Russell Brand, David Lynch and Barry Zito joined students at a San Francisco high school in a meditation program

David Lynch, Russell Brand and Barry Zito, a perhaps unexpected group of celebrities to be seen together, joined 700 students in a San Francisco high school auditorium on Monday and meditated. Yes, meditated.

The surrealistic filmmaker, outspoken British actor and Giant's pitcher took part in Burton High School's celebration of its sixth year conducting a Quite Time program. The program uses transcendental meditation techniques to help clam students and stay focused despite the stresses that arise both at home and at school.

The program is sponsored by the David Lynch Foundation. The filmmaker has been practicing transcendental meditation for 40 years and promotes it in schools across the country.

Despite some initial controversy about the practice with assumptions that it was a religious practice, research showing students' behavior and academic performance has improved has lead to wider spread acceptance. Brand and Zito both practice meditation and support the technique.

Of course Brand, even at a high school event, felt the need to curse as he said he "f-ing hated school" as a kid. But he told the students meditating "helped me access something inside of me that I tried to find in many other ways, through money, fame, sex, drugs," according to SFGate.

Zito said he began using the technique to cope with all of the criticism directed toward him on TV and in person. "I stopped putting so much stock in what other people thought of me," he said. "My inner voice started to get a little louder than every one else."

The Quiet Time program has been put into play in many San Francisco high schools. The technique includes students closing their eyes and sitting quietly for 15 minutes or so while concentrating on a particular mantra or sound and clearing their minds.