This Simple Meditation System Expanded My Mind Beyond Imagination (ft. Tony Nader)

Transcendental Meditation is allowing the mind to settle down and go beyond the thought process, beyond memories, beyond specific values.

Why suffering? How do you make sense of that? And then secondly, how do you get out of it?

Suffering is a result of losing touch with our deeper self. For whatever reason, the purpose of life is the expansion of happiness, and that expansion of happiness happens through the expansion of consciousness.

Hello. I'm here with Dr. Tony Nader. I want to tell you a little bit about him, and then we'll get into some questions. Tony Nader, MD, PhD, is a medical doctor trained at Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. For many years, Dr. Nader worked closely with Maharishi, who first introduced Transcendental Meditation, or TM, to the world in 1958, and who emphasized the scientific understanding and validation of Transcendental Meditation. So thanks for being here, Dr. Nader, and it's going to be a pleasure to ask you some questions, especially since I have been doing TM on and off since 2013.

So thanks, Joe. It's great to be with you.

Yeah. So you've got this big book here. Consciousness is All There Is. And so I'm going to ask you some questions about this. But my hope is that anyone that's watching or listening to this, I think what they may want is to feel better, to feel better, to be happier, to be more productive, to have more success, to have less pain and angst in their life and more joy and happiness. And you go very deep. I mean, your. Your book is incredibly deep and frankly, at times, a little hard for me to understand. And so I'm hoping that you can bring some clarity, not only to myself, but to others. And let me set this up first by saying I got trained in tm, Transcendental Meditation, and people that, if you've not heard of it before, go to tm.org there's trainers all over the world, and it's a great organization. So I went to Fairfield, Iowa, from our friend Janet Atwood, who introduced us, and she wanted me to go to. She'd been for several years. You got to get trained in tm. You got to get trained in tm. And I kind of ignored her. And I never could meditate. And I had the hardest time with. With just sitting still. And so there came this time where me and another individual were given awards for. For me for my contribution in entrepreneurship. And so I was invited to Fairfield, and I thought, oh, this is just going to be Janet setting something, something up. And so I show up into the town. There's A giant banner welcoming us to town. And. And then we proceed to have dinner with the mayor of Fairfield, big TM practitioner. And then for the next week, we went to the university, Maharishi University, met all kinds of people, Fred, Travis, a bunch of different people that were doing stuff, met all these practitioners. Everyone was so nice and so kind. And then at the very end of it, we were speaking at the university. And when we got there, there were signs everywhere, all over the town announcing that we would be speaking that evening. And it was like standing room only. And I'm like, wow, they put a lot of effort into this. And so for the first time in my life, I was there with six other six or six to eight other people. I can't even remember that we all got trained. And so for the first time I was able to sit down and meditate. So that's the good news. And there's a lot I can tell in between. So let's first have you define meditation. Like, what is meditation? What does it actually mean? Because we live in a world now where, you know, there's so many apps, there's so many processes, there's all kinds of things. And I mean, you are running the top meditation organization in the world as far as I know. So I don't know if there's. What would be even comparable to tm.

The term meditation is usually used to deal with something that we do through the mind rather than the body. You know, you exercise, it's the body, you eat, it's the diet, it's the physical aspect. And there is an aspect of us which is our mind, our consciousness, our awareness, our intellect also, of course, and anything that mostly deals or gives techniques to improve our thinking, to improve our well being, our health, our creativity, whatever we want to improve our greater health, happiness and peace and harmony through the mind, then it's usually called meditation. So therefore, you can imagine there are all sorts of techniques of the mind. You can have intellectual inquiry, so that is thinking about projects, being a scientist, planning your business, when you're sitting and closing your eyes and you're quietly inwardly examining the different aspects of life or whatever, you're doing some kind of meditation. So when you're praying, it used to be in the past that the meditations are kind of prayer also being in a. Looking to talk to some force that is supernatural, whatever you believe in, that is also some kind of meditation. And there are techniques that are not connected to any belief or any talking to anybody other than being with oneself. And there are different kinds Therefore, of meditation. So there can be concentration. You try to learn to focus on an object and keep your mind focused. People were thinking that this helps. And the ability to put the mind to, to rest and stand still and like that. Or some people try to create silence or try to create peace or harmony, or there can be contemplation, for example. Take a subject like love or living or happiness and think about it. So all of these are different kinds of meditation, but we can really think of them in general categories as being. Some of them are focused attention. So you kind of force your mind, manipulate your mind to focus on something. And some of them are called open monitoring. So that's a whole category where you sit there and you observe what is happening to you. You observe maybe your breathing. That's what usually is called mindfulness these days. To be mindful of what you're experiencing, be it a thought, be it a feeling, be it a physical process like breathing in and out. And that, you know, directs the mind towards specific aspects of functioning. And there is the other category which has Transcendental Meditation. And practically it is the only one in this category almost, that is automatic self transcending. We call it automatic way of allowing the mind to settle down and go beyond the thought process, beyond memories, beyond specific values, and not direct the mind or manipulate it or force it in any way to think of anything specific. So that technique is what we call Transcendental meditation. And that's why, as you said in your opening remarks, that suddenly it's easy, suddenly it works. Suddenly it's not something that you. It's not forceful. You don't say, I cannot do it. My mind always jumping around. How can I force it to settle on something? And there is a technique for that, of course, a technique for allowing the mind to settle down without forcing it. And we say this is guided by the nature of the mind. That's why we say the technique of Transcendental Meditation is natural, which means it follows the nature of the mind. And the nature of the mind is to always search for more. We want more happiness, more joy, better things to hear, better things to taste, to eat, to smell. Better knowledge, greater things, more charming experiences. This is always what we are looking for. And what we look for is usually through our senses projecting outside. Now, what we know and have discovered is that within ourselves is a field of consciousness, awareness, mind that has different layers. It's like an ocean which has the surface value of activity as waves. And then as you go deeper and deeper within the ocean, you get more Quiet, more quiet and more settled. So the mind is like that. It has that surface value, and if you force it to be on the surface, it will be jumping around from one thing to the other. But if you give it the inward direction, then guided by its own nature, it dives towards its own inner reality, which is actually more charming and more fulfilling than anything on the outside. And that's why it happens naturally. And that's why transcendental meditation is a very simple, very easy to practice, natural technique that you practice morning and evening for 20 minutes sitting comfortably in a chair. You don't have to change your beliefs, your habits or anything. You close the eyes and you dive. And then the diving happens by itself. It's like when you dive and let go, gravity takes you. And in this case, it's such a. Such a gravity, you know, without being grave. But it's being very easy and simple. It draws you towards your inner self, and there you find great fulfillment. So that's really the technique. And, you know, we say that if the mind has to be settled, you can try to force it, or you can give it something interesting and then it will go for it. For example, we take the example of a honeybee. If the honeybee is buzzing around, you know, if you try to force it, it will not be happy, it will sting you, it will do all kinds of things. But if you give it the nectar of a flower, then suddenly it will settle. And like that. You know, if you're reading a book, for example, that is boring and some nice music starts on the side, your eyes might be still going through the words of the book.

