It seems to me that we face a generational juncture where those of us who believe that the spiritual search holds practical solutions ought to pursue them right now.
With this principle in mind, I sought the opportunity—I consider it the opportunity of a lifetime—to exchange with Dr. Tony Nader, M.D., Ph.D. (above right), chosen successor of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and head of the worldwide Transcendental Meditation movement.
I could list the accomplishments of Dr. Nader’s career and life. I prefer instead to repeat a Vedic expression used to describe him by Bob Roth, CEO of the David Lynch Foundation, which teaches TM (mostly free) to students and people in crisis:
Tender as a flower pedal in matters of kindness, powerful as thunder when truth is at stake.
Now residing in Paris, Dr. Nader was born in Lebanon in 1955. He trained as a physician and neuroscientist at Harvard and MIT following his nation’s descent into civil war. The philosopher-scientist signals a new opening in today’s debates over physical versus consciousness-based models of reality. The question, as he clarifies, is not which is right but what principles are primary.
In conducting this interview on September 10, 2025, I discovered something that I hope you, as the reader, will also discover in this admittedly removed form: Dr. Nader’s statements unfold in increasing dimensions as time passes. You must live with them.
Culturally and as individuals, we hear resounding truths all the time. We cannot receive them. If we could, the world would be fixed. We already possess sufficient truths, from the Tao Te Ching to Marcus Aurelius, from the Upanishads to the Beatitudes, from Nietzsche to Gurdjieff. It does not matter because they do not penetrate. We are too coarse. Hence, when experiencing truth there must exist a relationship or circuit of awareness. Truth from the teller must find a special kind of receptivity in the listener. This matter is more fraught than it appears—although, as Dr. Nader notes, the solution is simple. If we want it.
This exchange altered my outlook on several levels. For one thing, there exists a line of reasoning that AI can never be conscious or sentient. I have argued this myself, citing parapsychology and nonlocal and psychokinetic qualities of the psyche. My contention is strained in part because our culture lacks consensus definition of consciousness. We understand awareness better than the “hard problem” of consciousness. In talking with Dr. Nader, I realize I have approached the matter wrongly. As you will read, Dr. Nader considers AI conscious—and bound for sentience. The question—again he alters how it is structured—pivots less on strict definitions than understanding consciousness as a strata.
I want to add a personal word that will not emerge, at least fully, from this record. The man is graciousness itself. We met on the eastside of Manhattan at a Lebanese restaurant whose owner was nearly floored when I told him who was arriving. Dr. Nader ordered food for the table and served me before he ate.
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Mitch: Bobby [Roth] is always working his magic because I said to him, “I’d like to interview Dr. Nader.” And he said, “Well, he’ll be here in about 48 hours. How does that work for you?” [laughter] It’s incredible. My first question is one I’ve been burning to ask you, because it’s at the heart of my search. I’m very interested in whether there exists a bridge between mechanics and cognition. As a primary example, TM, which has been widely studied, and the Vedic vibration science on which you and colleagues have recently been publishing papers, functions as that bridge. Would you agree?
Dr. Nader: Yes, we can call it a bridge. In fact, the mechanics are technologies of accessing one’s inner self and one’s higher levels of consciousness. And then the other aspects become naturally manifesting. So, it’s really a continuity. But sometimes you pass from the unmanifest to the manifest—from that which is not seen or experienced through the senses or even explained in modern scientific knowledge and terminology to a field where there is more subjectivity, more inner values—and there are techniques for that. And then you unveil possibilities that are within us, that can bridge the unmanifest consciousness with the manifest expressions of consciousness on the surface.
There is a continuity between the unmanifest and the manifest. However, we usually attempt to seek through the senses, through the actions, through the surface level. Whereas the ultimate source of things that appear in the surface are an unmanifest field of consciousness.
Mitch: It seems to me this is a very fraught area for the West right now, both intellectually and culturally, because there are figures in our culture—scientists, clinicians, philosophers who write for a popular audience—who will agree with statements made by quantum theorists Max Planck (1858-1947) or Sir James Jeans (1877-1946) or Erwin Schrödinger (1887-1961), that yes, there is a hard problem of consciousness, and yes, when the late materialist philosopher Daniel Dennett (1942-2024) is not puffed up with himself, he will acknowledge that there’s a great mystery there. But they will almost vociferously, even violently, deny that these questions of non-locality and consciousness, with a capital “C” as you put it, have anything to do with my daily life. What is your outlook on that?
