by Dom Harvey
I know all this because everyone had to briefly introduce themselves. I hated this part. I hate these sorts of things. Don’t know why—maybe because it all seems a little bit too touchy-feely for me.
When my turn came I resisted telling the truth. I didn’t think it would go down all that well if I explained I was there because I was completing a bucket list of silly things. Instead, I talked about my friend Richie, whose life had been changed by TM, then I copied everyone else and said I wanted to be happier and less stressed. Fortunately the room seem satisfied with my reasons. Well, how could the room not approve? Essentially I’d just repeated what they had all just said!
This free ninety-minute introductory lecture was mandatory for everyone who wanted to learn the technique and was pretty much just a sales pitch that went through the benefits of TM. Martin showed graphs and figures from some 600 studies that had been conducted over the past thirty years by 400 researchers at 215 universities. These were some big numbers—but still considerably smaller than the $1800 fee!
The claims were vast and many—TM will make you stop drinking, quit smoking, stop taking drugs, cure depression, make you nicer, stop criminals reoffending, reduce your blood pressure, and make you more creative and more alert. It had the feel of a TV infomercial. By the end of the session I was half expecting to be given a free set of steak knives. The other attendees in the room seemed convinced and if they did share any of my scepticism, they sure as hell didn’t show it. I stuck around despite my reservations. There was no denying TM had changed my mate Richie in a good way (plus I had a chapter of a certain book that I needed to write!).
The course fee seemed a bit less outrageous when it was pointed out that it was a one-off fee that meant you were a paid-up transcendental meditator for life, able to visit any TM centre anywhere in the world at any time and retrain or meditate in a group for free.
With the introductory seminar out of the way, I handed over a cheque for $1800. Now I had six more steps to complete before I could officially sit down and close my eyes.
Each of these steps is two to three hours in duration and only one of these is where you are actually taught the meditation technique—that is the step where you get the mantra in your own personal ceremony. All the other sessions involve a lot of talking—mainly about how awesome TM is. Every student has a one-on-one interview with the instructor to establish what they want to get out of TM. I confirmed that I would like it if all that stuff they promised from all those studies actually came true . . . apart from the bit about stopping drinking. I happen to be quite fond of alcohol so I would be really gutted if I learned this new thing then suddenly lost all desire to drink.
The day I was given my mantra and learned the technique was one of excitement and nerves. What if this did end up being a personality-changing experience? I sheepishly turned up to the TM centre mid-afternoon carrying a Pak’nSave bag with three very specific items—an apple, a hanky and some fresh flowers. These three things are used in the ceremony before you are taught how to meditate and given your very own mantra.
Don’t ask me what they do with the stuff after the client leaves. It’s supposed to be an offering to the Maharishi Yogi, the man who introduced TM to the Western world, but I suspect it is probably a gift to the meditation teacher’s wife. Not an overly romantic gesture, giving your wife re-gifted supermarket flowers. But probably better than nothing if you are from the ‘thought that counts’ school.
The curtains were pulled today, blocking out a bit of the daylight, and the room smelt of incense.
There was a makeshift altar in the room, a coffee table with a white tablecloth covering it. For the first time in this whole process I was seeing glimpses of my preconceived ideas about meditation—that whole mystical Ancient India vibe.
An obvious if not very convincing attempt had been made to make this room in an Auckland townhouse seem a little bit Eastern, a little bit more meditatey. It wasn’t really likely to fool anyone, though—the noisy construction going on three houses down was a constant reminder we were in suburbia. It did cross my mind that my induction ceremony could be less effective with a bandsaw sound going off in the background but Martin didn’t mention it or seem bothered by it so we proceeded.
On the altar there was a tray and a framed photo of a very wise and happy-looking old man in a robe. He was sporting grey facial hair as long as any you would have seen—a bit like Gandalf but nowhere near as well maintained as Sir Ian McKellen’s character was.
Next to the photo of the man with the grey beard a candle burned. In front of the picture was a tray. Martin instructed me to put my three Pak’nSave purchases on the side of the altar.
We both stood for the ceremony. Martin started to chant.
I think it was chanting, it could have been a song. Hard to say, since I didn’t recognise the words or the language. Whatever it was, it sounded very soothing and calming. I’m sure it would have had a greater impact without the offensive ‘NNNNNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEEENNNNN’ sound from the bandsaw at the building site in the background.
Martin then took a few grains of rice out of another cup and sprinkled them on the tray. A couple of the flowers and my apple were also placed on the tray.
The whole ceremony was all very surreal—the flowers, the rice toss, the chanty song thing, the old bloke in the photo—but I was totally into it. I suspect this was probably because I felt like I was in a bit of a calm daze brought on by the surroundings—the incense, the lack of light and that peaceful chanty song thing again.
Martin sat in a chair and motioned for me to do the same. He told me what my mantra is. It is a two-syllable sound. I don’t think it is even a word in any language. Everyone who trains in TM gets allocated their own personal mantra and signs an agreement promising not to share it with anyone. I am not sure why there is such secrecy placed around the mantra. You can find the sixteen different TM mantras online with a quick search, but without the training to go with it they don’t really mean much. I’m not sure how the teacher decides what mantra to give a student but I quite liked the feel of my mantra, or more specifically the feeling it gave me when I said it. From the moment my mantra was given to me I had no trouble saying it or remembering it.
