Where Have All the Meditators Gone?

In 1971 the 14 year old Prem Rawat left India billed as the Perfect Master who would bring Peace to the World. All but a motley collective of LSD-damaged hippies and astrologically inclined Aquarians thought he was a joke.

But Prem had a plan. He may never have heard the word 'exponential' but he could feel it in his heart.

I have a plan for world peace, you see. And if we all work to it, I'm sure we can get It. I can see how its going to work out. It wasn't very hard reaching the hearts of six million people, right? So it's not going to be hard for six million people to reach the hearts or one person each -- and that makes it 12 million.
The Sayings of Guru Maharaj Ji

The plan was simple and based on 4 premises:

  • Enough people would hear his spiel and react to it positively and be initiated into His Knowledge
  • This initiation would have a dazzling life-changing effect or at least begin them meditating regularly and listening to his directions
  • This process would create such a positive peaceful blissful effect on their lives that they would constantly obey and worship Prem Himself
  • Each of these meditators would attract at least one more person evey year to listen to his spiel …

In just 2 years he had as many as 20,000 young "premies" launched on the trip. Do the math:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
40
80
160
320
640
1280
2560
5120
10240
20480
40960
81920
163840
327680
655360
1310720
2621440
5242880

He wasn't such a shmuck after all. In less than another 20 years everyone would not need to obey Him. Everyone would be automatically peaceful, blissful and worshipful. What could go wrong?

But its been 50 years and really where are all the meditators and why is Prem Rawat still going around pretending to be teaching Peace?