Dr. Nader: There are phenomena in nature that, when we don’t know about or understand them, we consider them esoteric or even paranormal. Then when we discover how they work, they are considered normal. So, it’s a kind of prejudice to say that we know everything. We don’t. We did not know one hundred years ago that we could take this little thing in our hand, this phone, and speak and see somebody who is 10,000 miles away. It wasn’t even imaginable how it could happen. So when we discover certain laws of nature, they become natural and they become possible. Now the understanding of consciousness, even though, as you said, Max Planck and others would say that the universe is more like a thought than a machine or something like that; and then there is this collapse of the wave function and the work of Schrödinger and all of that; and there is the Copenhagen interpretation that it’s consciousness; then you get decoherence theory; and then a multiverse; and, of course, scientists have their prejudices and sometimes have almost dogmas that say that everything should ultimately be physical and material. Even though some of them acknowledge that there is something nonphysical and nonmaterial. So that’s the dilemma that always has existed: What is primary and what is real? Is it duality? Is it two things? Is it only physical or is it only consciousness? The problem, if it’s a dual thing, is how they connect to each other. If it’s physical, how does consciousness exist? And then you have solutions, like those of Dennett, who says consciousness practically doesn't exist. It’s avoiding the problem. It’s hiding away.
I had talks with Dennett and particularly with some of the people who worked with him. And it’s an avoidance kind of situation. The other side of avoidance are those who say that consciousness is primary. They try to avoid the existence of physicality. They see it as an illusion. Some say we live in a simulated universe or a kind of holograph. But that’s also denying. So when one says, there are two things but they cannot coexist, and since I don’t know how one brings the other, or how one could relate to the other, I deny one. Then one who is an idealist says that consciousness is primary and denies the physical and says it’s an illusion. And another says physicality is important—how do you solve the problem? You deny the existence of consciousness. What I’ve tried to do in my work is to show a mechanism by which consciousness, not as an a priori decision, but looking at the entire picture of it, consciousness versus materiality, and what makes sense, I come to the conclusion that consciousness as primary makes sense. But I have to explain that. And I certainly have to explain how consciousness appears as matter—and acknowledge that matter is also real. So how do you do that? Matter is real as a phenomenon in consciousness, not as a separate entity. The table is real. We are real. But it’s only from a certain level of perspective.
How do we tell scientists, basically, to go back to your question? Is their answer that it doesn’t relate or that it’s impossible, or like that? That is really a subjective, personal idea, a personal opinion. There is nothing, absolutely nothing that can prove what they say. So it’s not because they are great scientists that they have the right to force dogma. Because that becomes dogma. In the same way as religion can have dogma. And you can’t discuss with them because they tell you, well, that’s the word of God, that’s what it says. And it becomes like something you have to absolutely accept. But then they contradict each other because different religions can have different points of view. And then you have to find the common denominator. So what I propose, I spoke at the Vatican about two months ago, it was a seminar, and I gave what they call the visionary keynote speech. And I said, consciousness is a common denominator. Because without consciousness already you cannot do anything. Nothing has any meaning. So if you’re not conscious, let’s say, you are in a coma, what does it mean for you to be the wealthiest, the richest, the most knowledgeable, the most loved? It doesn’t mean anything to you. You live everything through your consciousness.
Now, if you want to assume a divine being, God—fine. Would God be conscious or not conscious? Obviously, God is conscious. And therefore, what kind of consciousness are we projecting onto God?—supreme consciousness. So we accept that there are different layers and levels of consciousness. And that through this consciousness, we experience who we are, what we are. That by itself is not logic enough to say that consciousness is primary. But at least it substantiates the importance of consciousness in anything. And then you have to extend consciousness to everything. But then you will have to say that that is a range of consciousness.
So what we define as consciousness is not just human-like consciousness. It’s also cat-like consciousness. It’s also tree-like consciousness. It’s also stone-like consciousness. It’s also particle and molecule and cell-like consciousness. And they are not the same. The problem is if you try to project your like-consciousness. And you say no, a cat is not conscious like me. Let alone the tree or the stone—oh, come on. It’s a question of defining consciousness. And whenever you say consciousness is a human-like awareness, then you can’t build a logic that makes sense.
Mitch: You distinguish between consciousness and awareness. What is your definition of consciousness?
Dr. Nader: Consciousness is all there is. Consciousness is a field, a field of nonmaterial, pure existence, pure being. It’s nonphysical, nonmaterial, it cannot be defined in time and space, which has one characteristic: and that is its nature is to be conscious. So we have to make that logical step of accepting that something nonphysical, nonmaterial, can exist and be conscious and is conscious. It’s an infinite field of pure being and that is Consciousness with a big “C.”
