Human beings have been fascinated with the idea of flying since antiquity. The ancient Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus escaping from the labyrinth on the island of Crete with hand-fashioned waxen wings exerts power to this day. Even in the modern age of jet travel and space shuttles, we have not lost our private dream of personal, unencumbered flight. We have created our own myths of flying heroes—Peter Pan, Superman, ET.

But the ability to fly is not limited to mythology. It forms an age-old heritage of humanity. Throughout the world, from ancient times to the present, we find stories of people who actually could float and fly. The earliest and most detailed descriptions come from the ancient Vedic tradition, where hovering and flying are described as the natural abilities of fully developed human beings.

Many well-attested accounts are, historically speaking, right in our own backyard. In Europe alone, levitation has been attributed to more than 200 saints, and is the most commonly mentioned miracle in the Roman Catholic tradition.

The best known example is St. Joseph of Copertino, the 17th-century Italian saint. More than a hundred flights were officially recorded during his life. At the slightest inspiration—beautiful picture, a sweet melody—he would be swept high into the air, soaring to the ceiling of a church and remaining suspended in mid-air, sometimes for fifteen minutes, sometimes for two hours, in full view of eminent witnesses. Today St. Joseph of Copertino is the patron saint of those who travel by air.

In the first century AD, the Greek philosopher-saint Apollonius of Tyana traveled to India, where, he reports, he saw Indian Brahmins "levitating themselves two cubits [three feet] high from the ground." Most historians have regarded his stories as pure fantasy. But Ernest Wood, the respected English writer on Eastern philosophy, reports witnessing the same thing during his travels to India just a few decades ago: "I remember one occasion when an old yogi was levitated in a recumbent posture about six feet above the air in an open field, for about half an hour, while the visitors were permitted to pass sticks to and fro in the space between...Levitation, or the rising of the body from the ground and its suspension a few feet up in the air above the seat or couch, is a universally accepted fact in India."

How is Yogic Flying possible? How can a person float or fly through the air in apparent defiance of gravity? Yogic Flying invites us to look at human potential in an altogether new light, to expand our notions of what human beings can accomplish, to think afresh about the connection between the human mind and the natural world.

In just the last few years, quantum physics has identified the most fundamental field of nature's intelligence, the Unified Field of all the Laws of Nature—the level from where all the Laws of Nature, including the force of gravity, arise. This universal level of Natural Law underlies all forms and phenomena in the universe, including the human mind and body.

The ancient Vedic understanding of nature that Maharishi has brought to light goes further, identifying this universal field as a field of unbounded pure consciousness. Since human consciousness has its foundation and source in this most fundamental field of Natural Law, the human mind can open to this most powerful level of nature and function from there. Functioning from this fundamental level, we command the total potential of Natural Law. We gain the ability to know anything, do anything, and accomplish anything. Functioning from there, nothing is impossible for us. Our potential is unbounded.

The Transcendental Meditation technique allows the mind to settle down and experience this field of pure consciousness, the Unified Field of all the Laws of Nature, within our own awareness. The advanced TM-Sidhi program, of which Yogic Flying is a part, allows the mind to think and act from this most fundamental level of Natural Law.

Yogic Flying therefore does not violate the law of gravity or any law of nature. It enables us to access and enliven the total potential of Natural Law residing within each of us—to open this infinite reservoir of energy and intelligence and harness it for all possibilities and fulfillment in daily life.

Around the world, individuals who can float are invariably regarded as the most spiritually evolved in their society. In Europe, they are called saints; in India, yogis; in south and east Asia, arahants; in Aboriginal Australia, "clever men" or doctors. Many people may dismiss stories about such people as fables, folklore, legends, or myths. Given the nearly universal assumption that floating is impossible, what else could be expected? But careful analysis of historical records compels us to accept that at least a few individuals in history possessed the ability to float in the air.

And if even one such historical account is true, we must draw this conclusion: Flying is within the realm of human potential.

Craig Pearson is Executive Vice President of Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa. This series of articles is excerpted from his forthcoming book, The Complete Book of Yogic Flying.