportion relapse. And so a study just came out. It was conducted at Avery Road, which is an alcohol treatment facility in Bethesda. And the findings showed that in a control group, that the people who were not meditating, every one of them relapsed.

And the people who were meditating regularly, there was like a relapsed. And the people who were meditating regularly, there was like a 60% reduction. They didn't relapse. Wow, that's amazing. Huge. They don't see anything like that. How big was the control group? It was a phase one clinical trial, so like 40 and 40. Now we're going for a phase two clinical trial, which will be 200. And then the third, which we really want to do is a thousand. which will be 200. And then the third, which we really want to do is a thousand. My goal is highest, best, toughest, most rigorous research.

So you can, with largest numbers independent. So you can, we can change public policies. And it goes back to my desire from the beginning was the effect public policy. And if the VA is paying gazillions of dollars for medication, well, why not pay a fraction of that for meditation? Right. Yeah, it's in their economic interest to invest in that as a viable alternative. Yeah, I mean, I'm in recovery. I've been sober for a while, but... You love this.

Yeah. You love this. Yeah. You love this. Yeah, I do. And I think, you know, as somebody whose life has been transformed by the 12 steps of which meditation is one, my perspective as a member of that community is that that step, which involves meditation, kind of gets the, it kind of doesn't get the attention that it deserves. It's part of it, but the meditation, there isn't really any kind of focus. People don't know what to do. They can't do it. So they do it for 60 seconds and no one tells them how to do it. And so it doesn't really stick.

And so it doesn't really become an integral practice in that recovery equation for most people. Well, I mean, what I tell people is the problem of stress, the problem of drug, these are serious problems. And you wouldn't just, if you had a physical ailment, you wouldn't say, well, I'll just go online and see what they tell me to do. You go to an expert. You go to a person who's a proper diagnostician who could prescribe something that's proven. And I think the same way is with mind.

We shouldn't be so casual. We should do research. You know, meditation, there's a lot of hippy-dippy stuff. There's some cheap stuff, but there's also some substantive stuff. And learn from a teacher who knows what she or he is doing. You know, you have a certified teacher. One of the big problems, and I have a lot of friends in the mindfulness field,

and Sharon Salzberg was telling me that she said, the problem with mindfulness now is they've lost their brand. Anybody can say they're doing whatever. And so science doesn't know what it is. If you do a mindfulness program at a school in Spokane, what are you doing in St. Petersburg? Yeah, there's no control. Whereas with TM, it's specific.

It's no control. Yeah, there's no control. Whereas with TM, it's specific, it's absolutely precise. And the training program is high level of certification. Right, and it involves doing 20 minutes of this practice twice a day, essentially. Once in the morning for 20 minutes, you get up 20 minutes earlier and you, people say, I'm not gonna give up my time, my sleep. And you say, no, no, it's better than sleep.

It's deeper than sleep. And then sometime in the afternoon or early evening before dinner. So the morning is like rejuvenating and you have a high level of energy that takes you sustained so you don't need multiple cups of coffee and that sort of thing and makes you more resilient.

And then you do it at the end of the day to sort of wash off the stresses of the day, whatever you've picked up and be more present with your partner, with what you're doing in the evening and sleep much better at night. So traditionally for thousands of years, it used to be done at dawn and dusk, but it was first thing morning and afternoon.

Do you ever miss? Yeah, of course. Yeah, I mean, I try not to, I don't want to. So you're human. Most people say, I don't have time or I don't know how I'm gonna make the time, but like myself, like a good alcoholic, I'm like, well, more must be better, right?

When I was talking to Dan Harris, he told me that he's experimenting right now with meditating two hours a day. Cause he wants to just see, you know, like, he wants to like push that envelope. He wants me to teach him TM. You do, yeah. Yeah, he told. Yeah, I would imagine that he would. Just to see like what would happen if he does that.