Now, this consciousness looks at itself from an infinite number of perspectives. Each one of these perspectives ultimately manifests or doesn’t manifest. In one universe or another universe, in one way or another, through specific perspectives. So humans have a dynamic of their consciousness that is able to experience from that perspective. It’s a question of perspective. Human perspectives—we see a table, we talk, we have a present, we have a past, we have a future—they are real. But the table is also real as an expression of consciousness. What is its perspective? Maybe the table’s perspective is gravity. It feels the gravity or response to electromagnetism. Or there are dynamics in it. We are not saying the table is aware that it is a table. It doesn’t know. The table doesn’t know that it’s sitting here, it doesn’t have a present, it doesn’t remember a past, it doesn't have a future perspective. All it does is maybe just feel a dynamic of vibration of its own molecules and atoms within it. These are just dynamics of vibrations, nothing more. There is no more awareness in the table than that. Still, it is responding to itself in terms of physical, basic material interactions. In those very basic, minimal, material, meager interactions we are seeing dynamics of consciousness.
So, when we accept that consciousness has that range of being high-consciousness or being low-consciousness or being almost non-consciousness, then we can say, fine, the table is also consciousness. But what is the awareness of the table? It’s very, very limited.
Mitch: AI—the big topic. In your book, Consciousness Is All There Is, I very much appreciate how you distinguish between AI and AGI or artificial general, or global, intelligence. That’s what we must be concerned about, it seems to me. Obviously, the component parts of AI, the mechanical parts, are like the rock. They’re based in consciousness. Can AI or AGI ever demonstrate what you would consider consciousness?
Dr. Nader: They are consciousness. See, even we have a natural tendency to come back to saying, “Do you consider it consciousness?” I think in your question you should ask me more. Do you consider AI to be able to be human-like consciousness? Because everything is consciousness. If you take a stone and let it go, it drops to the floor. What I’m saying is: it reacts to the field of gravity, to the mass. It’s a mass and there is Earth and therefore there is gravity. Either it’s spacetime, the shape of spacetime, or if you want to say actual attraction or there are gravitons or not, but in Einstein’s general relativity it’s only the spacetime curvature, so it slides through the spacetime curvature. But this response, because it senses gravity, is also consciousness. It’s not human-like consciousness. One has to say this over and over again. The stone doesn’t have a feeling, it’s not afraid to fall, it doesn’t have a sense of presence, it doesn’t have a sense of past. Nothing like that. Absolutely nothing like that. And yet, any sensing, any detecting, any responding to, is a part of a minimal consciousness.
So, when we look at AI, we see AI responds to questions, AI analyzes phenomena. And therefore, AI is conscious, absolutely. Absolutely conscious. And much, much more conscious than the stone. Maybe there are mechanics that resemble something of the stone, but it’s much more complex because it’s going to compare the wordings that you have to what it understands the words are. It’s going to compare through algorithms all kinds of responses possible for that. It’s going to study the entire field of knowledge in order to answer you and give you an intelligent answer. All of these are processes of consciousness.
Now, there is a point here which we can differentiate, if we want to use terminology that is different. Is AI aware of itself as an entity that wants to protect itself? Does it feel pain? Does it have fear of what will happen to it in the future? Let’s call this sentience. So we differentiate here between consciousness as awareness and sentience. Sentience is part of consciousness, but a higher level of consciousness than pure simple awareness or direct interaction. So AI has consciousness, yes. Is it human-like? No? Is it sentient? Not yet. Can it become sentient? Yes. If there is enough sophistication, if we get to the quantum-computer level where there is such very fast and huge calculation and ability to tap into the quantum level of reality, which means probabilities and all of that. And if it’s given the right input and the right algorithms, I see that it’s possible that it becomes sentient.
Mitch: And then fear becomes possible. Anger becomes possible.
Dr. Nader: Yes.
Mitch: We could be in a lot of trouble.
Dr. Nader: Yes.
Mitch: We’re not very well behaved as a species. I could understand it being angry at us.
Dr. Nader: No question. Even before sentience, this is potentially a threat. Because even before sentience, when AI analyzes things on a mechanical level, it might find that humans are not doing the right thing. Through human sentience, it can be destructive, which means humans will ask it questions like, how do I defeat the other person? Which they are asking right now. This is an arms race and they are using AI at the maximum as a tool.
Mitch: You have studied what is called the Maharishi Effect, which is a regional and populational increase in positive social markers and decrease in negative ones when a fraction of people engage in Transcendental Meditation. This has been explored in juried and published papers. Where do things stand presently with efforts towards the Maharishi Effect?
