Ram Dass Here And Now

Dan Ellsberg tries scare tactics to get Ram Dass to take social action. Ram Dass says –“In fact nuclear weaponry are out of balance with the way of things - The Dao - so you don’t have to cajole or coerce people into acting. You can’t milk it through fear. You can just trust people’s gut. They will react through their own intuitive sense of being in tune with the way.” “Quiet mind-open heart- we do what we can to relieve suffering” - Ram Dass “It’s the freedom of consciousness that hears the impeccable act that brings about the healing of the planet and all it’s people so that you are an instrument for the relief of suffering; Even though at another level you can see that suffering is part of the nature of things. And the perfection is that we act to relieve the suffering while acknowledging that both the act and the suffering are part of one mosaic.” - Ram Dass See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this wide ranging interview by Radio For Peace, Ram Dass talks about satsang/community and how it can uplift us as well as become a trap. “The possibility is there in spiritual community to die into the truth. But people die very hard and as a result fall back on structures that can enhance separateness.” There is pressure in satsang to conform to the median and that pressure to conform can get individuals calcified. Institutions that are optimum for the spirit are totallt creative and imaginative. We are in the process of dissolving and being creative every moment.” Ram Dass also talks about belief and faith- “Faith is an aspect of the nature of being. Belief won’t help you when you are facing death.” See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this podcast, Mickey Lemle, filmmaker and director of the Ram Dass documentary Fierce Grace, talks with Ram Dass about the power of storytelling. Writing sometimes doesn’t allow spiritual concepts to come across fully. Storytelling can convey the direct human experience of spirituality in a more personal and immediate way. Join Ram Dass and Mickey Lemle as they relive their stories together. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Surya Das joins Ram Dass for a puja side chat at Ram Dass' home on Maui. Surya Das is a bhakta as well as an American Lama. They explore questions like, "What is our true sadhana (spiritual practice)?" - "Are we egos or dharma masters? Or are we simply two brothers on the path to the Guru's feet?" Ram Dass talks about doing practices consciously, giving the example of yoga, where each pose is "shaking hands with God." Surya Das asks, "What keeps us from remembering God in each moment of our lives?" See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

How far do you have to go to get through the layers of psychology, of defenses, of personalities in order to get to the root of a being, behind those veils where the spark is - the overriding faith in reality beyond the senses. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We are both separate and one. Creator and created. The question is, “Can we allow for free will and at the same time acknowledge that everything is determined?” The trick is to neither identify nor deny either of them. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The confusion of the paradox you find yourself in is that you are in an incarnation that’s totally dedicated to the preservation of it’s own separateness, and at the same time you are awakening to the realization that the entire domain of separateness is but another illusion. So you find yourself marching in the opposite direction of everything you've learned, against everything your body is telling you, against all of the deepest structures of the ego. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Forms are created and exist and disappear into the formless. Methods are the ship crossing the ocean of existence. You entrap yourself in them in order to burn out karma that keeps you from being free. You know that the method works when it self-destructs. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

As long as you perceive love as a verb, you are thinking of another person as a separate object to give love to. When we are truly in love, we are in a simple state of “being” love. As an incarnation, you have to understand what it means to live outside of time and space. You have to understand what it means to see a continuing process of which a human birth is but one very minor segment… See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We can be the biggest somebody in the world when we have no attachment, but we have to start from somewhere, we can’t start out being nobody. The force of “somebody-ness” that develops the survival mechanisms (social, physical, etc.) is our starting point. It is in the freedom of non-clinging to models about self and other that you begin to tune to and hear the way of things, called the Dao or the Divine Law. When you respect that tuning in yourself, actions that flow from you start to become dharmic. They are acts that release beings from suffering and do not perpetuate the illusion of separate self. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Each of us has in us a psychic DNA memory of the quality of life in the Sat Yuga (the age of truth and purity), where people generally and naturally help each other. This represents an organic flowing of a healthy human heart. Episode Outline: - We are living in the Kali Yuga (Age of Destruction) not the Sat Yuga, where truth does not abound, but isolation, fear and separateness is prevalent. Still there are moments and times when there is a natural expression of helping each other. - The ultimate alienation is thinking about yourself all the time so you become an object to yourself, you can’t even help yourself. - Getting over the barrier of “us” and “them” is very tricky. - If you want to live in a peaceful world, you better be peaceful. If you are full of anger, you won’t bring about much peace. The qualities in yourself determine what qualities manifest in the world. - When you pit yourself against the way of things, you better expect that it’s going to cost you. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/p

Change is an opportunity for growth, but it requires consciousness that holds an inner quality of equanimity and openness to the unknown. A certain way in which the chaos of the moment doesn't undercut you because you are not dependent on the external for your equanimity. You and I are in training to be instruments in a society where we can be stable in the presence of change, not holding onto the old system, but being able to move into the unknown without fear. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Ram Dass hosts his long time Buddhist friends- Jack Kornfield, Catherine Ingram and Wes Nisker at his home in Maui for an intimate chat on their first meetings - the gathering of the "soul pod" - In the early 70's these westerners took in the essence of Hinduism and Buddhism from the East, deepening their understanding of true nature, and brought it back to the West. The group also discusses "spiritual bypassing", the meaning of suffering and Ultimate Reality. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The whole design of your incarnation is like an incredible computer program that sets you into the exact life situations to move you forward towards true awareness. It’s all perfect. Every part of the birth you are taking is part of the unfolding of the karma you need to burn through. There is not one experience you are having or could have or have had that is not part of that process. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The meaning of honoring Shiva is to give space to ALL of the forces of the universe. To recognize them all, to allow them to be, to not try to shove anything under the rug. It's all Grace: sickness, fatigue, pleasure, pain, there's nothing left in my life other than the teachings that bring me into union with the Divine. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

All spiritual practice ultimately becomes the preparation of your body, your heart, and your mind to receive God. The path of going into God, in truth, is not an easy path. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Desire is a trap; desirelessness is liberation. Desire is the creator; desire is the destroyer. Desire is the universe. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Our Journey is towards simplicity and quietness - to a kind of joy that is beyond time - a journey where we leave behind all our models of who we are. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

You build your life so that every moment is the moment of death and rebirth. Because life and death become so intimately involved with one another and finally they merge, it's the eternal present. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

At the moment of orgasm, you transcend your separateness and there is a moment when you merge together. For most people that is the direct route to a spiritually transcendent state. What you learn to do in a lot of yoga forms is awakening the sexual energy, not to the point of orgasm - but just to the point where you draw the energy up the spine into the upper chakras, and you use your partnership to keep awakening that energy. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.