But.

But your mind suddenly is with the music. Why? Because the mind finds the music more charming than when you're reading. But if what you're reading is really attractive and interesting, it doesn't matter even noise, what people are doing or music. You are fascinated and your mind stays. So the mind stays with something that attracts it, something that charms it. And since inward inside of us is maximum charm, then when we get that direction and let go, the mind settles by its own nature.

Gotcha. Gotcha. Well, let me ask you. So I want to translate this into why someone should do it. Because one of the biggest obstacles that people will say is, well, I don't have time. I mean, I. If they've never done it before, and that was clearly one of my objectives and obstacles, was how am I going to take 20 minutes once a day, let alone twice a day to meditate? I got so many other things to do. And so since so many entrepreneurs and business owners and frankly, busy people. Even though I think at this stage in life, it's sort of a busy world we live in. If you live in America and with access to so much content and so much knowledge and electronics, that people are constantly connected. So I think we're more connected electronically than ever before in human history, but more disconnected as humans. And so there's. A few years ago, I was at ted, the TED conference in Vancouver, and I saw Ray Dalio. He had spoken earlier that day, and I had gone up to him and I knew a couple of people that were friends of his. So I immediately, like, mentioned these people. And so I started talking with him. And so we. We chatted for a few minutes. And one of the things that I had asked Ray, and so people that don't know Ray, he wrote the book Principles. He's a billionaire, very successful, successful guy. And I said, out of all the things that you've done, all the things that you've learned, what has had the greatest impact on your success as a person, as a human? And he said, by far, doing transcendental meditation, doing tm. Not just meditating, but specifically tm. That's what he said to me. And so I want to mention that and I want to highlight that, because this is a guy who is a billionaire, he is a very successful person. And what he had told me was his. The, you know, the. The most valuable thing to his growth and success had been meditating. Now, we didn't go into how that translated into money, how that translated into stuff, but I wanted to bring that up. And so I wanted to ask you, like, there are people that are gonna be like, okay, that sounds good. But there's. I'm a mother, I'm busy, I am a father, I have a business. I. I have a lot of obligations. How does someone meditate, you know, 20 minutes twice a day, when I can barely even get through 10% of the stuff I have in my own life as it is? And so I wanted to have you speak to that.

Time is very relative in the sense that you can spend two hours and not achieve anything. So you say, okay, I've been working on this project for two hours. But then nothing happens. Your mind is not so clear. You're tired, you're not able to focus. You can't find the ideas because your mind is floating on the surface. We said the ocean and the waves. You're being jumping around on the surface. Maybe there are some issues you are worried about. Maybe there are stresses or something like that, or you're tired and so you are just floating on the surface and you can't get the intelligence which is already within you, but you're not able to access it. So resources are all within us and sometimes we can access them and we feel bright and clear and we find solutions and like that. And sometimes they are not there because they are veiled, they are covered, they are, you know, not available because of blocks and stresses and stimulants, strains and like that. So in a simple way, what Transcendental meditation does is allows us to remove the blocks and the stresses and the strains and gives us greater clarity of vision so that we can focus better. So actually, even though itself, it doesn't require to focus during the practice, but it gives the ability to concentrate, it gives the ability to achieve more because of clarity of thinking, inner peace and inner quiet and inner stability. And we are not just being shaken by, you know, other things. So what TM does is removes deep rooted stresses, even deeper than those that the good night's sleep removes. Things that have been lingering on for years because even we forgot them. And they are there in our subconscious, in our unconscious, and they are, you know, making us uneasy. We don't know why, but they are there. So what we have seen is this deep rest that is gained during transcendental meditation, which has a very interesting quality. It is what we call restful alertness. We are very alert and awake, yet we are very quiet and very peaceful. And this has been shown to dissolve stress and strain, improve health, improve balance of the physiology. Even on a scientific level, better, you know, performance, reduced cortisol level, reduced inflammation, reduction in blood pressure, even longevity and rejuvenation, better performance at school, greater creativity. And so to go back to time, then suppose you can do within 10 minutes what you would have spent two or three hours to do. If you are very clear and effective and rested, then the time that you spend in meditation, 20 minutes, let's say, plus the 10 minutes you spend on your work, is half an hour instead of three hours. So you have gained actually in time when you invested in yourself, in your ability to do things. You know, people who are with you and entrepreneurs and investors and all that, they know this better than anyone in terms of if you have some bag of money and you hide it and keep it there and you're afraid to give it away for investment, then it stays limited. And with inflation, we know it disappears very quickly. Whereas if you invest it properly, which means you get rid of it in a Sense, you take it away, you give it to some project or something. You invest it wisely. You're not losing it, you are actually investing it. So I would say that these 20 minutes are an amazing investment for great productivity, for dealing with the issues of life or being effective in any field as parent or as son or daughter or, you know, aspect of life in business or whatever. We all want precision and we want our time to be used best. And that happens when we are best within ourselves.

