Transcendental meditation is a quiet deep eyes – closed very relaxing, Inward meditation. Sometimes the silent inner experience is too quiet and the outer is too loud.
Maharishi's words of wisdom Were calming but not useful in extreme cases of stress When the outer noise was too loud and the desire to retreat back to the inner quiet was too strong to bear.
Maybe I was trapped in a car on a long tiring trip - forced to listen to someone else's chater - twangy, drippy, shallow country music playing too loudly; kids arguing and complaining; curves and bumps in the road too jarring to support a much needed relaxing retreat into a deep meditation.
This is where meditations like Thich Nhat Hanh's "breathing in - breathing out" helped immensely. I could ride in a car and practice smiling and breathing and even visualize myself as a strong and silent mountain. And this might help get me to my next deep, silent meditation. But I could never choose one over the other.
