Kelvin’s Transcendental Meditation™ History
(1970 - 1978)

Age 19

When Kelvin Chin was 19, he learned Transcendental Meditation™ and soon began to give introductory meditation lectures to students at Dartmouth College, as well as the general public in New Hampshire. In 1971, as the founding president of the Students International Meditation Society (SIMS) of Dartmouth, Kelvin continued lecturing to college and community audiences, and was interviewed by newspapers, and radio and TV stations throughout New Hampshire.

studying with Maharishi

In the summer of 1971, he attended the one-month teacher training program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst taught by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. After graduating a semester early from Dartmouth in 1973, Kelvin completed the Transcendental Meditation™ teacher training program in La Antilla, Spain with Maharishi, and returned as the New Hampshire State Coordinator for the TM movement. He continued to lecture, teach Transcendental Meditation™, or as it was commonly known, “TM,” and led many advanced TM group residence courses throughout New England, New Jersey, and Maryland — including teaching a one-month in-residence program to 600 participants on the Science of Creative Intelligence (SCI) at the University of Maine, Orono — the first step in the attendees’ training to become certified TM teachers and the first such SCI course offered in the world.

teaching at yale and west point

While at Yale Graduate School, Kelvin continued teaching TM at the university and throughout Connecticut. In 1974, on behalf of the TM movement, Kelvin successfully renegotiated its lease with Yale University. He also was invited by the U.S. Army (through a general in the Pentagon who had learned TM), and taught the first TM meditation courses at West Point Military Academy, which involved lectures and meditation classes to several hundred cadets, Army officers, and staff.

first national leader of hong kong

Within days of graduating from Yale, Kelvin got a phone call from Maharishi saying that the TM organization had a free first class round-trip ticket on Swissair’s inaugural flight to Hong Kong and that he would like Kelvin to go there to teach TM. As the first National Leader of Hong Kong and Director of Expansion in East Asia, Kelvin established the TM organization and lectured to all sectors of Hong Kong society including business, education, and government, and was a guest speaker on television shows, at universities, and was featured in many newspaper articles in the South China Morning Post, Hong Kong Standard, Sing Tao Daily, and others.

teaching in korea in u.s. army and air force — tunnels discovered under dmz

He also lectured and taught the first TM courses in the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force in South Korea teaching on all the bases, including on the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) between North and South Korea. He had a GS-11 rating (equivalent rank of Major) from the Pentagon. Due to the heightened state of alert throughout Korea at the time, a curfew at night with military roadblocks from 9:30 PM to 6:00 AM was in effect every day. Kelvin had arrived in South Korea in November 1974 just two weeks after the U.S. discovered the first tunnel (2 miles long) dug by the North Koreans under the DMZ with the ability to move 1,000-2,000 troops per hour through the tunnel — a major military offensive was being planned by the North Koreans (most likely along with the Communist Chinese government) to take over the peninsula. A few months later in March 1975, a second tunnel was discovered — this tunnel was large enough for tanks, field artillery and armored personnel carriers — and more than 30,000 troops per hour could be moved through it.

chairman of cambridge tm center

After his tour of duty in Asia, Kelvin continued his lecturing, teaching and leadership in the TM movement as the Chairman of the Cambridge TM Center — then one of the largest in the U.S. with 200 teachers — and as a visiting teacher at the Washington, D.C. TM Center when members of the Ford administration and White House learned TM.

leading chinese-american teacher training

The last official TM project that Maharishi asked Kelvin to lead involved the training of Chinese American meditators to become TM teachers to prepare them to teach in the People’s Republic of China. This special project was based at Maharishi International University (MIU) in 1978.

now...

Kelvin no longer teaches Transcendental Meditation™, but credits Maharishi for revolutionizing the practice of meditation worldwide by bringing attention to the fact that any meditation technique can and should be effortless.

Since then, Kelvin has removed all religious and cultural trappings from the teaching and practice of meditation, and has continued to make the technique even more effortless and flexible, so it even more easily fits into our busy daily lives.