Yeah, no, that's great. That's great. So let's talk. Let's talk about consciousness then. And I don't know if I know anyone that has ever gone deeper in writing about consciousness that I've come across than you. So you really describe what consciousness is. And there's probably not just a simple answer, but one thing that I have said over the years is, you know, I just want to increase my level of consciousness. And what I mean by that is I just want to be a more connected human being, right? I want to feel that I have purpose and meaning and joy and not that I have to have any sort of purpose other than just being and for, you know, operating what I consider based on a value system, integrity, having people in my life that I enjoy. And also when I have to work really hard or I have to do things that will endure suffering, I'm a guy that will exchange peace of mind for productivity, meaning I will suffer oftentimes in order to get done what I think is important. And I don't know if that's a very conscious thing. However, there are trade offs that I will do, especially the work I do in addiction recovery. So I spend about half my time I genius recovery, my foundation, and I don't pay myself. I could take that same timing and contribute to a bunch of other things, but it helps me my own recovery. So it's not this philanthropic thing just because I'm a nice person. It's really beneficial and helpful to me. And I deal with some pretty heavy stuff and I deal with a lot of pain of other people. And so I think consciousness, that is a more conscious way for me to actually live my life. And so consciousness is an interesting word and I think it gets thrown around a lot. And I'd love for you to explain what it is. And I do want to say in your book, you talk about big C and small C consciousness. So I'd love for you to explain the difference of why it matters for understanding, you know, our experience as a human.

On the simplest level, consciousness is that which allows us to be aware, to be conscious. So now we're conscious. We're conscious of what we're saying, we're analyzing it, we're thinking about it, we're responding to it. If we were in anesthesia, we would not be conscious, of course, we would not be aware of anything. And so consciousness is really the most important aspect of our life that we usually take for granted. And we take for granted that we are conscious beings. And we don't even think and realize that without consciousness, we don't exist, we are nothing. You know, we are just a mechanical object that, you know, doesn't have a sense of meaning, doesn't have a sense of experience of anything. So life goes on. And, you know, there are many facets of how we can really look at consciousness as a subjective experience, which means a very personal experience of what it is like to be myself, what it is like to be loving, what it is like to be having knowledge or joy or happiness. All of these experiences that we live on a subjective level are colors of consciousness. So when you say I'm in love means your consciousness, your awareness, has taken the flavor, the color of love. When you say I'm feeling happy, that means your awareness is taken a color, a flavor of happiness, which means fulfillment, which means well being, which means sense of security. All of these are subjective, personal experiences. And they are actually colors and shades of awareness of consciousness. So how is it, you know, imagine without consciousness, there is not even pain, you know, and surgery, you can have under anesthesia surgery, and you don't. You don't mind, you don't care. You're not there, nothing happens. So you might be the wealthiest person in the world, or the most balanced person on the surface level, or the richest or the most knowledgeable. But if you're not conscious, if you don't have awareness, it doesn't mean anything. So that is personal consciousness, the ability to experience something. And different individuals have different broadness, different depths, different abilities, different widths of consciousness. So consciousness is not just an all or none phenomenon. It is something that changes. For example, in deep sleep, the body is conscious because if you poke the body or if there is a loud noise, it feels it and wakes you up. So that's why even deep sleep is a state of consciousness. In dreaming, you are there and you live, but you live a fantastic or, you know, fictitious kind of reality, but you believe in it during your dream. So this is a kind of consciousness. Also during waking, you can have different, different grades of consciousness. You can be drowsy you can be dull, you can be alert, you can be calm, you can be feeling joy. You can feeling freshness and peace and feel great. You can have moments of ecstasy and epiphany and aha. Experiences and feel like flying. So all of these are different, different layers and levels of consciousness. Even though you are the same person, you can go through all of these layers of consciousness. So the question is, where is this consciousness coming from? Is it the product of physical activity of the nervous system, as usually it has been thought, or is it something more fundamental? And so the research that has gone very deeply into trying to study where does this subjective experience come from, has led to many theories and paradigms, some of them saying that it all comes from the nervous system. But nobody is able to connect the physical, material, objective level with the subjective, personal experience of consciousness. How can you translate chemistry and electricity into that feeling of love, into that feeling of compassion, of knowledge, of hope, of even pain and joy and happiness and all of that? And there is absolutely no indication how this can happen and how we go from the physical to the consciousness level. So what I have taken in my research and in my study is to look at actually all the factors that could produce consciousness from a physical perspective. And I have found that it's a wall that you cannot cross. So I thought, why not look at it from the other way around? What if consciousness is primary? What if consciousness is a field and that field is infinite, unbounded, unlimited? And what if what we have as our individual consciousness is only the ability to experience some aspect of that field or another, depending on different situation and circumstances? And I found that this can answer all the questions actually, not only about the relationship between mind and body, consciousness and physiology, matter and non matter, but also about the meaning of life, about why we are here, about freedom and determinism, choice, how much choice we have at different levels, why there is suffering, what does it mean? What's the purpose of it all? And so it gave a full paradigm that answers very profound questions in life. And also a logic that explains how from a field which is a field of consciousness, you can actually experience the physical and material less aspects of life. That there are tables and planets and chairs and people, that they are physically there and they are real, they are not just an illusion, they are absolutely real. But what they are made of is something more subtle. And that field which they are made of is a field of consciousness. So the theory is not like my theory to start with. It's been there for thousands of years. And the ancient knowledge from yoga and Veda and Vedanta, it says that consciousness is primary. And there are many philosophers, you know, Plato, Leibniz, Spinoza, you know, many, many we can mention that are what we call idealists, and even some very top physicists today and in the past, quantum mechanics, you know, discoverers that have made the change in quantum mechanics that have said that the universe is more like a thought than a physical thing creating a thought, but the thought is really primary. So what I did actually is take this and show how it can appear as matter and what is its explanatory power, which means how can it explain different phenomena in life? And does it contradict any finding? That is a robust finding in science. So it does not contradict. To the contrary, it's in tune with scientific findings. And plus, it has a very powerful explanatory power on all fields of actually that matter in our life. Happiness, well being, meaning, you know, peace, harmony, all of these questions. So that is really the kind of long answer, but also short about.

