by Barbara Bottner and C. Montana

“Joy is our natural state,” says Rohanna Salom, doctor of Oriental Medicine in Valley Village, California. “But we seem to have forgotten our true nature.”

Of all the 21 st century organizations working to heal this condition, one of the newest and largest is undoubtedly the Oneness Movement, started in Chennai, India in 1991 by twin avatars Sri Bhagavan and Sri Amma. The declared intent of the Oneness Movement is to uplift humanity’s consciousness from a state of chronic separation and suffering into a state of enlightenment - the awareness of wholeness and oneness – mainly through an energy transmission process called the Oneness Blessing or Oneness Deeksha. Currently acknowledged as teachers and bringers of enlightenment and god-realization by more than 20 million adherents around the world, Sri Bhagavan and Sri Amma’s goal is to bring enlightenment to a minimum of 64,000 people worldwide by the year 2012.

The primary methodology to accomplish this is Oneness Deeksha, a transmission of the energy or frequency state of enlightened oneness, which often takes the form of a laying on of hands. The transmission, which is accomplished by a trained initiate who has undergone a 21 Day Process at the Oneness University near Chennai, is designed to re-pattern neural functioning in the brain, and thus create a shift in thought processes and the dissolution of personal perceptual filters that foster the illusion of separateness.

Since 2003 millions of individuals around the world have received the Oneness Blessings or Deeksha on an ongoing basis. Although those attracted to participate in Oneness Movement workshops and experience Oneness Blessings are advised that a lasting experience of oneness rarely happens instantly and that it doesn’t automatically occur in everyone, most report that their participation has resulted in significant change in their lives in terms of peacefulness and an ability to co-exist with others more harmoniously.

This increasingly peaceful state probably doesn’t match most Westerners expectations when they hear the terms “enlightenment and god-realization,” but according to Sri Raniji, Oneness Movement lay Spiritual Leader of North America, the state of oneness is really “a non-mystical state of mind that is the constant recognition of the reality of connectedness.”

Pauline Bauman, a former naturopathic physician from Ashland, Oregon who has been to Chennai and regularly gives the Oneness Deeksha to others, agrees. “This is not all exotic and mystical and that sort of thing,” she says. “It’s about becoming functionally awakened.”

World peace - One person at a time

The Oneness University campus

The Oneness University at Batthalavallam, 70 km outside Chennai (formerly Madras) in southeast India is close to the movement’s headquarters in what is now known as the Golden City. Called “the university of universities” by Sri Bhagavan, its purpose is to assist individuals to become true human beings and realize the connectedness of all life. The Oneness Blessing or Oneness Deeksha is the primary tool used to accomplish this.

But what exactly is Oneness Deeksha and how does it work? Sri Bhagavan explains that the energy transmission actually dampens down parietal lobe activity while enhancing frontal lobe activity in the brain. German Ph.D. biochemist Christian Optiz, who has performed extensive brain scans on individuals before and after Oneness Deeksha, concurs with Bhagavan’s explanation. Utilizing an advanced electromagnetic frequency diagnostic device developed at the University of Milan, Opitz established individual’s baseline brain functions, then retested individuals after the Oneness Deeksha had been given. His tests showed significant, replicable shifts in subjects’ brain activity and striking changes in certain areas of the brain.

“I checked what Bhagavan was saying against what I could measure about the deactivation of the parietal lobes and the activation of the frontal lobes,” says Opitz. “And I found that this was really true; that in people who had received a substantial amount of Deeksha, the parietal lobes were so much more quiet than the frontal lobes, which were so much more activated - and always with a slight dominance of the left frontal lobe.”

As Opitz determined a consistent pattern, he expanded his investigations to include studying the wave forms that participants’ DNA emanated. Apparently, the wave forms increase in strength as a person continues to receive the enlightened transmissions, which are frequently described as a golden ball of energy descending into the head. He found that the reptilian brain, or brain stem, which holds much of our primitive fight or flight responses, was quieted through administration of Deeksha. He also measured growth in certain brain centers.

