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Tao of Guides & Teachers

Baba Ram Dass

~Psychedelic Grace~

 

"Our minds are often permeated
by memories of the past
or worries about the future.
What gets missed is the present ~
and right there in the moment
is the doorway into timelessness."
~One Liners~

Richard Alpert (Ram Dass) was born in 1931. His father, George, a lawyer, helped to found Brandeis University and was President of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad. Ram Dass studied psychology, specializing in human motivation and personality development. He received an M.A. from Wesleyan and a Ph.D. from Stanford. He then served on the psychology faculties at Stanford and the University of California, and from 1958 to 1963 taught and researched in the Department of Social Relations and the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. During this period he co-authored (with Sears and Rau) the book Identification and Child Rearing, published by Stanford University Press.

In 1961, while at Harvard, Ram Dass' explorations of human consciousness led him, in collaboration with Timothy Leary, Ralph Metzner, Aldous Huxley, Allen Ginsberg, and others, to pursue intensive research with psilocybin, LSD-25, and other psychedelic chemicals. Out of this research came two books:The Psychedelic Experience (co-authored by Leary and Metzner, and based on The Tibetan Book of the Dead (see below), published by University Books); and LSD (with Sidney Cohen and Lawrence Schiller, published by New American Library). Because of the controversial nature of this research, Ram Dass was dismissed from Harvard in 1963.

"Remember,
we are all affecting the world every moment,
whether we mean to or not.
Our actions and states of mind matter,
because we're so deeply interconnected with one another.
Working on our own consciousness
is the most important thing that we are doing at any moment,
and being love is the supreme creative act.

As long as you have certain desires about how it ought to be you can't see how it is."

Ram Dass continued his research under the auspices of a private foundation until 1967. In that year he traveled to India, where he met his Guru (spiritual teacher), Neem Karoli Baba. Ram Dass studied yoga and meditation, and received the name Ram Dass, which means "servant of God." Since 1968, he has pursued a variety of spiritual practices, including guru kripa; devotional yoga focused on the Hindu spiritual figure Hanuman; meditation in the Theravadin, Mahayana Tibetan, and Zen Buddhist schools; karma yoga; and Sufi and Jewish studies.

"The spiritual journey is individual, highly personal.
It can’t be organized or regulated.
It isn’t true that everyone should follow one path.
Listen to your own truth."
~Neem Karoli Baba~

"Be open to all teachers
And all teachings,
And listen with your heart."

In 1974, Ram Dass created the Hanuman Foundation, which developed the Prison Ashram Project, designed to help prison inmates grow spiritually during their incarceration, and the Dying Project, conceived as a spiritual support structure for conscious and dying. These projects are now directed under independent auspices. The Ram Dass Tape Library Foundation serves as the organizing vehicle for Ram Dass' teachings, and for the distribution of his books and tapes.

"You must come to see every human being
including yourself, as an incarnation
in a body or personality, going through a certain
life experience which is functional."

Ram Dass' interests include the support of psychedelic research, international development, environmental awareness and political action. He has written a number of spiritual books including Be Here Now, published in 1971 (over one million copies sold, 37th printing, Crown Publishers); The Only Dance There Is (Anchor/ Doubleday); Grist for the Mill (with Stephen Levine, Celestial Arts); Journey of Awakening (Bantam Books); Miracle of Love: Stories of Neem Karoli Baba (Hanuman Foundation); How Can I Help? (with Paul Gorman, Knopf); Compassion in Action: Setting Out on the Path of Service (with Mirabai Bush, Bell Tower Press) and Still Here: Embracing Aging, Changing and Dying (Riverhead Books). His latest book, One-Liners: A Mini-Manual for a Spiritual Life was published by Bell Tower Press in September, 2002. In September, 2004, Harmony will be publishing Ram Dass' next book, entitled Paths to God: Living the Bhagavad Gita.
In 1996, Ram Dass began to develop plans for a talk radio program called “Here and Now with Ram Dass.” Seven pilot programs were aired in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area, and Ram Dass planned to launch the show on a nationwide basis the following year. But in February 1997, he experienced a stroke which left him with expressive aphasia and partial paralysis. The after effects of the stroke have made it necessary for him to postpone plans for his radio program, but he has been able to resume his other teaching commitments and is using the experience to explore the spiritual dimensions of suffering and the nature of the aging process.
Ram Dass is a co-founder and advisory board member of the Seva Foundation, an international service organization. He works with the Social Venture Network, an organization of businesses seeking to bring social consciousness to business practices. He continues to teach about the nature of consciousness, and about service as a spiritual path.