It's very good, and it's very deep. Hey, I hope you're enjoying this video. And I want to let you know that I have a new book that's come out, and if you'd like to get it absolutely free, there's a link below in the description, or you can wait till the end of this video, or you can simply go to Joe's free book and you can get a copy there. I think I have no way of quantifying this. My sense is that, I don't know, let's say maybe half the planet has goals and dreams and aspirations, and they strive and they develop careers and they have children and they have some level of freedom. And then there's other people that are just in the most immense suffering imaginable, and. And they just want a pain pill, right? And I say that metaphorically speaking, they just want to be out of pain. And there's a lot of people in America that are not starving, that have means and money, but there's an incredible amount of angst. And of course, I spent a good portion of my life trying to escape. And let's frame this from the standpoint of addiction. So I believe addiction is a response to trauma. And. And it's also biochemical. It's serotonin, it's dopamine. It's just wanting to feel good. And so I love the line. You know, Johann Hari kind of popularized it. The opposite of addiction is connection. And I have a friend, Dr. Anna Lemke, who wrote a great book, I've interviewed her before, called Dopamine Nation. And so she's a Stanford doctor, and she does a great job of explaining the biochemical aspects of why we behave and, and, and what causes us to. To be, you know, driven or not. And so let's take, you know, the neurotransmitter, neurochemical dopamine, which is anticipation. And so we live in a world where most people are staring at screens, they're looking at their phone, they're looking at computer screens, and they're these constant dopamine cash registers. And then there's all the other anticipations that we have. How much of this is biochemical? Meaning some people. You are a very calm individual, right? And I think that comes from years of how you have literally developed yourself. It's no accident, right? You. You put in effort, you put in work, you immerse yourself in this whole field. And there's other people that are neurotically all over the map and absolute anguish, right? And so why suffering? How do you make sense of that? And then secondly, how do you get out of it? Because I think anyone listening to us right now, they would love to have a way to feel better or to get out of pain. And a lot of people are struggling in so many ways with depression and addiction and, you know, suicide, I think right now is the number one or number two leading cause of death for young people. I mean, there is a lot of pain in the world, and I think you have a mechanism here to take people out of that. So let's talk about it.

Suffering is a result of losing touch with our deeper self, for whatever reason. And then we become disconnected from the energy, the source of creativity and intelligence, of peace and harmony. And we are becoming like a football of situations and circumstances. And that accumulates in terms of stress and strain and blockage that cut us from our deep inner self. And then we depend on changing this chemical or changing that chemical. And what I've done in my own life is actually look for chemicals. My research has been originally in neuroendocrinology, and at mit, I worked on what is the chemistry of the brain and how we can improve that to actually alleviate problems and issues. And so I was always hoping to help and contribute, be it in research or in medicine, as a medical doctor, also to help from this perspective. But what I found is that in a more holistic way, in a more integrated way, we can approach these problems from the level of the mind itself, from the level of, in this case, we can call it consciousness or awareness. And so, you know, the movie of life is projected in our screen of consciousness. You have a movie, life is happening. And if the screen is distorted or dirty or blocked or has some filters on it or some wrinkles on it, then your ability to process the movie is going to be damaged or hampered. So imagine you have a screen and you're projecting on it a very beautiful movie, but the screen has darkness, has holes, is not, you know, it's not proper. And therefore you're not able to experience the movie at all. It can be noisy and not so pleasant. This is an analogy. Analogies have their limitations. But, you know, just to have imaginary an image of what it is like is that our screen inside has been damaged for whatever reason by experiences we've had, maybe by changes from inheritance of something that we have in our even DNA, or from exposures throughout life to certain circumstances that are damaging. And what we have done is not allow this to be cleared. You know, when you get tired, you go to sleep, you rest, and the fatigue and the tiredness goes away. The body has a very powerful ability to heal itself. You cut yourself, it gets healed. You know, you might get a small scar depending, or even if the healing process is perfect, you don't even get a scar. And so, you know, you go through moments in life where you lose somebody or you're disappointed, you might feel low or depressed somehow, but then you heal yourself, you come back out of it, you become stronger, you move on. If you have the proper mechanisms, if you are properly connected with who you truly are within yourself, then you can activate those healing mechanisms. You can activate, you know, dopamine, you can activate serotonin, you can activate them in the proper balance between them from an experience on the level of consciousness. And that is very important in the context of the paradigm that I present, where consciousness is primary and consciousness is what appears as matter and physiology and all of that. So all of these factors that we talk about as physical factors are actually dynamics of consciousness appearing as physical entities. And if we can act from that field of consciousness, which is the ocean of consciousness, go beyond the surface values, get deep rest within ourselves and heal ourselves from within, then I have found that this is much more powerful in contributing to well being, to removal of pain and suffering, to even giving greater creativity. Because when we find ourselves in like, poverty or situation of difficulty, either we can fall victim to it and are unable to solve our problem and feel we are victims, victims, victims, or we can take our life in our hands. By diving deep within ourselves and gradually with strengths, with faith in life, with greater clarity, actually create the circumstances that will allow us to overcome the problems that we are facing. And that is where the simple technique of Transcendental meditation is not just to rest a little bit. You can sleep and rest, you can run and feel better a little bit. It is really diving deep within and going to the reservoir of creativity and intelligence which is really diving in the depths of our being and the depths of that ocean of consciousness and come out for proper strengths, activity and dynamism and in clarity and effectiveness to overcome problems that we have and get over the difficulties that we are facing.

