Since the year 2000, Goenka's assistant teachers have supervised free courses open to all those interested in the technique. People with serious mental problems are excluded. Participants in the 10-day beginner's course are accommodated free of charge. That includes meals and board.

Students listen to pre-recorded tape of S.N.Goenka's intstructions

To meet the different needs of students who come from different backgrounds and religions, everyone is given vegetarian meals. A wide variety of people, from lawyers to computer engineers to university students to restaurant cooks, have joined the courses, said a Mr. Gregory, one of t0he assistant teachers at the center. 

What does the 10-day course entail?

Jim Jee absorbed in meditation

Students must take a vow to observe five rules: these require them to refrain from killing living beings, from taking what is not given, from all forms of sexual conduct, from telling lies and from taking intoxicants. Gender segregation among the students is strictly enforced in all the activities, and "complete silence" has to be observed: students are not allowed to communicate with anyone but the center's management, even by gestures or eye contact.

"This noble silence and observation of five precepts are very important for you, students, because you are going to undergo a very deep mental surgical operation," Goenka's pre-recorded voice  informs students in the meditation hall.  "By observing these rules, you have fulfilled the first part of the course, which is morality and purification of conduct." 

For the first three days, the students are told to close their eyes and concentrate on their nostrils. Whenever their minds drift, they are to acknowledge it and return to their nostrils.' 

"On the second day, I seriously wondered whether I would be able to survive the remaining days," said one of the students who took a course. "But on the third day, I found my mind no longer wandered away. My attention was almost fixed on a small part of my left nostril and I began to feel an indescribable sense of peace."