TM teachers are instructed within a yogic-advaita framework - one that
underpins their understanding about meditation and reality. Without exposure to
Shankara's teachings and the traditional Upanishad methodology, it will be hard
for any TM'er to entertain this original view.
Shankara says:
For there is the statement of the shruti : “The Brahman that is direct and
immediate” (BU 3.4.1) and there is the statement, tat tvam asi “you are That”
(CU6.8.7) which teaches [that Brahman] is already accomplished. This sentence
“you are That” cannot be interpreted to mean "you will become That" after you
are dead (i.e in heaven).
Comans explains:
Firstly, Shankara is committed to the understanding that the Self is
self-luminous, for it is by nature simple, sheer Awareness (BUbh 4.3.23).
Secondly, in accord with this view of the self-luminosity of the Self as
Awareness, Shankara has characterized the Self as “Experience Itself”
(anubhavâtman). We should therefore expect that the experience about which
Shankara speaks is the “intuition”, “insight”, or even “recognition” of oneself
as sheer Awareness. It cannot be a new experience of producing something that
did not previously exist. Nor can it be an experience involving the
objectification of Awareness. It is rather the “experience” of oneself AS
Awareness, without limitations. For that is what one is, and so finds oneself
to be, when there is the apprehension of one’s own fundamental
Awareness-nature, together with the apprehension of the “seeming”, or the
apparent nature (mithyâtva) of all limiting adjuncts (upâdhis) - those that
pertain to the individual body-mind (tvam), as well as to the Lordship of
Brahman (tat).
TM teachers are not educated or trained to receive, apprehend or articulate
such a view about the immediacy of direct realization.