Out of last month’s Virginia Tech shootings comes the call for “pure bliss consciousness,” or more precisely, the teaching of a meditation method that can help young people believe in themselves, and stand up for non-violence.

Filmmaker David Lynch planned a very compelling press conference today, and aired it on the web, to discuss his campaign to help end school violence by teaching one million young people Transcendental Meditation (TM), a method of calming the mind through mantra repetition. Lynch’s successful foundation has already provided nearly $5 million to support in-school Transcendental Meditation programs for thousands of students in public and private schools in the United States and around the world.

In the press release, Lynch and British folk singer Donovan Leitch spoke about how they themselves have conquered their own anger, and connected to the peace of their inner worlds through two 10-minute TM sessions a day. Quantum physicist John Hagelin (of “What the Bleep Do We Know?!”, and “The Secret”) also spoke about the change in the brain’s basic chemistry under stress and after meditating.

Since we were just discussing this last week, it is interesting to note that their release says the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has granted more than $24 million to study the benefits of TM for reducing high levels of stress and anxiety, improving brain functioning, and promoting cardiovascular health. Other published research shows that regular meditation can “reduce depression, drug and alcohol abuse, and hypertension—while improving academic performance, creativity, intelligence, and ADD.”

The conversation of meditation’s benefits will no doubt continue when Lynch, Hagelin, and Donovan explore their anti-violence plan in detail during a national student weekend at Maharishi University of Management (a TM school) in Fairfield, Iowa, May 25 to 28. Students from throughout the United States are invited to attend, so check out this link to learn more.