The previous article discussed the predicament posed by having identified talent as a company’s most valuable resource while observing that Western education and job-training techniques have consistently failed to improve talent. Vedic technologies of consciousness, most notably, according to extensive scientific research, the Transcendental Meditation and TM- Sidhi Programme including Yogic Flying of His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi have resolved this quandary. Maharishi’s programmes have been measured to promote growth not only in such fundamental competencies underlying the statement of talent as creative intelligence, but also in the development of talents currently considered beyond the pale of human potential: the siddhis as described in Patanjali’s “Yoga Sutras”.

This remarkable compilation of extraordinary talents and formulae for their development provides a blueprint for benchmarking the unfolding of full human potential; namely, the degree of mastery of these siddhis. That Patanjali’s work is currently viewed with skepticism and not recognized as an authoritative text on human development is due to the insistence that performance of the siddhis violates scientifically discovered laws of nature. Thus the reliability of numerous eyewitness accounts in the past of yogic flying has been discredited on the basis of the classical understanding of gravity formulated by Newton and Einstein.

However, with the discovery in quantum physics of a Unified Field of all the laws of nature that govern the creation and orderly (intelligent) evolution of the universe the objections of modern science to the descriptions by India’s great rishis of the unbounded nature of human potential become stilled. The Unified Field, as a field of all possibilities based on its self-referral creation of all possible diversity located in the universe, gives credence to the plausibility of mastering siddhis. Yogic Flying, for example, does not violate the new quantum mechanical understanding of gravity, providing the performer is established at the level of the Unified Field, the Planck Scale where gravity becomes defined by a space-time foam. This stipulation is the same as the prerequisite Patanjali established for developing the siddhis. 

Practically speaking, though, physicists, unable to investigate directly into the nature of the Unified Field, have yet to propose new technologies for harnessing this unlimited resource of talent. However, with the remarkable discovery that the Unified Field is the field of pure consciousness, Atma, the Self of everyone, Vedic technologies fill the void created by modern science. As Maharishi has pointed out, on the basis of technologies of consciousness anything can be achieved in the whole field of creation. This is a stunning conclusion; its vision of an infinitely extending human potential horizon opens up realizable achievements on the order of the eradication of war, poverty, disease and all suffering that brings unhappiness to the family of man.

Such is theoretically quite practical, but it is predicated upon the ability to operate directly from the Unified Field, the origin of creative intelligence - the infinite organizing power of Natural Law that governs the universe. As Maharishi says, “Total Natural Law is available in the self-referral state of consciousness – Transcendental Consciousness – that is why the Vedic Philosophy of Action is: 

Yogastah kuru karmani (Bhagavad-Gita, 2.48) Established in the Self, perform action.

Prakritim swam avashtabhya visrijami punah punah (Bhagavad-Gita, 9.8) Curving back onto My own Nature, I create again and again.

Yatinam Brahma bhavati saratahih (Rik Veda, I.158.6) For those established in self-referral consciousness, the infinite organizing power of the Creator becomes the charioteer of all action.” 

Western philosophies of action pertain to skill utilization, as exhibited by stressful global emphases on maximizing the workday, and characterized by Edison ’s description of genius as 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. The Vedic counterpart with its focus on talent – the successful employment of skills - is summarized by Maharishi’s statement: do less and accomplish more. 

It is not input effort but output achievement that determines success, and the two are inversely related. To improve talent levels, go to the source of talent, the field of pure consciousness, which according to physics is a field of least excitation. To display talent to the utmost, the formula is to first minimize activity; to shoot the arrow forward, as Maharishi advises, one must first pull it back in the opposite direction. 

To improve company performance the procedure is to pull back the talent arrow by incorporating employee group practice of Maharishi’s Vedic Technologies of Consciousness into the daily work routine. Only on this basis should skill training and education be subsequently implemented. Skill development enhances efficiency, but of what use are efficiency improvements, if effectiveness, a function of talent, remains beyond control? Doing the wrong things better may have harmful repercussions. Top priority must be restored these days to improving effectiveness and this is via the same Vedic technologies as used for developing talent. 

Managing effectiveness and other issues whose realization requires a Vedic approach to knowledge - such as the unfolding of full organizational potential, the cultivation of leadership qualities, the elimination of stress and the guaranteeing of success - will be addressed in subsequent articles. 

Submitted by Dr. Ian Brown, Prof. of Vedic Management, Maharishi Institute of Management – Chennai.