Yeah, no, that's very good. So I don't know if you know the author David Bach, but David Bach was very successful author, many New York Times bestsellers. And out know it was probably eight years ago or so. He, I was talking with him and he was sharing with me. He was having some stress in his life. And I said, I really think you should get trained in tm. And so I, and I said, I know you're, you're, you're kind of, you have access to a lot of interesting stuff. So I introduced him to Bob Roth, and then Bob personally trained him. And to this day, David's like, that was the most important thing that I've ever done in my life. There's nothing that. And he's a very accomplished guy. And he's like, there's nothing that I have done that has helped me feel better as a human and feel more productive than doing tm. And my question to you is, if you could find a way to get there without having to sit down for 20 minutes twice a day, would you take it? Would you do that? And I say, that's kind of a silly question, but the reason I'm putting myself in the shoes of people that are listening saying, okay, still, you know how. I don't know how to do this. What is this? And they've tried meditation, so they have their preconceived notion of what that is. Or they may have downloaded some apps or they may have gone to some seminars or whatever. They sit around in breathing classes. They may have done psychedelic and plant medicine journeys. You know, there's a million things that, that humans do to try to get to, to that place. And there's, you know, people always trying to hack stuff. And I have an issue sort of with apps. I've tested different meditation apps. There's only one that I really, you know, find better than others. I'm not even going to mention it, but it's what it is. But there's, there's a lot of stuff because people resonate with it. But I, I've always had thought, like if you need an electronic device in order to meditate, I think there's some sort of. To me, it seems like a disconnect. So my, my question is, you know, if, if you could get to that space, would you take a shorter, faster route to get there?

Well, from what you said, and it's beautiful that you mentioned these different examples starting with wonderfully yourself and then Ray Dalio and Bach and all of that. And really this is the experience that we have seen with many people. We don't try to contradict or compete or show, oh, I am better than the others. But this is really the experience that we have that people say, well, that's the best thing I've done in my life. And so there are, you know, there are different ways to get different places. And what you want is something that is solid, that is proven, that really is effective, that is simple, that's easy to do, that's enjoyable, that is natural to, you know, to the maximum possible extent of naturalness. And that is why transcendental meditation has been proven to have that. And again, it's not just a simple one moment experience. I know, of course people can take a drug or can take something and have an amazing feeling for a moment. It's not that which creates the effect. What creates the effect is an integration of the functioning of the nervous system, system and a natural way of getting rid of the stresses and strains, not just bypassing them for a second and creating demand for, you know, greater dosage or, you know, or all of that, which we call addiction, which cannot at the long term be very helpful because it's just, you know, hitting one, one molecule or one transmitter or one receptor in the nervous system or the other and then getting bombarded feeling like you wake up and it's great. But then you have not integrated all of this with your own system and cleared up your own system. So I wouldn't take something that just like, oh, will give me the experience that I get in transcending for a minute without really knowing what it does, how it works. What are the implications over long term? Am I going to be needing more and more of this? Is it going to be an addictive kind of path? Am I going to remain productive and active and clear and enjoy life when I open my eyes and want to plunge into activity and want to work in the world and contribute to making life better for myself and everyone. And so I would, I would check it, I would test it, I would see what scientific research has been done on it and how it works and where does it come from. And so, you know, in Transcendental meditation we have thousands of years of experience. It's not something invented yesterday. It's part of the Vedic tradition of the yoga system, mental yoga. It's been handed down throughout, you know, thousands of generations because it's effective. It has been maintained in its purity, it is taught in its simplicity, in the same way it's been taught thousands of years ago. And it has been researched scientifically from many, many angles. Electroencephalographic brain changes, hormonal changes, you know, heart, all of these factors, you know, that, that one can check and see that they have been done and, and published in peer reviewed journals, etc.

Yeah, well, you know, the reason I wanted to mention too, so a very interesting story when I was in Fairfield, so I'm there with Janet, I'm there with a few friends and so I meet Prudence, you know, Mia Farrow's sister, prune it, she probably know her. And so she tells me the whole story. So people, they're not. Have you ever heard the Beatles song? Dear Prudence is like Dear Prudence, come out and play. And I said, so what is. So the Beatles did tm, they knew Maharishi, they helped really popularize it back in, in the day. And she said that the song was written because they always wanted me to come out and hang out with them, but I had more enjoyment meditating. And so the Dear Prudence, come out and play was like a call from the Beatles asking her, will you please come out of your room and come and play with us? But she was in there doing transcendental meditation. And so my question to you about if you could find a faster way to do it. I, I think people often think that you do it because you're trying to get somewhere. And I certainly have thought of that. Oh, I need to feel better, I need to calm down, I need to relax, you know, calm my nervous system, get in parasympathetic, whatever. And oftentimes I think the act of what we're doing is looking at trying to get the result. And I don't think that is the way that you encourage people in order to get to consciousness.

Well, does help both ways. You know, you might have a plan, a desire, you know, I want to maybe reduce my blood pressure and I know that there is research that Helps. That shows it helps. I want to be more peaceful, I want to be more happy. So you might have, I want to sleep better. And so you might come to learn TM for a specific reason, and that is completely fine. But ultimately what it does, it improves all aspects of life. So it has tremendous side benefits. And ultimately, you know, raises your consciousness, which means broadens your awareness, allow you to make better choices in life, allow you to find your purpose, allow you to get more organized and be more productive. And so that is the more holistic, if you like, aspect of the practice. Even though it can be targeted to different, different aspects of one's life. And as long as stresses go away and strains go away, there is more clarity, we get back in touch with our deeper inner self, then we're better in every way and in all kinds of conditions and situations.

Yeah. Awesome.

Awesome.

