When I brought Maharishi to Yale

One evening in November of 1966, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a then-little-known Indian teacher, spoke to about 1,000 Yalies in Woolsey Hall.  I arranged that lecture. Here’s how it happened:

The summer after our freshman year, I was traveling around Europe and saw a poster in a London underground station announcing that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was speaking later that week. I had never heard of him but something about the photo of his face intrigued me.  I went to the talk and was deeply impressed, both by what he had to say and by the ease of his manner.

I went to a follow-up meeting and learned his method, which he called Transcendental Meditation. In some of my first meditations, I found myself in a state of inner silence that I enjoyed tremendously. That was almost sixty years ago, and I still do it every day.

Coming To Yale

Maharishi learned that I was a student at Yale and asked if I would like to arrange for him to come and give a talk there. I didn’t hesitate to say yes. With the help of Dean John Wilkinson, I booked Woolsey Hall for an evening. I went all out with publicity—posters all over campus, fliers, an article in the Yale Daily News, and a Notice Board on Elm Street just outside Yale Station.

On that brisk November evening, the auditorium was nearly full, but Maharishi was late. About a half hour after the planned start time, a security officer announced that Maharishi would be at least another half hour late. I went on stage and told everyone that they could either stay or leave and return in half an hour. Almost everyone either stayed or returned, and to my relief, Maharishi arrived.

He spoke for about an hour on his message that a simple and effortless technique could bring anyone to experience the innermost essence of their self, which he described as bliss consciousness. This pretty much described my own experience with it.

We announced a follow-up meeting for people interested in learning, and about a hundred Yale students and some faculty went on to learn.

Over the rest of my Yale career, I gave some talks with fellow student meditators Michael Chelnov,  Doug Grimes, John Clapp and Eric Dahl and arranged for trained teachers to come and teach the technique on campus.

By our junior year, Dean Wilkinson said it had become the largest student organization at Yale.

I would love to hear from any of you who were at Maharishi’s 1966 Woolsey Hall event or subsequent talks, especially those who went on to learn TM. Have you continued with it? If so, or if not, why? How would you describe its effects on your life?   Feel free to leave a comment below, email me and/or join the Zoom event that Wayne has arranged for us on September 8th at 3 PM Eastern.  (Registration link here.)

After Graduation

After graduation, I went to Maharishi’s ashram outside of Rishikesh, India, and was taught by him how to teach his technique of meditation. I returned to travel around the East Coast and Midwest, teaching people at a number of universities.

In the 1970’s, I became Dean of Planning and Development of Maharishi International University. We bought a campus in Fairfield, Iowa, the former Parson’s College, and recruited a faculty of scholars interested in the relationship between their disciplines and the knowledge and experience of higher consciousness. We gained full accreditation up through the doctoral level. MIU retains this to this day and continues to operate on that campus.

Then … Serial Entrepreneurship and Kauai Writers Conference

For anyone interested in my life after those years, I became a serial entrepreneur, founding or co-founding, running and exiting from companies in biotechnology, telecom and real estate.

For the last twenty years, I’ve lived on Kauai, more or less retired, but I keep busy running the annual Kauai Writers Conference. It has become one of the most highly regarded literary gatherings in the US. If you’re writing a book, or want to, drop me a line, and I’d be happy to help you arrange to come.

If meditation has been part of your life, perhaps inspired by Maharishi’s 1966 talk, let us know!  Wayne has offered to arrange a Zoom session for anyone who’d like to talk about their experiences with TM if I will facilitate the meeting.

Zoom Session To Compare Notes

I will be hosting an informal Zoom session on September 8th at 3:00 PM Eastern time for anyone who was at Maharishi’s lectures at Yale, or who connected to TM at some other point in their lives or classmates who simply want to join and say “hi.”

Just register here for a Zoom meeting, Sept. 8th at 3 PM Eastern.

I’d love to see you (again)!

David Katz
Saybrook, 1969
davidk@kauaiwritersconference.com