Martin then started saying my mantra out loud, slowly and thoughtfully, in a nice relaxed tone, the sort of tone you would use if you were trying to shut up a crying baby. The mantra had a nice rhythm to it. After Martin said it a few times he told me to join in. So there we were, two grown men, practically strangers, sitting in a darkened dining room in the middle of a summer’s afternoon just making a sound in unison. I had my eyes shut; I assume Martin did too. I didn’t want to open my eyes to check if his were shut in case they weren’t. That would have been awkward.
Then Martin stopped chanting my mantra and, in a whisper, told me to slowly dial the volume of my mantra right back to a whisper, which I did.
My next instruction was to continue chanting it more and more quietly, until I was saying it to myself.
This was to go on for twenty minutes. This is TM and followers of it are encouraged to do this twice daily.
Usually I battle to sit still for more than a minute or two. This inability to concentrate even had me tested for ADHD as a young fella. But on this day I did not move, twitch, itch or scratch for a whole twenty minutes, and the time flew! It felt like only a quarter of that time. But before I knew it I heard Martin instructing me to stop chanting my mantra and then just sit silently for a minute.
I felt good. Actually, I felt really good. The whole time I was meditating it felt like I was in a deep sleep while still being wide awake. That sounds like a contradiction but there is really no other way I can put it. My body and mind were in a complete state of pure relaxation and stillness, but my mind was still aware of sounds and surroundings. I could hear cicadas in the trees outside and the sound of power tools going down the road. I was also aware of one or two flies buzzing round the room, but was not bothered by any of i
t.
I still had a couple of follow-up sessions as part of my training but I was now a transcendental meditator. These follow-up sessions were just to make sure I had my technique all sorted and was saying my mantra properly.
This TM thing was good stuff. I’m not sure of the science behind it, but I’m guessing that making the same sound over and over again acts like some sort of self-hypnosis.
Since learning the technique, I have stuck with it. Some days I get too busy (or can’t be bothered) and miss a session, but most days I do it because it feels good when I do. As soon as I sit down, shut my eyes and start saying that mantra I can feel my shoulders get a bit less heavy. Like my worries just melt away.
And as soon as my twenty minutes is up, I feel great. It’s as though I’ve just had a real good snooze for a couple of hours. And the truth is, I notice it if I skip a session.
Sometimes I can focus on the mantra for the whole twenty minutes with no trouble at all; other times I find my mind wanders and I start to think about stuff that is going on in my life. During the TM training you get taught that thoughts pop up from time to time and when you become aware that you have stopped saying the mantra, to just go back to it and carry on.
Every time the meditation experience is different. Sometimes I feel my hands and arms go numb and it can feel like I am floating. Believe me, I am a cynical prick, so I’m aware how ridiculous and kooky this may all sound, but this is an accurate account of my experience with TM.
For my mate Richie, transcendental meditation changed his whole life. The changes were so drastic that some of his mates even noticed them. I don’t think I can claim the same level of success. No one has come to me and pointed out any difference in me like I did to Richie. But I reckon it has made me more chilled out. Stuff that would stress me out or get me all worked up prior to learning TM just doesn’t worry me as much anymore. Maybe the practice has given me some perspective that was missing from my life without it? Maybe I spent $1800 when I could have just spent $25 and got a copy of that book they sell at airport bookstores about not sweating the small stuff. Who knows? But I like meditating and I think it has been a good thing for me.
And the two biggest bonuses? Not only do I still like to drink, but I reckon a session of TM the morning after a night out makes my hangover less painful.
ARM-WRESTLE AN ALL BLACK
I’ve never really played rugby. I am far too soft, too breakable. Lots of guys enjoy trying to hurt other people and getting damaged in the name of sport. Not me. I think I played three seasons of schoolboy rugby before I managed to whinge enough that Mum and Dad let me quit and Dad accepted his eldest son would never play for the All Blacks, a depressing realisation for any rugby mad Kiwi parent.
I recall hating it. All I wanted to do on Saturday mornings was sit in front of our gas heater in the lounge and watch the kids’ TV show What Now on the telly. In rugby season I would turn on the radio to Palmerston North’s ‘2ZA—your information station’ and cross my fingers that my game would be cancelled. Bear in mind, this was in the early 1980s, so we didn’t have a My Sky recorder that would allow me to record What Now. Even video recorders were something only the very rich families had back then. So if I missed Steve Parr, Frank Flash and the What Now team, that episode was gone forever and that was a heartbreaking prospect for this indoorsy kid.
Walking around on that cold and often frosty rugby field I was never in the position I was supposed to be in. Other little boys in the team who actually wanted to be there and happened to be enjoying themselves would tell me off for not paying attention—dropping balls, missing tackles, not standing where I was supposed to be standing, all that stuff. That was back when they still passed the ball to me! If it could be avoided, they would always get the ball to any other player in the team.
