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More and more people are rediscovering meditation–a practice that takes you inside for an out–of–the–world experience.

If typical American media hype is to be believed, a watershed in the legitimacy of meditation happened precisely on July 28, 1993. On that apocryphal day, one of the largest insurance companies in the world, Mutual of Omaha, announced that it would reimburse individuals who took Life Choice, a program developed by the celebrated Dr Dean Ornish. The program promised to reverse the consequences of heart disease using meditation, and diet and lifestyle changes.

In India, too, meditation is finally coming home after spreading the message all over the world. Ironically, till as recently as 10 years ago, most of us believed that meditation was for misfits, misanthropes and plain nuts. Itinerant and often half–baked swamis went about giving rousing discourses on the spiritual life. But all they could recommend was japa, the monotonous repetition of god’s many names.

The times have changed and so have the pathways to salvation. Today, tens of techniques are available off–the–shelf. “Yes, interest in meditation has picked up in the past three to four years,” says Swami Chaitanya Keerti, an Oshoite. Adds Sudha Suri, a naturopath based in New Delhi, India: “A couple of years ago, you ran into the same circle of people at every meditation course or personal growth workshop. Today, that circle is widening.”

Read more: Meditation - The new Mantra