You know, it's funny, tonight I'm gonna go see Russell Brand, who's been a TM meditator for many years. And I met him I don't know how many years ago, because Bob Roth had set it up, he was doing a comedy show. And then I went backstage and talked with him about addiction recovery because he's been in recovery for many years. And TM is just one of the things that he has added to part of his recovery program with meditating. How would, how would you define addiction? Because you certainly, your organization has helped a lot of people that struggle with, with addiction.

Addiction is when you are subject to requiring a number of factors that are generally not natural. Not, you know, it depends how you define natural. And then that you start depending on them for your well being and depending on oftentimes increasing the dose. Because there is in the nervous system what we call, you know, up and down, acting on the, on the, on the receptors and all that. There is a mechanism for that and therefore you will need more and more. And when you don't have that thing, that factor, which is the addictive factor, you don't feel good. You do, you feel terrible and you just are in demand for it, right?

Yeah, no, it's, it's, it becomes that cycle. So I have a. One of my genius network members is a guy named Dr. Don Wood. And he's a trauma therapist based in Orlando, Florida. And he has this great line. I actually found it to be such a profound line that I wrote about it in my book what's in it for Them? And stuff. And he says if you, if you understood the atmospheric conditions of somebody's life, it would make sense why they are the way that they are. And so when I look at, why have I. How did I become an addict? How did I develop a successful business? You know, all the aspects of myself and other people look at any human, I always have in the back of my mind when I'm thinking from my higher self, which I'm always not, but when I am, I'll be like, oh, okay, you know, what were the atmospheric conditions of this person's life that has caused them to go down this path, good or bad? And I believe when you're a child, you oftentimes cannot have oftentimes any control over your environment or your parents or things. But as you become an adult, you can change the atmospheric conditions of your life, and you can also alter them for other people. So I think TM is not just beneficial for ourselves, but everyone around us. You know, David lynch, you know, in Catching the Big Fish, he talks about when he first started doing TM after about two weeks. His wife at the time said, you know, the anger just went away. He just was no longer angry. And that completely changed. Or he didn't have the anger he had before because he was always in an angry state. And that's pretty profound. It may be subtle, but that's a pretty big deal. And so that's the often things that you will hear with people once they start doing tm, and they'll start doing it on a consistent basis. So when I think, you know, of you talking, when I hear you talk about consciousness, I'm putting it through the frame of the atmospheric conditions of perception and awareness and experience and how you feel in the body and physiologically. You know, if someone is very stressed out, it manifests in disease, it manifests in addiction. It manifests in a lot of different things, and you can. You can alter that. And I don't know, there's a lot of aspects to a healthy human. I mean, for instance, you know, I've been doing a deep dive on seed oils and how they impact health. And 30% of the calories of most people today comes from oils which never existed like this, you know, 50 years ago. And most of it is very toxic. And so if you're. If you're doing tm, but you also have all of these other aspects that are impacting you in a negative way. Will that counteract it? So that's one way to frame it. The other is if you become more aware and more conscious, you're probably going to be aware of things you didn't even notice because you're not putting yourself in that position. So, you know, part of it is I'm trying to do a bit of a sales job here to have anyone that has never been trained in TM or has never done meditation to, you know, the, the takeaway from listening to us is that they actually go out and add this to their life and see if it makes their life better. They pick up your book, they read it, they get more awareness, their life gets better. And if their life gets better and they feel better, I can guarantee you everyone that is around them, if they're a parent or a, you know, a mother, a father, a husband, a wife, it's going to impact the atmospheric conditions of the entire being of that human. So that is, you know, that is my main goal and objective here. So let's, I'd like to ask you about your life. So one question I had written down is how has your journey with Transcendental Meditation shaped your view of consciousness? Consciousness. And what experiences motivated you to write a pretty in depth book? I mean this is like no easy task here. I mean you put a lot of work into this book. So talk about your own experience because I think it'd be important for people to understand what motivates Dr. Tony Nader and how you came about it.

My desire was to see why people behave the way they behave and how I can do best to improve my own life and make the right choices. What is our full potential as human beings? Why we are here? So the big questions and is there something absolute in this world of change and relativity all the time, everything changing, changing. And so my first experience with transcending was to meet something or to experience something that is really non changing, that is not relative but kind of absolute. And to experience that within myself as a feeling of infinite quiet and peace and harmony and well being. While I am very aware and alert and conscious, but without any specific thought in that consciousness, any specific even feeling or anything except for that unboundedness of being. For me that was something, you know, that was worth, worth continuing and all the other aspects of it. Which means my ability to be living in, for example, in my case in a Civil War situation as a medical doctor and in the emergency room and seeing so many things and having, you know, to be awakened many times in the middle of the night and to deal with very difficult situations and to have all my word collapse in a sense on the outer value. Everything that I thought was great and heavenly and wonderful, to collapse into a situation that's very, very, very bad, to Say the least. And yet the ability to go back to myself and find that silence and that peace and be able to come back outwards and support others and work with strength and faith and give them courage and hope was really absolutely fulfilling. I continued to do my medical studies and went into research and into neurology and all of that at the same time. And I was feeling that, you know, there are so many doctors in so many fields, so many scientists and researchers, and I can myself contribute in this field, which I felt has such a profound impact on what counts in life. It's like ultimately the priorities of life. What does it matter to be the wealthiest person if you are, you know, unhappy and if you are depressed or you're not feeling good or whatever, you know, after all, what does it matter if you are really happy and joyful and full of hope and feeling great, but your possessions are minimal, which one is better? Where are the priorities? And so these kinds of questions led me to say, well, I've been through all this path of science and research, but this is a field that really can make a difference in individual well being and social well being also, because we didn't talk about this. But when a small group of people practice Transcendental Meditation, they have an effect on their environment. And when the number reaches a critical size for a specific society, we have seen decrease in crime, decrease in accidents of the road, decrease in hospital admissions of people who don't practice Transcendental Meditation. But they are in an environment where people are practicing this technique. And so that is one of the elements that says that consciousness is not limited to our physical body, but it's like a field, like an ocean. We said we use the analogy of the ocean. It's like a field. So you can have electricity that is local, but there is an electromagnetic field which is beyond the local jump in electricity that gives you the light and the bulb of the lamp. And so there is that, but there is the field. And so this field effect is real also. So from all these perspectives, I felt in my life that this is somewhere where I can contribute even more than a doctor or a scientist that I was trained to be. Although I have the greatest respect and admiration for all the scientists and all those who help others, you know, be it like what you're doing with your program to help, you know, different levels of addictions and people, which is fantastic, and also help from these different levels. So now even we have a program for what we call Heal the Healers that was actually created by the David lynch foundation with Bob Ross. And we have seen that the doctors and the nurses, they go through huge trauma and they get depressed, they get anxious, they get suicidal. And during the COVID situation, they were in a terrible state with what they faced. And I like them to have what I had during even worse situations, because what I had is daily, you know, deaths and trauma from war and hate and like that. And so we have actually, on the 12th of September, a program that is called Meditate America. And it's organized by Bob Ross and the entire David lynch foundation that will have Hugh Jackman and Maria Shriver and the Surgeon General and others that are coming to launch a program for giving, you know, relief and healing and feeling good for the US during these times of elections, but for all times, and particularly for the doctors and physicians. And so this is what we are doing. This is what I have been through and why I am passionate about this program.