"When you awaken
You are no longer a Buddhist or a Hindu or a Christian or a Jew or a Moslem.
You are love, you are truth.
And love and truth have no form.
They flow into forms.
But the word is never the same as that which the word connotes.
The word "God" is not God,
the word "Mother" is not Mother,
the word "Self" is not Self,
the word "moment" is not the moment.
All of these words are empty.
We're playing at the level of intellect,
feeding that thing in us that keeps wanting to understand.
And here we are, all the words we've said are gone.
Where did they go?
Do you remember them all?
Empty, empty.
If you heard them, you are at this moment empty.
You're ready for the next word.
And the word will go through you.
You don't have to know anything: that's what's so funny about it.
You get so simple.
You're empty.
You know nothing.
You simply are wisdom-
not becoming anything,
just being everything."

Remember ~
Be Here Now...

cover

Be Here Now by Baba Ram Dass (Richard Alpert)

A Lama Foundation Book. Describes Ram Dass's transformation upon his acceptance of the principles of Yoga and gives a modern restatement of the importance of the spiritual side of man's nature. We are never without this book. I ACCEPT THE HERE AND NOW FULLY or Magic Theatre For Madmen Only Price of Admission Your Mind. Highly Recommended!

'Fierce Grace'

(Directed by Mickey Lemle, and featuring Ram Dass)
Ram Dass receives the viewer into the now-ness of his being, as he gently opens to the spiritual journey of living with his physically debilitating stroke. In the first part of the film, watching him as he struggles for words and concepts is a lesson for us all in understanding and compassion, while accepting, as he does, the true beauty and perfection of it all.
Ram Dass (formerly Richard Alpert) was born into a traditional, upwardly mobile Jewish family in New England. His upbringing and achievement orientation brought him to Harvard in the 60's, where he felt "the world was my oyster." This did little to prepare him for a new faculty member named Timothy Leary! Their experimentation with the consciousness raising effects of LSD led to their ultimate expulsion from Harvard. (And was an important chapter in 60's history) Becoming disenchanted with being high all the time, Richard travels to India, and encounters his guru Maharaj Ji..and this is where his legacy to us all truly begins.
Throughout the film, I was moved to tears and felt the raw, heart-opening presence of Ram Dass as well as Maharaj Ji. I not only recommend that you see this movie, but purchase it.
Ram Dass has been an example of spiritual awakening in our youth, and continues to be an example of the mellowing wisdom of spirit that opens wider to us in our aging. He has been traveling long and well in his journey. Now he has gifted us, once again, with his wisdom in opening, exploring and surrendering to "being here now."
Truly, "Fierce Grace" is a powerfully moving exploration. Thank you, and namaste! Ram Dass for sharing your spirit in such a loving presentation. May you be blessed!

-SunInMoon-August 2005-

Check Out Our Other Books By Ram Dass at our:

Spiritual Teachers Bookstore

Being conscious is
cutting through your own melodrama
and being right here.
Exist in no mind, be empty, here now,
and trust that as a situation arises,
out of you will come what is necessary
to deal with that situation
including the use of your intellect
when appropriate.
Your intellect need not be
constantly held on to
to keep reassuring you
that you know where you’re at,
out of fear of loss of control.
Ultimately, when you stop identifying
so much
with your physical body
and with your psychological entity,
that anxiety starts to disintegrate.
And you start to define yourself
as in flow with the universe;
and whatever comes along ~
death, life, joy, sadness ~
is grist for the mill of awakening,
Not this versus that
but whatever.
from Ram Dass, Grist for the Mill

The Lama Foundation-San Cristobal, New Mexico

Neem Karoli Baba Temple/Ashram-Taos, New Mexico

You can write to Ram Dass at
524 San Anselmo Avenue, #203
San Anselmo, CA. 94960
You can send e-mail to Ram Dass at RDTapes@aol.com