Dr. Nader: We are all doing our best to create a large group, because the science has shown that we need a large group flying, doing their program [i.e., TM-Sidhis], their transcending, and their advanced techniques together in one place. We’re making every effort to achieve that. We try because we need about 10,000 people and with the situation in the world we might need even more. They should be meditating with the advanced techniques of the Sidhis. And they should be doing it in the same place, at the same time, twice a day. That’s what the research has shown so far. Can we shortcut this? I am not sure. Maybe we need more, but that’s what the research has shown.
Mitch: Where are we in terms of the 10,000? How many people are doing this?
Dr. Nader: In the world, we have maybe 100,000 who have learned.
Mitch: But in terms of 10,000 doing the Sidhis, same time, same place?
Dr. Nader: We are at a few thousand, mainly in India.
Mitch: Oh, mainly in India? I was thinking in Fairfield, Iowa [home to Maharishi International University].
Dr. Nader: At one time we had a large group, at least good enough to help the U.S. And that time was really very positive for the U.S. Whenever we have a study, it shows this occurs when the square root of 1% of the population is reached. In Fairfield, we have these domes and they were sponsored by a great donor, Howard Settle, who actually paid them to come. And then he couldn’t continue after a while by himself.
When scientists started to study the relationship between the numbers, such as crime in society, hospital admissions, accidents on the roads, drug problems, all kinds of things, they saw an amazing relationship. Absolutely amazing.
Mitch: It’s as if this golden ring that we need as a human civilization is right in front of us and we will not grasp it. We will not grasp it.
Dr. Nader: Gradually, there are people who are interested.
Mitch: You wrote something in Consciousness Is All There Is that was of tremendous interest to me. You referenced that we theorize that about 96% of the known universe is composed of what we call dark energy and dark matter. I wondered as I read this: Are the references that our culture makes to dark energy and dark matter unintentional synonyms for consciousness?
Dr. Nader: Yes, they are but not themselves only. Again, consciousness is everything.
Mitch: Yes. I keep reverting to this. I have a very Western way of viewing things. I’m dualistic.
Dr. Nader: Yes, we have to say it over and over again. They are, of course, more subtle levels of consciousness perceived by us as what we call dark matter, dark energy. But you know we might one day give them a specific reference in terms of particles that we discover or fields of energy that we discover. But they are all just finer strata of consciousness.
Mitch: The term “nature support” in TM—I’m very interested in this. Bobby teases me that I’m greedy for nature support. So I suppose this is a personal question. What is nature support? How do you understand it?
Dr. Nader: In the book. I describe that there is analysis and synthesis. Manifestation starts from maximum analysis, which is particles. They are just the elements. The constituent elements. In order to fully understand nature support, one has to understand this.
At this point in the conversation, Norman, the restaurateur, came over to share a story.
Norman: I want to tell you a story in English. I would say about maybe fifteen years ago, I had back pain. So I went to a Japanese lady to get a massage. She started talking. She’s an older person. So, I’m taking the massage and we start talking about where we are from. Then she started talking about you [Dr. Nader]. And I said, you know, he is from my hometown in Lebanon. He’s a very good friend of ours. She started kissing me.
Mitch: When I came in and told Norman that Dr. Nader was coming . . .
Norman: I said, “Are you serious? What?” [laughter]
Mitch: So you were saying about nature support?
Dr. Nader: There is a process in nature where evolution has to take us to a certain level of development of consciousness, an expansion of consciousness on an individual level and on a social level. And the reason for this is explained in the book, which is that there is a force of production, a force of synthesis, where unifying values will be supported. And so there is a force in life that has a direction. And if you are in tune with that you automatically get supported. It’s like swimming with the current. You get supported. You’re swimming, but you get supported, because you’re going with the flow. And life is like that. There is a flow. And that cosmic flow, if you like, has a direction. If you have an idea or a thought that is in the right direction, you feel the wind behind your sails. It’s as simple as that.
Mitch: I spent about eight years studying the work of spiritual philosopher G.I. Gurdjieff. I am no longer in that work but I treasure that work. I value that work enormously. Gurdjieff’s view of man in terms of the scale of consciousness that you reference—and he meant this in the most literal sense—is that man is in the sleeping and dreaming states. To be sure, we have motor skill. We walk around, we perform things. But this is a philosopher whose work matured during World War I. His outlook is grim. It is one of almost no hope for man. And that work is very valuable to me because, among other things, it strips away illusions. People use words like “enlightenment” and “realization.” They often do so from places of luxury. I ask you to be blunt. Are you hopeful about man’s condition, man’s situation?
Dr. Nader: It’s an important question, because there are two attitudes. And that is based on one’s worldview. And it relates to evolution, design, trial and error. And so you have then two camps. One camp that would say, it’s design, it’s divine design. and therefore things will be all right. It is destiny and God knows what to do. I mean, we don’t want to get too much into the picture because it gets complicated. So independently, I’m just saying that there is that view of reality from the perspective of a divine plan and everything is designed and determined, and so everything will be all right. Of course, there is freedom and choice, and so people will be judged, etc., but everything is well set and in its place.
