With the $500 stipend for room, board and incidentals, and free tuition, I bgan to think of how I and my SIMS friends would have reacted in the early 70's: Packed and out the door, running! This contrasts with today's limp response. Why.
I think a major difference is back then, we were in our 20's fluid, without roots or responsibilities, and could leave school, jobs or "hanging out", with great alactrity, if not electricity. Even with no internet or cell phones, and expensive long distance rates, word of such a course would have spread like wild fire. 2000+ would have amassed on FF faster than the blitzkreig. Others can make the case for disillusionment with the TMO, broken past promises, and uneven applicaion of dome admittance rules. Those are factors also. But I suggest the age cohorts of the TMO, now and then, are the far more germaine underlying driver of different participion rates, now and then. And i have been thinking of how fast SIMS grew from nothing. Peter Wallace, travelling hippie style, wandered in to the Rishikesh ashram and was taught TM, in 1965 or so. He returned to LA, told his younger brother Keith about how awesome TM was, they told friends -- like Karen Blasdale -- and got a young SRM initiatiator named Jerry Jarvis to give a lecture at UCLA. It grew rapidly by word of mouth. Word spread to Berekely, courses were given, it blossomed. All pre-Beatles. SIMS was growing very rapidly, without theBeatles. If instead of the Beatles starting, a 12 month free course had bee offered for the first 2000 to sign up, I think it would have soon been flooded. Sudents, first in California, then other universities, would have been banging on the door so they could start TM and then get the "heavy juice" at the 12 month FREE course. Or if you are skeptical of that scenario, the Beatles left MMY in Spring of 1968. Rejected him. If the Beatles effect was so powerful, it should have squashed the growth of SIMS. But SIMS grew hugely 68-72. And by 72, 2000-3000 students were in Mallorca/Fuiggi. All pre-siddhis. A new SIMS army of TMers and long-course wannabes could arise almost overnight, as it did in the 60's. The only blockage I see to a neo-SIMS flood is the 2500 TM fee. $600 if a whole school does it, but thats a hard one, IMO. (30% of a school, no problem. 100% yes, a problem). If the TMO dropped SIMS rates to $400, perhaps tying it to FF course application, soon they would be flooded once word got out, and students "got it". Heck, just give free TM scholarships to all the students who attended the Lynch lectures, and that could be the kernal to start it all. A blazing bonfire of 2000+ SIMSers rushing to the FREE course. With 2000 SIMSers, plus 1000 or so regulars in FF now, 3000 full program 8-hour YFers would I suspect, really have some juice, really have an impact. And this "light' could make older 60's SIMSers wake up and want to "Go to the Course". Another 2000 or so 60's SIMSers could easily decide to take a years sabatical, vacation, early retirement, etc. if things were really popping in FF. So with 3000+ 2000 = 5000 full time YF, it could then really begin to snowball. Bono might even show up :) Regarding a neo-SIMS, some will say, "well, sure, but when they dig a bit deeper, they will run of the hills when they hear of rajas, eastern entrances, yagyas, etc. I disagree. As far as entrances and yagyas, many will respond (in their venacular), as 60's students would have, "HEAVY! Does this get any more far out!". And why should the raja's scare students if say HHDL doesn't. To me its amazing. i am a jaded old SIMSer. But, rembering the spark and wildfire effect of "great courses", in the early 70's, I think we might be very close to that now. To me the major hurdle is the SIMS TM fee. 2000 students x $2000 fee reduction is only $4mil. Either SIMS bite the bullet (It would still make $1mil of fees for 2000 students at $500 -- far more than its making now on students) or someone donate $4Mil. The Lynch foundation perhaps. For the first time in ages, I'm stoked! A BIG course could be close. Or very far. Its at a tipping point. As may be a real core transformation of "the world". To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
