TERMS

The fertile valley between IRONY and SINCERITY is called STYLE. STYLE is unrelated to public perception, acceptance, or rejection—it is its own pure value. IRONY and SINCERITY sit atop BLUFFS, gazing down upon the wastelands that sit outside their craggy perches (CYNICISM and CRINGE, respectively).

This is why David Lynch’s and Andy Kaufman’s STYLE remains undimmed, despite the idol-worship of many of our nation’s laziest art-bros. Given the death of the former and the release of an estate-authorized documentary on the latter, it seems apt to reappraise the situation of TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION (TM), absent its two most visible symbols (and, through the David Lynch Foundation, its most significant funder), within the psychic landscape defined above. 

Come next spring, will TM bloom anew across the Elysian plain? Or will it find itself jettisoned—to one cliff or the other, or beyond?

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EXPECTATIONS

On my last Sunday in the city before a recent spate of travel, I ambled towards an intro session at the Los Feliz center. My companion and I wondered aloud about what awaited us, sipping Home State coffee and trafficking in cultish stereotypes. 

How menacingly serene would our white-woman instructor be? How many draped tapestries and photos of Maharishi would adorn the walls? How many Lynch stans—hoop earring, Basquiat Converses, and chore coat-clad—would deprive our curiosity of oxygen?

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TESTIMONIAL

What we found was altogether more understated, tender, and engaging. We were the first of a modest six participants to arrive at a building with all the comforting non-aura of my psych prescriber’s nondescript offices in Pasadena—a fact which assuaged my fear of CRINGE. Ritual was then re-introduced in manageable doses, sometimes even pleasant ones (for instance, we were asked to remove our shoes once gathered before sitting in a circle—this one worked on me). 

As it progressed, the session continued to strike a canny balance between the mundane and the ceremonial, an equilibrium which helped loosen my grip on my reservations. The background hum of Maharishi reverence and the overstatement of TM’s health benefits (to her credit, our instructor did backtrack from implying that cancer, like high blood pressure, was often caused by stress addressable through TM) were balanced by sober, rational 

assessments of anxiety and inattention epidemics and the limitations of talk therapy and medication. 

One by one, we shared what had brought us there that afternoon. Even in this, the solitary Lynch-bro’s darkly imitative CYNICISM (he shared first) was subsequently offset by more earnest and open rationales. One member of our cohort, a therapist herself, bravely admitted that though she recommends therapy as an additional tool for patients, she had never herself confronted the practice out of fear of failure.

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CONCLUSIONS

For many, fear of one’s lack of focus prohibits engagement with tools designed to remedy that same problem. But what sets TM apart from other meditation practices, we were told, is its ease. An unconscious descent, through mantra, into deep awareness. Just 20 minutes, twice a day. To get there, just four easy courses and a few hundred bucks (less, noted my companion, than many co-pays). What could be more STYLISH?

What I planned as a chance encounter may yet have roots. Several of our number lingered post-session to sign up for courses. Bound for Tanzania the next day, it would be only a couple of hours before I Googled “TM Center Arusha.” The valley awaits.