No, that's good. That's great. So where is that.

Is that.

Where's that taking place at?

It's in New York. It will actually even be broadcast. We have arranged for it to be broadcast.

How do people view that?

You can check the David lynch foundation or just even. You can Google or search Meditate America New York program or something like that. You can. I'm sure the. Now the search engines are so powerful, you will find it.

Yeah, no, totally. So your book Consciousness is all there is. This is not just a book that I think people just read. I mean, the obvious thing, yeah, get the book, read it. But how. How did they get the most out of it? How would you encourage people to. Because a lot of people will listen to this and they'll. They'll get a copy of the book. How do they. How would you suggest they interact with it to get the most out of it? And then, of course, I'd like you to explain. How does one go about getting trained in tm?

Just go through it easily sometimes, you know, you might have to think about some aspects. And I've put illustrations, I have great illustrator who works on those that can help to have, like, a metaphor that will allow something that is more intellectual to become, on the level of imagination, easier to understand. Because metaphors, they help. Imagination is sometimes more powerful than the intellect, really, and comparison and stories and all of that. And so it's a book you can read all through from first page on, which is best, because there is a logic that gets built and it gives you an idea and understanding of what we are, who we are, what is our awareness, what is Our life. What has been found from science, modern science, even on the physics level, without going on the physical and mathematics level too much, but gives hints about that and understanding. And also what has been known on the level of consciousness, the different states of consciousness that we have that are normal states, states that are altered states and that are higher states that one can achieve. And putting all of this in focus with the purpose of life and answering the big questions about meaning, why we are here, why we suffer, why do we actually have freedom? How is it possible we have freedom when there is deterministic law? You know, these are big questions. And then the techniques that will help, some hints, hacks here and there, but particularly inspiring to learn Transcendental Meditation, because that is technique that give us direct experience of the self and why it's important and how to do it is not explained actually specifically in the book, because you have to learn from a teacher. And it's only a few sessions, two, three days, and you learn it. So this was your second question, actually. How do we learn Transcendental Meditation?

Right. Yeah. Please share that, like how to find a practitioner, all that, because I would like people to, you know, really kind of be clear on what to do if they'd like to go forward with this.

So there is the site, tm.org is simple tm4transcendentalmeditation.org and then immediately you can say which area you are, and the teachers will be there. Wherever you are, hopefully there will be a teacher very much near you, because we are all over the US and all over the world, actually. So even if you're traveling and have some vacation somewhere and you learn, you like to learn, and you learn it in actually only three, four days. So first you get an introduction to know what it is. And so what we've discussed today is like an introduction. You don't even need more than that. But you might want to be familiar with what research has been done so that you know the effectiveness and how it works on different aspects of mind, body, health, behavior, and influence on the environment. And then you get what we call a preparatory talk or lecture, which can be done during the introductory talk. So within one hour, you can have all of that. In the preparatory talk, you get what is what you're gonna learn, exactly what will be the steps, how you're gonna learn, what you're gonna do, etc. And then there is the instruction day after that, which also takes one, one and a half hours, where you actually learn and start practicing it immediately. So within that time, you Immediately are a practitioner of transcendental meditation. And you can start feeling the benefits immediately from that instruction day. And then of course you will have questions, which means, do I do it before sleep, Do I do it after eating? Before eating, should I do this? You know what happens? How do I know I'm meditating correctly? What about when my breathing goes like that? You know, many questions that come out from the practice that you would want to have answers. And so that's why we have three sessions more to answer those questions and to explain the mechanics of what is going on, how stress is released, how we deal with thoughts, we deal with noise, you know, can we meditate sitting, sleeping, you know, standing or not, etc. And then where it takes us, why should we continue to meditate? Will be the last session and then you get follow up, but you are on your own. Basically it's do it yourself technique. You don't depend on an app or anything, but you will by nature you will want more knowledge because you want to understand more. Your consciousness is expanded, expanding. That's why we have books like my book and other lectures and knowledge. We have an app. The app is a support system that can do actually the follow up after you have the first day instruction. So if you don't want to go to the teacher every day, you can actually do it yourself on the app. And the app stays with you to remind you, you know, let's say I have a headache, what do I do, I have this, what do I do, etc. And so that's how you get the follow up. And it will be with you with all kinds of advanced techniques that we can have going on weekend to practice. These are very important and helpful. You take a good rest during the weekend and you meditate more, more than the 20 minutes there is knowledge accompanying it and the experiences are strengthened and stabilized during these, these sessions.

