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The Silva Method is a self-help and
meditation Meditation is a practice in which an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness, or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm ...
program developed by José Silva. It claims to increase an individual's abilities through relaxation, development of higher brain functions, and
psychic A psychic is a person who claims to use extrasensory perception (ESP) to identify information hidden from the normal senses, particularly involving telepathy or clairvoyance, or who performs acts that are apparently inexplicable by natural laws ...
abilities such as
clairvoyance Clairvoyance (; ) is the magical ability to gain information about an object, person, location, or physical event through extrasensory perception. Any person who is claimed to have such ability is said to be a clairvoyant () ("one who sees cl ...
. It has been variously classified as a self-religion, a
new religious movement A new religious movement (NRM), also known as alternative spirituality or a new religion, is a religious or spiritual group that has modern origins and is peripheral to its society's dominant religious culture. NRMs can be novel in origin or th ...
and a cult.


Biography

José Silvadoros, an electronics repairman, developed an interest in
psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries between ...
to see if it could help him increase his children's IQ. After experimenting and being convinced of his daughter's sudden clairvoyance, Silva decided to learn more about the development of psychic abilities. In 1944 Silva began developing his method, formerly known as Silva Mind Control. He used it on his family members and friends before launching it commercially in the 1960s. Silva was the subject of a 1990 biography. He adopted a Unitarian view of God.


Technique

The technique aims to reach and sustain a state of mental functioning, called alpha state, where
brainwave Neural oscillations, or brainwaves, are rhythmic or repetitive patterns of neural activity in the central nervous system. Neural tissue can generate oscillatory activity in many ways, driven either by mechanisms within individual neurons or by ...
frequency is seven to fourteen Hz.:p19-20 Daydreaming and the transition to sleeping are alpha states.:p19-20 Silva claimed to have developed a program that trained people to enter certain brain states of enhanced awareness. He also claimed to have developed several systematic mental processes to use while in these states allowing a person to mentally project with a specific intent. According to Silva, once the mind is projected, a person can allegedly view distant objects or locations and connect with higher intelligence for guidance. The information received by the projected mind is then said to be perceived as thoughts, images, feelings, smells, taste and sound by the mind. The information obtained in this manner can be acted upon to solve problems.


Skepticism

James Randi James Randi (born Randall James Hamilton Zwinge; August 7, 1928 – October 20, 2020) was a Canadian-American stage magician, author and scientific skepticism, scientific skeptic who extensively challenged paranormal and pseudoscientific cla ...
wrote that the Silva Method:
claims to develop improved memory, learning ability, and
paranormal Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Not ...
powers like telepathy. Much of the course consists of "visiting" absent persons imagined by students and performing diagnoses on them. No tests of the validity of this practice have been done; such tests are discouraged by the teachers of the system.


See also

*
Autosuggestion Autosuggestion is a psychological technique related to the placebo effect, developed by apothecary Émile Coué at the beginning of the 20th century. It is a form of self-induced suggestion in which individuals guide their own thoughts, feelings ...
*
Extra-sensory perception Extrasensory perception or ESP, also called sixth sense, is a claimed paranormal ability pertaining to reception of information not gained through the recognized physical senses, but sensed with the mind. The term was adopted by Duke Universi ...
*
Visualization Visualization or visualisation may refer to: * Visualization (graphics), the physical or imagining creation of images, diagrams, or animations to communicate a message * Data visualization, the graphic representation of data * Information visuali ...
*
Remote viewing Remote viewing (RV) is the practice of seeking impressions about a distant or unseen subject, purportedly sensing with the mind. Typically a remote viewer is expected to give information about an object, event, person or location that is hidden ...
*
Samyama ''Samyama'' (from Sanskrit संयम saṃ-yama—holding together, tying up, binding, integration) is the combined simultaneous practice of Dhāraṇā (concentration), Dhyāna (meditation) and Samādhi (union). Description Samyama is a to ...
* Self-help


References


External links


Silva Ultramind official website

The Silva Method official website
{{Authority control Large-group awareness training Pseudoscience Self religions Cognitive training