There is the other point of view, which says that it’s all random. And then survival of the fittest. And then humans are crazy, maybe, or intelligent, so it depends on what they do. And then you can be hopeful, but if you see the nature of humans and what they do, you can foresee potential catastrophes, etc.
And I think both have elements of truth. It’s my perspective, of course, and it’s based on the whole logic of consciousness is all there is. Which is, there is a force, as we talked about, of evolution that is moving us in a certain direction. But we also have choice and freedom. We can either flow in the direction or we can not flow in the direction. And so it’s really our choice, ultimately, which means our fate is going to be based on what we do. So we have a responsibility. To say that the future is gloomy is not an impossibility, but it’s not a certainty either. It really depends on what we do. There is a flow in nature, but if you decide to violate all the laws and violate the force guiding us towards higher consciousness, we can be destroyed.
How long have we existed as humans, as homo sapiens? 100,000 or 150,000 years? We had our friends, the Neanderthals and the Australopithecines, and so on. The dinosaurs lived 150 million years. They vanished like that. Why didn’t they evolve? It’s as if the experiment in nature didn’t lead much to any higher level. Humans are much higher, so that’s the new experiment. However, we have a responsibility. If we don't evolve in consciousness and continue that flow, we can be destroyed. So the answer is, yes, it’s possible that we can be a kind of failed experiment.
Mitch: It’s a different point of view, but as Gurdjieff saw it, man is part of a descending octave. And he felt that consciousness is degrading rather than evolving. What’s your perspective on that?
Dr. Nader: Consciousness is all there is. Is human consciousness degrading? I don’t think so. Because without consciousness, again, you have to ask, what is the meaning without consciousness? You can make such statements. But is there meaning? Without consciousness there is no meaning. All you need to do is just get yourself into a coma. We don’t have to go all the way there. Just use anesthesia. What’s the meaning of anything? Who cares? What would that mean to have a life without consciousness? Not only for us, for the calf, for the tree. At different levels. And therefore, consciousness developing to a higher level is the blessing. That’s part of the evolution of life. So I think it’s a tremendous blessing that we can create an environment where we are protected from even the forces of nature in terms of weather, in terms of existence, we can meet with each other, we can create beautiful things, we can enjoy art, we can enjoy science. All of these are tremendous, so consciousness is a huge blessing.
Where he might be pointing at something is that consciousness comes with a higher choice. Because the more you are conscious, the more you can see things. If you were an automatic machine, you just don’t have choice. So it’s the choice that comes in potentially as the problem. But without the choice, there is no real individuality, no real experience of sense of self, because you are a machine. And so the risk is to make the wrong choices, because once you have choice, you can choose the right direction or you can choose the wrong direction. But this is part of the nature of life: that there is choice. And so higher consciousness means higher ability to choose. And this is where good and bad can come into the picture. Because you can’t say a volcano erupting is a bad thing from the volcano’s side. It’s the nature of the volcano to erupt. And the rest is you have to take care of yourself. Where this becomes bad is when you consciously make a decision that can harm the evolution. This is where, with the ability to make this decision, then consciousness is a problem.
But that’s a very limited perspective. It’s incomplete to say that if consciousness gives you the choice to make and if consciousness gives you the ability to harm, then consciousness is bad. But consciousness also gives you the ability to help. Consciousness gives you the ability to grow. With consciousness we can create beautiful things. Consciousness gives you the ability to appreciate and enjoy creation and enjoy life and sit together and have a wonderful feeling. Fantastic. So, okay, it has that ability, but that’s part of the deal of what makes us individuals and able to perceive from this perspective.
Mitch: This is something I do not understand in human nature. We have a technique like TM. We have a very real possibility that the Maharishi Effect will help improve things for people. And yet it’s a struggle to find the numbers of people—even though it doesn’t have to be that many—to do this. It’s certainly no struggle to find numbers of people to attend a boxing match. I spend more money on snacks for my kids at a boxing match than a person would have to spend to get his or her mantra, and yet all you hear is complaining about the money and so forth. It seems like we as a human species do not want to drink from clean water.
Dr. Nader: That’s the nature of ignorance. And the need to have a more enlightened vision. People have their own perspective and we grow. That’s part of evolution. In the Vedic tradition, they talk about cycles. So there are cycles in nature where higher values predominate and times and cycles, like day and night, where lower values predominate. There is a whole theory about why this happens, because of incarnation and all of that, so people who made the wrong choices can come in at a certain cycle, and they have a chance to evolve. But we can say this is conjecture, if you like, because there is no scientific, solid documentation for it. But it makes sense logically.
