Most people sitting in their room practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique don’t motivate John Lennon and Paul McCartney to write a song. But that’s exactly what happened to Prudence Farrow Bruns when she sat to meditate in Rishikesh, India.

Prudence, the daughter of Hollywood actress Maureen O’Sullivan and film director John Farrow, as well as the sister of actress Mia Farrow, says she began the TM program in 1966 at a summer course at UCLA while visiting her older brother.

She remembers sitting on the bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean outside his home, reading a book on meditation, when suddenly a voice seemingly manifesting itself out of nowhere said boldly, “If you’re interested in meditation, I know just the meditation for you.” Startled, she turned to find a tall, lanky friend of her brother’s named Peter Wallace peering over her shoulder at the large, opened book on her lap.

Peter had recently come back from six months in India where he spent time traveling with the renowned saint Anandamayi Ma, who introduced him to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. It was there that he began the practice of Maharishi’s Transcendental Meditation technique. Prudence says that although she was enthralled by his story of India, it was his description of meditation that captured her attention.

Prudence is seen here sitting in the front left next to Ringo Starr

“It was the simplicity of the Transcendental Meditation practice that struck me most,” Prudence said. “I had been actively reading and trying different methods of meditation for some time. They had all been complicated and difficult. When Peter described a simple, natural practice of diving deep within, I knew he was truly onto something.”

So began a journey that would lead her to India in 1968, and the rest, as they say, is history. Prudence remembers being in India: “It was a very special time for me. I knew that to be able to study meditation under the direct tutelage of a master of the caliber of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi comes but once in a lifetime. So I would rush straight back to my room after lectures and meals in order to get the most from this precious time. In the evenings John, George, and Paul would sit around jamming—playing and writing music.”

“I could hear them from my room, which was next to theirs. Sometimes they would come into my room and play their new music, thinking they were cheering me up. As much as I appreciated their attention, I preferred to be left alone to meditate.”

John Lennon and George Harrison describe bringing their guitars to her room to encourage her to come out and sing. It was this dynamic that became the inspiration for their song, “Dear Prudence” in which John sings, “won’t you come out to play?”

John Lennon & George Harrison sit by the Ganges river in Rishikesh

George Harrison mentioned to Prudence that they had written a song about her, but Farrow did not actually hear it until it came out on the 1968 album The Beatles, commonly known as the “White Album.”

Prudence’s dedication to her meditation practice allowed her to graduate from the course four months later and become one of the youngest teachers of the Transcendental Meditation technique at that time. She then returned to India for further training with Maharishi in 1970.

Since that time, Prudence has instructed thousands of people throughout the U.S. and Canada in the practice. She also became a published Sanskrit scholar with a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Broadway and Hollywood producer.

Currently Prudence teaches the Transcendental Meditation program in northwest Florida with her husband, Albert. She also has three children and four grandchildren.

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Also from tm.org

Successful people in the entertainment industry often talk about trying to find some personal peace of mind in what is otherwise an incredibly intense public life.

The 36-year-old American actress Eva Mendes is one of those people who has found a way to achieve that sought-after balance. In a recent interview at SpotCeleb.com, she talked about the importance of her practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique and the positive effect it has had in her life.

eva-mendes-standing

“I’m actually huge into meditation, Transcendental Meditation, and that really helps create not only a sense of balance… this is going to sound clichéd, but [also] serenity and kind of a calm state of mind. And not that I’m like that all the time, but it helps me deal with life’s ups and downs, coming from more of a centered place. Also, it helps with creativity…”

Eva Mendes was born in Miami to Cuban parents and grew up in LA where she studied marketing in college before deciding to pursue a career in acting. She is a dedicated professional and has appeared in a number of successful Hollywood movies. She is also a supporter and active participant in an international campaign to raise funds for breast cancer research.

Eva said that she appreciates the effect of Transcendental Meditation practice on her creativity:

“…it helps creatively on a level that I cannot describe. I can give you a list of things I think, but it’s tapping into something so deep that when I reap the rewards, I do not even know I’m reaping them. It’s a more overall kind of thing.”

In her interview, she says that what helped her to realize the impact of the Transcendental Meditation technique on creativity was listening to the audio book Catching the Big Fish by award-winning filmmaker David Lynch:

“(He’s) one of my favorite directors…. The audio is really interesting because you hear his voice and there is something so astonishing about him… his voice is so incredibly regular, and I mean that in the [most] ideal way possible.”

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Ecuador's Invincible Military: Photo Gallery

Ecuador has implemented Invincible Defense Technology (IDT) by establishing a Prevention Wing of the military. This Wing practices the Transcendental Meditation technique and its advanced programs daily in large groups. The group is sufficiently large (greater than the square root of 1% of the population) to create invincibility for the country.

The text below is taken from a report by Lieutenant Colonel (Ret.) Gunter Chassé, Deputy Minister of Defense for the Global Country of World Peace.

Prevention Wing of Yogic Flyers in the Ecuadorian Armed Forces

Ecuador has four military services: the army, navy, air force and the
military police. The military police branch was chosen to establish the Prevention
Wing to make Ecuador invincible. With a population of 14.5 million, Ecuador needs 382 IDT experts to achieve the required group size (the square root of one percent of the population). A commander with the rank of General was very receptive to this idea. So he made the decision to start the project on March 8th, 2010.

Test Case as a First Step

As a test case, the General selected two units from training centers where young soldiers receive their six months' basic military training before they are sent to operational units. Each training unit has 300 soldiers who were taught the Transcendental Meditation technique, and 200 in each unit are now IDT experts. The General set the time and place for the soldiers to practice their program in a group in accordance with their duty routine.

Test Results Were Very Satisfying

After one month of practice, a test was done together with army psychologists in order to check the validity of the program.

Here is a summary of the soldiers' statements:

96 % thought it was a very practical activity
95 % said it was completely satisfying
92 % declared they improved dealing with stress and had better performance in their actions
96 % declared their relationships with others improved.

Implementation at the Military Academy

Based on these test results, the General made two decisions:

1. The Transcendental Meditation technique and its advanced practices (the practical aspects of IDT) should be taught to the soldiers of the two training units to achieve invincibility for Ecuador right away.

2. Implementation of the program at the national academy during the students' four years of training for the young officers should be considered.

The General appointed new officers to participate in the program, and currently 339 are becoming IDT experts. Another 400 will be added later in the year so that there will be 739 IDT experts at the academy. They can be added to the 2x200 IDT experts at the training centers for a total of 1,139 IDT experts later in the year. The goal is to have at least 1,000 IDT experts regularly practicing the program.

Training Program at the Academy

In addition to group practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique and its advanced programs, the training program at the academy will now include weekly hour-long lectures about theory of invincibility during all four years of training. The Transcendental Meditation Teacher Training Course (TTC) will also be incorporated as part of the curriculum so that the military will have its own TM Teachers. This will ensure that the IDT program will go on permanently and the required number of IDT experts will always be available.

This program has already started at the academy for cadets who are between 19 to 24 years of age.

Which country will become invincible next?

Dear Prudence: Won’t You Come Out to Play?

Eva Mendes — finding more balance and creativity