THE SCIENCE OF MEDITATION

Kamlesh D. Patel (Daaji), 62

SPIRITUAL SCIENTIST, MUMBAI

Daaji”

to his followers, he doesn’t believe in religion but in one’s ‘inner light’, a yogic practice that transcends barriers of culture, religion and spiritual paths. Today, across cities in India and the US, you will find a community of ‘heartfulness volunteers’ sitting down together for meditation with anyone interested in experiencing the method.

Daaji was studying to be a pharmacist in Ahmedabad when he met his guide, Shri Ram Chandra of Shahjahanpur, a master of the Sahaj Marg, a unique practice of the Raja Yoga tradition centred on the heart. He moved to New York in the 1980s, and has lived there mostly since. Like all masters of the sahaja path, he too abided by

the norm that the best place to grow spiritually is right where you are, without renouncing marriage, family or social life. In 2014, he was proclaimed the guide: what started as a spiritual movement in India in 1945 got a global identity under him as ‘Heartfulness meditation’.

And why heartfulness? Because it is based on meditation and “the intrinsic goodness of the heart”. It’s a simple, practical way to learn to discover the unlimited resources of the heart. Over time, one experiences a calmness from within, leading to better inner balance and wellbeing. Heartfulness meditation, in fact, combines a scientific approach to spirituality. “We take the heart as the centre for meditation, as it is the centre of life,” says Patel. “The heart is the pumping station for our blood, and a meditative heart sends out purified blood to all parts of our body, including the smallest cells, thus purifying our entire being.”

The meditation system is studied around the world to check its effects on heart rate variability, blood pressure etc. A research collaboration between IIT Delhi and the department of noninvasive cardiology, Max Super Speciality Hospital, Saket, showed that Heartfulness has a positive effect on cardiac activity, especially on “sympathovagal balance” (Indian Heart Journal, December 2018). Patel is today busy with meditation workshops worldwide, writing books (The Heartfulness Way), besides appearing on TV and radio to spread the good word about science and spirituality.n

—Damayanti Datta