“In some of the dhasas (direct disciples of Bhagavan and Amma) in India, I measured their septum pellucidum, which is also called the brain’s joy center, and it was huge. I mean, I've never seen anything like that. It's a brain center that's under-active in most people, and it's severely shrunk in people who are depressed. It grows when real joy becomes a basic experience of the person's life.”

Opitz’s tests also seem to indicate that, unlike results of similar investigations monitoring long-term meditators and people who do other kinds of energy work, the effects of Deeksha appear to be permanent. Rev. Dr. Michael Milner, who is an ordained a Taoist and a Christian minister, has written about his experiences at the Oneness University and the effects of Deeksha over the years. “ As I continued to receive the Oneness every week, bad habits and addictions began to simply fall away. Annoying thoughts and feelings couldn’t “stick” to me like they used to. There were so many changes… painful memories, thoughts and aspects of personality have simply lost their “charge.” They just don’t cause suffering any more, because the ‘person’ who suffered, the suffering ‘self,’ is no longer there.”

A non-sectarian, non-religious organization, The Oneness Movement has centers throughout the world. But so far, nowhere is the impact of the movement’s focus more apparent than near its home base in Chennai.

Anandagiriji, who was one of the three main disciples of AmmaBhagavan, was 12 years old when he joined the original residential School Jeevashram, founded and run by Sri Amma Bhagavan. When he was14 he began to receive Oneness Deeksha. Today Sri Anandagiriji heads up the Oneness Movement in India. He also manages a rural development project called the “100 Village Project” and many other social development projects in and around the vicinity of the Oneness University. The “100 village project” is primarily aimed at achieving social development through spiritual transformation in the 100 odd villages surrounding the Oneness University headquarters. The guides of the Oneness University travel around these villages conducting Oneness Blessing events to raise the levels of consciousness of all the villagers. To date most who travel in this region note increased levels of cooperation, happiness, prosperity and fulfillment in these villagers.

But the global impact of the Oneness Movement is spreading rapidly. When the largest structure at the Golden City, the Oneness Temple, reaches completion it just might make a quantum leap. A mammoth three floor marble structure twenty times the size of the Taj Mahal, the Oneness Temple was designed by Sri Bhagavan for many functions. But one of the most important will take place in the great hall where 8,000 people will meditate together non-stop, specifically with the intent of influencing the morphogenetic fields across the earth helping to elevate the consciousness of humankind.

For those familiar with studies about the effects of meditation done by John Davies, Ph.D. co-director of Partners in Conflict and Partners in Peacebuilding Projects, and the work of quantum physicist John Hagelin, Ph.D. Director of the Institute of Science, Technology and Public Policy at the Peace University in Fairfield, Iowa, this shouldn’t sound like science fiction. And the number 8,000 should ring a bell. It is, roughly, the square root of one percent of the world’s current population of 6.5 billion, which is the number calculated by Hagelin’s staff during years of research on the field effects of meditation, as the minimum number of people necessary to affect the morphogenetic fields of human consciousness worldwide and trigger a paradigm shift.   Sri Anandagiriji and Sri Raniji also travel around the world, attending conferences and Oneness Movement events, and coordinating with other Deeksha givers, spreading the Oneness Blessing . On June 17th, in Los Angeles, the public is invited to attend the largest gathering of Oneness Blessing givers ever held in the world. This will be a day of intense experience of the Divine, intelligent energy, healing, and breakthroughs from personal suffering. This exceptional opportunity is rendered even more unique because of the appearance of Anandagiriji,

Presentations will also be given by Sri Raniji. Tony Robbins, regarded as the father of life-coaching, who has impacted the lives of millions of people around the world through his workshops, books and tapes, is now affiliated with the Oneness University and will also present.

The June 17th event is non-denominational and non-sectarian and will be held at the L.A. Convention Center starting at 8 a.m. The public is welcomed. Bring your drums and musical instruments to join in a healing drum circle lead by Rick Allen, drummer of the Def Leppard band.