One of the greatest spiritual teachers of our time, Ram Dass, passed away last week. Ram Dass has been a huge influence on me, as I have always found him honest, humorous and very willing to own his own stuff and share his processes and sequences. He’s never claimed to be of a high spiritual consciousness and is simply authentic. In 2019, I was very fortunate to receive a private one on one mentoring session with him, over Skype as he’s in Maui, which I had on. He only does 4 of these a month, and I had to wait a few months. I got very nervous about the time zones and after waking at 4am with so many nerves, I waited online hours later…to crickets. He wasn’t there and didn’t log on and I felt sick thinking I had somehow missed it. I emailed through to Rachel who managed it all, to discover I was a day too early. So then I got a little bit nervous again, although relieved I now had it right. waiting for his call to come through and then suddenly there he was, beaming and grinning through on my iPad. Technology is always a trip like that for me.
There were so many beautiful things he shared with me, but a few in particular, I want to share with you. We were discussing overthinking, and he said the key to overthinking, especially negative thoughts, is to love them. Love each and every thought. Drop all ideas about ‘oh I shouldn’t be thinking that thought’ or ‘ugh why do I have this thought’ etc and just love all the thoughts for what they are. I said well I will be doing a lot of loving because I have a ridiculous amount of thoughts. When we spoke about the ego, I said one of my biggest fears was that mine was ginormous. He said, you have to love it too. All of it, all of the ego, and ‘no taming or mastering’ of the ego. Just love it. I replied well with all the overthinking and the size of my ego, I sure will have a lot of love happening and then we both cracked up laughing. And he said yep, that’s the point.
As a result of his passing, I have been re-reading so many of my favourite parts of his books, and listening to old recordings and going through all of my notes. And our February Day Retreat in Sydney called A Path To The Heart, I am now going to incorporate his teachings and what I have learned from him into this special experience. I am also going to share with those attending a special meditation centred on love that Ram Dass shared with me. I honestly cannot wait to honour his teachings within this beautiful experience. I hope you can join me.
Written with love,
Jac x
If you have no idea who Ram Dass is you can see his site here and I would really recommend his latest book with Mirabai that I found very sweet, Walking Each Other Home, as well as Be Here Now (a tome) and Polishing The Mirror. Also, his podcasts are wonderful, Be Here Now, (in truth, I fast forward past the introduction straight into Ram Dass talking and teaching).