Ram Dass Quotes

Along with faith comes the requirement for dogged persistence. At first meditation may bring you mild highs or some relief from suffering. But there may come a time - just as there does in the development of any skill - when there will be a plateau. You may be bored, discouraged, or even negative and cynical. This is when you will need not only faith, but persistence.

You give up not meditating. It's called meditation action. There's no way out of it. Meditation means to be constantly extricating yourself from the clinging of mind.

Real happiness lies in that which never comes nor goes, but simply is.

Cosmic humor, especially about your own predicament, is an important part of your journey.

All that you seek is already within you. In Hinduism it is called the Atman, in Buddhism the pure Buddha-Mind. Christ said, 'the kingdom of heaven is within you.' Quakers call it the ‘still small voice within.’ This is the space of full awareness that is in harmony with all the universe, and thus is wisdom itself.

If you could stand back far enough and watch the whole process you'd see you are a totally determined being.

If you feel a sense of social responsibility, first of all keep working on yourself. Being peaceful yourself is the first step if you want to live in a peaceful universe.

If we can give up attachment to our roles as helpers, then maybe our clients can give up attachment to their roles as patients

Allowing dying to be so intensely present enriches both the preciousness of each moment and our detachment from it.

Wisdom is one of the few things in human life that does not diminish with age.

The thinking mind is what is busy. You have to stay in your heart. You have to be in your heart. Be in your heart. The rest is up here in your head where you are doing, doing, doing.

Thoughts are going by like a river; awareness simply is.

To him who has had the experience no explanation is necessary, to him who has not, none is possible.

When humans come together with a true spirit of dealing with the mystery collaboratively, it's incredibly beautiful.

Remember, Be Here Now.

Can you use the rational mind to transcend itself?

I feel vulnerable because my mind - because of the stroke, my mind doesn't focus. And then I feel vulnerable because I don't understand the world around me.

The dark night of the soul is when you have lost the flavor of life but have not yet gained the fullness of divinity. So it is that we must weather that dark time, the period of transformation when what is familiar has been taken away and the new richness is not yet ours.

All you can do for another person is be an environment in which if they wanted to come up for air, they could.

I used to be afraid of things like strokes, but I've now discovered that the fear of the stroke is worse than the stroke itself.

After one arrives at the summit, after going through the total transformation of being...there is yet one more step to the completion of that journey: the return to the valley below, to the everyday world. Who it is that returns is not who began the climb in the first place. The being that comes back is quietness itself, is compassion and wisdom, is the truth of the ages. Whatever humble or elevated position that being holds within the community, he or she becomes a light for others on the way a statement of the freedom that comes from having touched the top of the mountain.

If I go into the place in myself that is love, and you go into the place in yourself that is love, we are together in love. Then you and I are truly in love, the state of being love. That's the entrance to Oneness.

We reap in age what we have sown, in our values, all along the way.

Every religion is the product of the conceptual mind attempting to describe the mystery.

Unconditional love really exists in each of us. It is part of our deep inner being. It is not so much an active emotion as a state of being. It's not 'I love you' for this or that reason, not 'I love you if you love me.' It's love for no reason, love without an object.

Faith, consciousness, and awareness all exist beyond the thinking mind.

There are wars and poverty and so on - it's based on fear. You can cure that with your being by not being afraid.

I don't have a fear and urgency feeling inside myself about the state of the world affairs and everything collapsing.

The healing begins when we can start to feel more gratitude that our child came into our life than despair and outrage that our child died. The gratitude is what heals the despair.

The point isn't to deny our Egos, but to extricate ourselves from our exclusive preoccupation with them.

It is possible that in the 21st Century the Earth will not be inhabited by humans. One of the great mystics of India, a very simple man up in the mountains, somebody once asked him about the future. He said there will come a time when you'll walk five miles and you may see a light and you'll be so happy to know another being exists.

Early in the journey you wonder how long the journey will take and whether you will make it in this lifetime. Later you will see that where you are going is HERE and you will arrive NOW...so you stop asking.

Our thinking minds deprive us of the happiness that comes when we are living fully in the moment.

Aging has its own beauty. It is a beautiful stage for doing inner work. You have a chance to not be so dependent on social approval. You can be a little more eccentric. You can be more alone. And you can examine loneliness and boredom instead of being afraid of them. There is such an art and a possibility of aging.

Our rational minds can never understand what has happened, but our hearts.. if we can keep them open to God, will find their own intuitive way.

I am embarrassed to admit what drew me to psychology. I didn't want to go to medical school. I was getting good grades in psychology and I was charismatic and people in the psychology department liked me. It was as low a level as that.

This is the pathless path - returning to where you were initially before you got lost. The deepest truth in you is where the journey leads - shedding, like taking off layers of an onion, until you come to your essence. The key to the spiritual journey is not acquiring something outside of yourself. Rather it is shedding the veils to come back to the deepest truth of your being.

If you think you are free, there is no escape possible.

When we see the Beloved in each person, it's like walking through a garden, watching flowers bloom all around us.

Let the natural flow of the universe, course through your being, and harmonize your soul.

We've gotten lost in our Ego and have forgotten that our Soul's only motive is to merge with the Beloved.

When we're identified with Awareness, we're no longer living in a world of polarities. Everything is present at the same time.

I love everybody. Even George Bush.

The person who says, 'I'm enlightened' probably isn't.

Souls love. That’s what souls do. Egos don’t, but souls do. Become a soul, look around, and you’ll be amazed-all the beings around you are souls. Be one, see one. When many people have this heart connection, then we will know that we are all one, we human beings all over the planet. We will be one. One love. And don’t leave out the animals, and trees, and clouds, and galaxies-it’s all one. It’s one energy.

When you see the beloved all around you, everyone is family and everywhere is love.

Suffering only shows where you are attached. That is why, to those on the path, suffering is grace.

Learn to watch your drama unfold while at the same time knowing you are more than your drama.