He must be interesting for his wife. I was actually, I know we can close, but I was actually talking to this businessman in New York who was with his 12-year-old son. And they were sent by by his wife was meditating. And I think the wife took this son aside and gave him some tips on what to say. So the husband was saying,

I'd like to learn how to do it. I don't think I can do it because my mind is so busy, but I don't have the time. I just don't have the time. 20 minutes, do I sit down at the time? So the kid said, dad, there's 1,440 minutes in a day. You don't have 40 minutes. And then this is where the mom came in for self-care. So, and the fact is it has to be a priority. The trajectory that we are all on as a society, as a culture, as individuals is not

sustainable. It's just not sustainable. We're falling apart. And so this is an intervention. This is my own intervention. I'm going to take 20 minutes from my morning, find it, get up earlier. I'm going to take 20 minutes in the afternoon for myself. And then the rest of the world will adjust. And the nice thing about this is so many people who come say,

I could never close my eyes for two minutes, much less 20. And because this meditation is so many people come say, I could never close my eyes for two minutes, much less 20. And because this meditation is so enjoyable, the experience is so satisfying, 20 minutes flies by, just flies by. I think even beyond that, there's a weird spiritual equation that takes place where time bends in on itself. And because by virtue of doing a practice like this, you suddenly have more time because you're more efficient. 100%

100% You're more focused, you get more things done. There's no procrastination. And suddenly that list of to-dos shrinks precipitously compared to what it looked like when you're not practicing this sort of. And can I close by just giving the brain research on this? So everybody wants to be more creative. Everybody. Nobody wants to feel they're stagnant. They want to grow. They don't want to feel

they're stagnant or stuck in a relationship and their own feeling inside and their job, they want to grow. And so a lot of very creative people, I teach a lot of very creative people. And so I was curious, what's the brain mechanism of a creative, what's a creative brain? And they say that there's three, they used to think that there was regions of the brain was governed creativity. Oh, the right hemisphere, that's the creative side.

And then the scientists, it's not regions, it's networks, it's connections. And there's three networks that are involved in the creative process. The first is called the prefrontal cortex, which is the executive network, the executive control center. That's focus, concentration, judgment, planning, that's attention, focus. Then the other element opposite of that is called the imagination network or the clunky name, default mode network. And that part of your brain gets awakened

when you take a hot shower, go for a run. We are not like in front of the computer typing and figuring it out. Then there's a third part of the brain called, I'll just say, it's what navigates. It shuts down, when you need to focus, it shuts down the imagination center. And when you are sort of blue skying,

it shuts that down, the attention. Sorry, this is complicated. But a creative person, and meditation develops this, has both networks functioning at the same time. Because those neural pathways are communicating with increased efficiency. So that means you can focus, but not lose the wandering, the open, the imagination.

And you can have the imagination, but not lose the ability to make it real. I'm sold Bob Roth. Will you teach me TM? Yes, next time I'm in LA, I'd be honored to teach you. No, it'd be great. I would love to take you up on that. I appreciate it.

When I come back and I'm gonna spend more time in LA, I would like to teach you. All right, well, thank you, sir. I know you gotta get going. I appreciate the time. I'm doing something with David Lynch. Yeah, well, say hello to him for me. I'm going to.

The invitation is wide open for him to come on the podcast anytime. The new book is great, Strength and Stillness. So it just came out February 8th, right? Six, six, six. February 6th, so brand new on the podcast anytime. The new book is great, Strength and Stillness. So it just came out February 8th, right? Six, six, six. February 6th, so brand new on the shelves. It's very accessible. You can read this in like two days.

No, two hours. Two hours, yeah. It's like, it's super easy. And the best way, the best place for people to find out a little bit more about you and your work, davidlynchfoundation.org. Or tm.org. tm.org. Okay. Yeah. Great. Excellent, man. Thank you so much for your time. Appreciate this a lot. Okay. Really

great. Peace. All right. We did it. It's done. What did you guys think? Brief, but awesome. Short, but sweet. Hope you guys dug it. Do me a favor, share your thoughts of this conversation with Bob himself. He's at MeditationBob on Twitter. I am at Rich Roll on Twitter and Instagram. Would love to hear what you thought. While you're at it, make a point of picking up Bob's new book, Strength in Stillness, wherever you buy fine books. I'll put a link in the show notes to make it easy for you to do just that. And speaking of show notes, check them out. We put a ton of time and work into them. They're almost like a syllabus to extend your learning, your edification, your infotainment

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