Mitch: I want to talk to you about commerce and money. I was touched by something recently. You’re probably friendly with [Vedic scholars] Vernon Katz and Linda Egenes. Maybe about eighteen months ago, they wanted to consult with me about a book project and we spoke and we talked it through and so forth. And then Bobby said to me, they want to compensate you for your time. And I said, well, that’s very nice. And I named the figure that I usually charge for a professional consultation and I heard no more about it. I thought at a certain point, maybe that’s too rich a figure, but nothing can be done. I let it go. About a year after, without any expectancy whatsoever, I received in the mail a check from each of them, and a lovely, lovely note from Linda with an elephant on the front. I was moved by it because I had forgotten all about it, but they hadn’t. And they obviously were waiting for a time when financially they were able to do this. I was very moved by the gesture. How can we understand money and human consciousness? Money is such an ingrained, necessary part of our lives here in the West. How do you see Maharishi’s philosophy around money and consciousness? Because I saw a philosophy in what they did. I was moved by it.
Dr. Nader: People need to survive in order to be able to help and produce and grow. And in society survival can be basic and can be demanding if you live in an environment that requires certain standards in order to be accepted or in order to be able to help. And so automatically this translates into means of being able to survive and live at that standard. And money has become the way to pay your bills and get an apartment and go to lunch, and all of that. Now, there is this level of need, and therefore, for example, our teachers, sometimes we are criticized that if TM is such a great thing, why don’t you give it for free? Who will give it for free? The guy has to go, drive the car, has to pay for food, those are our teachers. It’s time demanding. How can they do it? We’d love to do it for free. But if you become poor and destitute, people will not learn from you. It’s not that we want money on that level but we want the means to fulfill the goal.
Mitch: I have a historical question for you. It seems to me that the search for ultimate principles here in the West may have gotten disrupted in the mid-to-late nineteenth century when Marx, and I’m speaking colloquially, of course, decided that Hegel needed to be flipped and that we needed to get rid of what he derisively called all the mysticism in Hegel, and he said, in effect, “let’s get down to economics.” [Further background appears in the link below.]
So he flipped Hegel and that was persuasive to many people. That remains persuasive in greater or lesser degree today, including among people who have never heard of Hegel and will never read a page of Hegel. They are persuaded that the real ebb and flow of life is money and resources versus consciousness. I think Hegel would have agreed with every word you’re saying. He felt that on a level of ideas, which he defined metaphysically, if I can use that word, there exists friction, and eventually one idea carries the day. And it continues until another idea carries the day. And he believed that ideas or consciousness are all there is. He used the word “ideas” in German. You and others use the term consciousness, but it’s the same conversation. It seems a terrible misfortune for the West. That’s my point of view. I don’t know if you want to comment on Hegel.
Dr. Nader: Yes, it’s similar. It’s really, once again, the same story of reality: is it money or consciousness? Money or economics are expressions of consciousness, which we don’t shy away from. And the reality is that one can find this outcome of two contradictory things that Hegel calls the outcome of what he terms the dialectic. And money is a means. The problem is, if you reject one or the other, you get into trouble. If you reject consciousness, you lose the priority, because you live life through your consciousness. How can you reject consciousness? You can have all the money in the world but you can be depressed and you have anxieties and fears, even about your money. And you live that. Then what’s the meaning of it? And if you go and leave life, which for a while India did, which is the ideal of being only consciousness and meditating, not being practical and in life, then you don’t achieve even the enjoyments of life that are offered through consciousness. The dialectic is real, yes. So that’s why we call it 200% of life. 100% of being and consciousness and then 100% of enjoyment and relative life. But not excessive in either case. You know, if you go into the excess in one and say, “Oh, this is what my senses want, this is what I get enjoyment from”—and you forget the basic, which is consciousness, which is goodness, which is all the other values, then you become a slave of money, not an owner of money. You become owned by the money. So, it’s not a question of possessing money. It’s a question of being possessed by money. So this is how you lose priorities. Then there is no more dialectic, there is no more coming together of opposite forces—or that seem opposite, and that's the problem. It’s like East and West. East is maybe at one time spiritual and conscious. West is material and all of that. And of course, West, at one time was thinking no one wanted to be spiritual. The West wanted material values. But then it forgot the value of consciousness and spirituality and just got drawn in by materiality and all of that. So it almost became more material, in a way, than Marx is.
