In the past century, science has tackled all 3 problems. A series of remarkable scientific breakthroughs has allowed scientists to understand these extraordinary mental states.
In 1929 Hans Berger, a German doctor, invented the EEG or electroencephalogram. For the first time, researchers could look inside a person’s skull and see how the brain was functioning.
Berger’s contemporary, Dr. Paul Brunton, spent decades traveling the world. He studied with all the great Masters in whose lineages all the world’s spiritual traditions were recorded. He systematically recorded the wisdom of Hindu sages, Christian mystics, Buddhist monks, Catholic nuns, Native American shamans, Egyptian priests, and Taoist masters.
Brunton identified the keys to mystical experience common to all religions. He broke them down into 36 "milestones" along the journey. He synthesized the practices used by many of the Masters into 30 "exercises" that advance you from milestone to milestone. For the first time in history, we had a structure based on the steps common to all the great traditions.
In the 1950s British engineer Max Cade developed a special EEG to measure the brain states of the Masters. He identified a brainwave pattern common to people in these altered states of consciousness. For the first time, enlightenment could be measured.
Researchers extending Cade's work realized that people in flow states had an identical pattern to those of the Masters. Peak performers, whether in art, science, or athletics, also exhibited the brainwaves of flow. But while these states were temporary in peak performers, Masters had crossed an invisible boundary, and were in Bliss Brain most of the time.
Today, high-resolution MRI machines can map the brains of Masters down to a single neuron. Laboratories study monks and nuns with thousands of hours of spiritual practice, providing a neural map of their brain function.
Brain regions associated with happiness are highly developed, while those involved in stress and suffering are dark. The Masters can go into Bliss Brain whenever they choose. For the temporary periods when they're in flow, peak performers get there too. By mapping Bliss Brain, science has solved the measurement problem.
Measuring these brainwave patterns has also solved the curation and initiation problem. With the correct training, people can be taught to acquire Bliss Brain without going through 10,000 hours of initiation. They skip the monastery, pilgrimage, vows, and penances. Science directs them straight to the flow states of the Masters, and using the 30 exercises and 36 milestones, they learn to stay there.
This has in turn solved the replication problem. Guided by science, thousands of people have now been trained to acquire these enlightened states. A research-based training program is now available that allows anyone to experience Bliss Brain, then rewire their brains to make it their default setting. It's called The Short Path to Oneness. It provides you with the training to develop the deep and lasting inner peace characteristic of flow, and stay there consistently.