And because I seemed to feel the cold more than the other boys, I had a tendency to keep my hands in my pockets during the match. This continued until one day when the coach, who was probably just one of the parents, pulled my parents aside and had a chat with them. That week, Mum took my rugby shorts and sewed the pockets shut. That was a devastating day.
The day that Mum and Dad finally caved and told me I didn’t have to play anymore was one of the happiest of my childhood. Right up there with the day I worked out how I could play with myself in the bath without the water making a loud splashing and slapping sound.
After my short and unfruitful rugby career was knocked on the head I managed to drift though my childhood a bit more aimlessly, doing stuff I actually enjoyed doing—things like making my own binoculars to spy on the teenage girls in the cul-de-sac who had boobs. These binoculars were quick and easy to make: they consisted of just two used toilet rolls held together with a rubber band or tape. It did nothing to make the girls I was spying on appear closer than they actually were. It just made me look like a weird kid with brown toilet rolls over my eyes.
From there I dabbled with non-contact sports—tennis, cycling and distance running. I was incredibly uncoordinated, so individual sports seemed to be my best bet—that way there were no teammates telling me off for being so shit.
I was tackled by an All Black once and it was quite a traumatic experience. I was on holiday in the Bay of Islands one summer with a good friend of mine who at the time happened to be a member of the All Blacks, Christian Cullen.
I think Christian and I got on well because his life was consumed by rugby and by being this famous All Black. So when he wasn’t playing, there was nothing he wanted less than to be talking about rugby. And in me he found someone who had no interest in talking about rugby.
Also on holiday with us was Christian’s teammate Tana Umaga. At the time, both guys were at the peak of their careers.
One day we were playing a game of touch rugby with a bunch of kids when Christian and Tana got bored and proposed a rule change: ‘Let’s make it touch for the kids, tackle for the adults.’
This revised version of the game was working well and the two All Blacks seemed to be having the time of their lives. They were tackling each other with power, pace and intensity that was actually frightening to see from up this close. The smacking and slapping sounds their bodies made when they crashed into each other made me wish I was on the sideline watching through a pair of my homemade toilet roll binoculars. These hits looked ferocious enough to snap a mere mortal in half, yet the pair of them were giggling and seemed to get great pleasure out of hurting and getting hurt. I had two goals—winning the game and self-preservation, the latter being the top priority. Then my worst nightmare happened. Christian, who was on my team, passed the ball to me. I ran a couple of paces but before I even had the opportunity to get rid of the ball and make it someone else’s problem, Tana Umaga nailed me.
Generously, he tackled me with nowhere near the same pace or force he was hitting his All Black teammate with, but my fragile torso wasn’t to know that. I lay on the ground winded and unable to breath. In fits of laughter, Tana got to his feet, then helped me to mine. ‘You all good, bro?’ he asked.
It was an unnecessary question. It was fairly plain to see I was the opposite of whatever ‘all good’ was. Still unable to speak and not sure of exactly what internal injuries I had sustained, I just responded by giving Tana the thumbs up.
I had no desire to be involved in that sort of confrontation ever again. I think both Tana and I dodged bullets that day—I was lucky not to be killed, he was lucky not to be charged with manslaughter.
However, I was keen to take on an All Black in a physical confrontation, one on one, man to man. I needed a contest that would allow me to walk out of the battle arena at the conclusion alive, and preferably unharmed. An arm-wrestle seemed like the best way a cottonwool kid like me could ever take on an All Black—worst-case scenario, my elbow would end up being a little bit tender from being on the bar leaner. That was an injury I could cope with!
The opportunity to tick this item off my bucket list came in August 2011, not long before t
he Rugby World Cup which the All Blacks went on to win.
I was at the Cavalier Tavern on College Hill in central Auckland when three of the All Blacks walked in. It was a Steinlager photo opportunity, where the guys would get behind the bar and pour a few pints and do a few interviews while photographers snapped away.
I got talking with All Black loose forward Jerome Kaino, at the time considered one of the best loose forwards in world rugby. The Samoan-born Kaino stands at just a shade under two metres tall but has a presence about him that makes him appear considerably bigger.
He is only slightly taller than me. But at 105 kilos he weighs a lot more than the 88 kilos of meat hanging off my skinny frame.
I looked to see which hand he was using to drink his bottle of the sponsor’s product. Despite it being a Steinlager function he did not appear to be drinking, so I would have to ask.
He must have thought it was an odd question when from out of the blue I asked if he was left- or right-handed. He paused a split second, then responded ‘Oh, um, right-handed, bro. You?’
I am a leftie and said so. This would be perfect! I would propose a left-handed arm-wrestle. His arms were at least twice the size of mine, so for it to be anything close to a reasonable contest, my dominant side would have to be up against Jerome Kaino’s weak side (if he had such a thing).
Even then, there was still no guarantee this was going to amount to anything more than a farcical mismatch—a bit like Usain Bolt having a sprint race against Heather Mills.
I went in with some flattery that was borderline flirtation. ‘Physically, you’re quite imposing, aren’t you. You’re a big guy. Could we have a left-handed arm wrestle?’