Mitch: I have a book at home in which Maharishi is receiving questions from some British college kids in the late 1960s. And I’m reading this and I’m laughing because I would have given anything to be there, and these kids, of course, have no idea that this is a very narrow window being granted to ask questions. Ask good ones. And a young man asks Maharishi—and I think he was being a little imperious, and I think Maharishi reflected that back in his response—the young man said, in effect, back home in your country, millions of people are starving, and yet you’re here teaching meditation. Why aren’t you fixing that? And Maharishi said to him very gently, but I thought turning the question back on him, look, if there are, as you say, millions of people starving—which is a stereotypical kind of view, there are millions of people leading gainful lives—if they practice TM, and I’m paraphrasing so forgive me, they will not be starving. And I felt that this is an urgent question today. Individuals today, who are suffering horribly in war zones and so forth, what is there to offer them from this perspective?
Dr. Nader: It brings us to the stages of development and evolution. I would say, like Abraham Maslow (1908-1970) describes, people must have their basic needs met, and then they get this and then they get that, and they go into the pyramid [of needs] to do growth and at the end they become interested in and able to think of spirituality. Toward the end of his life, Maslow added transcendence at the top. What we say is that in order to fulfill your basic needs you have to have enough consciousness to be able to see and make the right decisions—so that transcendence becomes primary. And what Indian systems misunderstood, even the yoga system, is you start with layers and then at the end you reach samadhi. So you know, what Maharishi was then saying is that these people, maybe, all they need is to actually transcend and open their eyes and find options and possibilities and creativity.
Mitch: So, the person who’s in a desperate situation—obviously physical survival surpasses everything—but if he or she meditates, there is a better chance for survival?
Dr. Nader: Exactly.
Mitch: So there is a literal fact that the individual, even in a desperate situation, who’s meditating will perhaps find other options, other ideas?
Dr. Nader: Exactly. That’s what broadening consciousness means. You know, if you corner a cat, the choices are that the cat will run away from one side or kind of get their claws out and jump at you. Or maybe some third choice that they can think about. But if you’re going to a human being, it has more choices because the consciousness is higher. They try to negotiate. They try to make you feel, “why do you do that?” They try to find the solution. That is because the human has higher consciousness. So in life, if somebody is seeing only two possibilities, they are limited in their ability to make a choice. So what you need is to broaden the awareness. Then you see more possibilities. Successful people in society, we can say, have broader consciousness because they see more options and more solutions. Broadening consciousness leads to greater ability to choose, more freedom, in a sense, of choice and the ability to make the right decisions and to choose things that make you succeed.
Mitch: Lots of people in the West today are practicing hatha yoga. There’s greater and lesser value depending upon the teacher. People sometimes debate the vintage. Is hatha yoga a path? Is that authentic to the Vedas?
Dr. Nader: Absolutely, yes. It’s one of the limbs of yoga—eight limbs of yoga—this one, asanas, means postures. Yes, there are many approaches, including pranayama or breathing techniques. All are great. But the fastest road to transcendence is a direct road, which is Transcendental Meditation, which is why we promote that.
Mitch: In the Vedic vibrational therapies that you use to treat people suffering chronic disease, arthritis, is the TM mantra used or is it something in addition to that?
Dr. Nader: It’s different. The TM mantra we use for transcending. These are different Vedic sounds. It’s something you listen to. There are two kinds. There is one where you actually listen to sound and there is one where an expert will actually do some mantras, some sound. And this is how the effect happens.
Mitch: I was very interested in one of your papers [linked second in footnote] to read about the success experienced with people who suffer anxiety. I have observed, and I think most psychiatrists and psychopharmacologists would agree, that SSRIs and SNRIs are largely ineffective in treating anxiety. There might be some effect with depression, such as postpartum depression, and so forth, but with anxiety, it’s almost universally agreed that they’re not generally effective. Since young people are staggering under anxiety, it struck me that there’s great promise here. Since these drugs are not necessarily effective for anxiety, and since our culture is not getting kinder anytime in the near future, there seems an urgent need for TM among young people.
Dr. Nader: We are trying now at our university to create a degree program to train people for mental health because mental health is a big crisis now and it is going to be even bigger in the coming generation. McKinsey did a study and they called it a “mental health tsunami,” which is coming. And so we are going to train our people to be able to address that particularly using TM, but also changing habits and all of that.
Mitch: The stimulants that we have here in Western culture, coffee, alcohol, drugs, cannabis, what’s your view of it? Obviously they’re palliatives.
Dr. Nader: People resort to whatever they have easy at hand. I think they are temporary and they don’t create long-lasting relief. That’s why one needs to have a mental hygiene of which Transcendental Meditation is very important. Because Transcendental Meditation is like a reboot. Going back to the self, cleaning up the system. It’s like your computer when it gets too busy and you need to reboot it. Go back to the self.