Yeah. Awesome. And by the way, you still have it to where once someone gets trained, they can lifetime check ins with other practitioners if they just need a real human to do a check in, correct?

Yes. Yes.

Yeah. And I want to mention that because I think that's a very valuable thing because I think you guys are not just trying to have someone go to a seminar. And then here's the next thing, it's like literally giving them a lifelong practice. So you know, there's a lot of things in your book. So for instance, one of the questions but this is addressed in the book, you discuss the link between consciousness and modern science. You know, what do you think of the biggest misunderstandings about consciousness in science and philosophy. You know, how do you believe a better understanding of consciousness can help improve society and promote, you know, global peace? You know, there's a lot of things that are addressing her, so I'll just let, I'll suggest people go get a copy of your book, which is Consciousness is all there is. What have I not asked you or what have we not discussed that you feel would be important before we wrap up?

The purpose of life is the expansion of happiness. And that expansion of happiness happens through the expansion of consciousness. The higher your consciousness, the more freedom you have, the more ability to see in the future to have proper intuition, to have relations that embrace others naturally as part of yourself, which is some of the highest wisdom of all, you know, wisdoms of life. You know, treat others like you would treat yourself, you know, do you know, onto others what you want to do to yourself. And this becomes a natural process. This, this natural evolution comes from experiencing the self as being everything and which means everyone also. So that creates great unity and harmony. So that differences on the outside are not overwhelming. They are seen as potentials for growth and development. Because on the inside we know there is this unity of oneness. So we allow diversity on the basis of inner unity. So don't be afraid of diversity. And if other people have different opinions, see how we can learn from them and use this and the dynamics of growth when we know that life is one and we are all sharing it on a very profound level of being awesome.

Awesome. And so I do want to wrap up by telling everyone, do go get a copy of Dr. Tony Nader's book Consciousness is All There is. Check out tm.org I've recommended TM. I've to lots of people. So I know people that are listening. This already do TM and, and I've sent a lot of my team members, I've got them trained. I've utilized it as holiday gifts, birthday gifts for people over the years. I've never had a bad experience where someone was like that wasn't really, you know, you guys are in the transformation business. I recently acquired the website name, which I wanted for years from a friend of mine, transformation.com and right now we have it directed towards genius recovery. Because like, the biggest thing I want to do is my tagline with genius recovery is I want to change the global conversation about how people view and treat addicts with compassion instead of judgment and find the best forms of treatment that have efficacy and share it with the world. So I just Want to share with people the things that will make their lives better and that we know works. And TM has the largest amount of scientific research on the benefits of TM of any, any organization in the world in this, in this area, as far as I know. And so I think that's an accurate statement, correct?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not just of course. You meant the research on meditation.

Yes, that's what I meant. Research on meditation. Sorry if I was not clear. And so with, with you running an organization, what advice would you give? Because you're, you don't have like a easy job. I mean, you oversee a very big, very large organization. I mean, how many, how many people are involved in even the organization of tm? I mean, from employees or practitioners or whatever. I mean, what's the number?

Just off top of my head, like some 40,000.

40,000? Yeah. So you're, you're, you've been entrusted with this organization. What advice would you give that you've not already said to the entrepreneurs and the business owners that are out there? Because I think that's the majority of my audience. They just want to strive to be able to do a better job. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.

Know how to take a distance from micromanaging and look at the whole as one family of people who really want to do something good, but they need to be guided. Sometimes they need to be directed. Sometimes they need to be loved and cared for and accepted, whatever they are. But also, of course, the need to, to train, the need to inspire. And you know, there will be situations where one need to have something corrected, and that's fine. When it's done from the field of caring rather than, you know, caring for the whole, for, for some higher values, then you are better off. And practice transcendental meditation. It gives you clarity and spontaneous ability to, to manage and guide.

Wonderful. No, that's awesome. And so before we started recording, you know, I told you that I had a cold and, and I did not feel physically very good today, but I wanted to hear what you had to say. I'm usually, you know, I'm more of a excited, peppy self, but today I felt really just a bit under the weather because I was traveling for three weeks out of the country. But I really wanted to have this discussion with you today and hear what you had to say. And I, and I feel a lot better as a result. I still have my cold, but I do feel a lot better. So I really appreciate you for what you put out into the world and what your organization is doing and people that don't know. I mean, you guys are in prisons, you're in schools, you do a lot of stuff. And so you're out there just trying to, you know, help expand happiness for. For people in humanity. So I appreciate the work that you do. And do you have any social or anything where people can follow you personally or do you do you kind of stay off?

I have a website, it's Dr. Tony Nader dot com.

Okay.

D R T O N Y N A D E r dot com. That's my main thing in terms of website. I have. We have an Instagram and Facebook and YouTube mostly under the title like the book Consciousness is All There Is. So you can look all of these like podcasts and if Joe would like to, we'll actually take this discussion after he shows it and we can ourselves also promote it and put it on our podcast series.

Yeah, I would love that. And yeah, I've listened to some of your episodes that you've done on your Tony Nader podcast. So yeah, we will certainly do that. And I will put wherever you are watching this or hearing this, we'll put the show notes and links so you can find out about Tony a copy of where to get his book. But of course, go get it right now. Don't even wait. You don't need a link to that. It's easy to find Dr. Tony Nader n a d er and its consciousness is all there is. And until next time, Tony, thank you and I wish you the very best and I wish all of our listeners a transformation. So thank you, sir.

Wonderful. Thanks to you. It's really a pleasure and wonderful to be with you.

Thank you. Okay, I hope you found that video awesome and useful. So if you want to get a free copy of my book, I want you to click here. And if you want to watch, watch some more videos that will be useful and awesome. Click here. Go ahead, you're over here.

Do it now. Come on.

Thank you. Watch them.