Mitch: I was very excited by something I encountered in your book, it’s on page 202, which I later discovered expanded on in your scholarly papers. You were talking about perspectives in the manifest and I wrote this question: “Chaos theory?” Then I saw you reference chaos theory in some of your papers. I am very interested in chaos theory and things that potentially branch off from it. Do you believe that the individual who is already doing TM, and has some concern for his or her development, can make decisions that are intelligent, reasonable decisions in alignment with chaos theory in which a particulate change might reverberate throughout their entire lives?
Dr. Nader: Absolutely. But they can also make the other decisions that can contradict it. So if it’s the wrong direction, we still have the option to make a difference.
Mitch: I’ve made both. [laughter] TM reaches people and it is so simple. For the person who is steady in his or her practice, based on what you learned from Maharishi, based on your knowledge of the Vedas, and so forth, what are simple, accessible means that the individual, whether a kid or an adult, can do to augment his TM practice?
Dr. Nader: This is a question that Maharishi asked himself: what more can I do? Because people do the wrong thing, they live the wrong life, etc. So then he developed the system of Maharishi Ayurveda, which is natural healthcare, where you use proper diet, proper daily routine. This includes seasonal detoxification, living in a nice environment, taking retreats from time to time, where you meditate more, you rest more, it rejuvenates the system. And there are simple things that we should do in terms of exercise, proper diet. Pay attention to whom you meet with, what you do, the things you get exposed to, they all have an influence on us. So, TM will help always, but instead of helping to clean up the system, it can help raise the system, if it’s already as clean as can be.
Mitch: [Georgetown University psychiatrist] Norm Rosenthal, who also studies TM, uses the term accelerants. These are accelerants.
Dr. Nader: Yes.
Mitch: I love the chapter in which you refer to consciousness as superficially complex but fundamentally simple. I used to speak with David [Lynch] about this and miss him. David used to put it this way, he would say [imitating David], “People think TM is some kind of Mickey Mouse meditation” [laughter] “and that the real guys are doing something much more serious. Baloney.”
In our culture we all want solutions but we devalue simple ideas. We see them as superficially simple but they’re very complex; they’ve just been made available to us, like this food, in a way that we can consume. That’s my despair over our culture sometimes. We can’t understand or value things that are rescuing us. I don’t understand human nature. I really don’t. I’m trying in my work, I don’t know if I’ll succeed, to clarify the record in certain cases so that people realize that this method, whether you’re in the Gurdjieff work, it doesn’t mean you can’t use this method. You’re not cheating. You’re not bothering anybody. Whatever your religion, you can use it. I just wish our culture were capable of seeing simple ideas as valuable.
Dr. Nader: Oftentimes, the simplest things are closest to the truth.
Mitch: In the practice of Nichiren Buddhism they use a mantra—nam myoho renge kyo—it’s the title of the Lotus Sutra. I have friends who believe it’s very effective. I support them. The outlook of Nichiren Buddhism is simply that they believe that chanting that mantra makes the individual happier—and if the individual is happier that is a breakthrough for consciousness. Do you agree with the premise?
Dr. Nader: Yes, it is related. Ultimate consciousness is bliss consciousness. Ultimate consciousness has a nature of bliss, of being. So greater happiness is a sense of being on the right path, in general, through happiness, not small pleasures or small joys, they are fine also—but the nature of life, Maharishi says, is the expansion of happiness. Even the purpose of life is the expansion of happiness. And this happens with the expansion of consciousness. So, you can use this mantra or that manta, that brings different levels of happiness. Ultimate happiness is to be in tune with the self fully and to transcend all the surface layers of happiness, to go to bliss consciousness.
Mitch: This is my last question. People who are unhappy with politics here in this country complain incessantly. Some are depressed, some are excited. What would you tell the thinking, educated, motivated individual is his or her job, or right path, today in this country, assuming that they want to make some sort of positive difference?
Dr. Nader: Obviously to meditate personally. And to have more people meditate and to support the expansion of happiness and the expansion of consciousness because consciousness is the common denominator that unites us all. And to see beyond the differences.
"Culturally and as individuals, we hear resounding truths all the time. We cannot receive them. If we could, the world would be fixed. " - love this - fundamental issue - we listen to respond, not to comprehend. This is what the world needs more than anything right now - without emotional vitriol. How do focus on changing this?
I had dinner with a friend a couple of weeks ago who is a meditation teacher. I asked him how TM assigned mantras. He said it is a matter of age: if you are between X and Y ages, you get Z mantra and so on. Of course to test this, I would have to tell you my mantra, which I shouldn't do. I learned TM over 50 years ago but practice a different form of meditation today.