#ramdass

Richard Alpert to Ram Dass: A Journey from Mind to Soul

The transformation of Ram Dass is one of the most profound spiritual journeys of the modern era. It is the story of a man who had everything the Western world could offer—education, status, success—and yet felt something essential was missing. That absence became the doorway to a life devoted to truth, love, and service.

There Is No Other: The Way to Harmony and Wholeness by Ram Dass; Parvati Markus

Pub date - 10/21/25

Parvati Markus has compiled some of Ram Dass’s most powerful messages in this book and I found There Is No Other to be a title I read slowly, so as to be able to best take in the essence of each piece.

This was a title I enjoyed greatly, thinking so much about what I read in this particularly as times are yearning for these messages. I sincerely appreciated the opportunity from Harper One to read an early copy of this; this is one I will get for my own bookshelf.

Thank you to Harper One and NetGalley for the DRC

Ram Dass shares a revealing piece of wisdom that looks at how we find ourselves stuck in-between the stories of the past, served to us through culture, religion and politics, and what we are...

“When you bear what you think

you cannot bear, who you think you are 

dies.” -Ram Dass

The same notes float 

through the early winter darkness, 

around the still lake, 

through my open patio doors, 

night after night. I sit 

alone trying to quiet my mind,

while a nearby stranger practices 

Tchaikovsky’s “Chanson Triste.”

Most nights the pianist stumbles 

on the composer’s grief with long pauses, 

skipped chords, and abrupt restarts. 

Once I even heard the fall 

crash over keys. Yet, I can’t help 

but think isn’t that the song of loss? 

Unremitting, frustrating, fractured, 

hidden in distance, unmasterable 

even after years of rehearsal?

Yet sometimes on a night like tonight,

an evening no more special than 

the last, practice pursues perfection. 

Hands dance in simplicity and sadness, 

aligning past with present, coordinating

Tchaikovsky’s suffering- choosing 

separation from his wife, dying to his old life- 

with skill. I close the doors somewhat 

relieved, believing sometime soon 

with fortitude and practice, I too may become 

an instrument of compassion: beyond 

bearing the unbearable, not thinking

of the interminable future, not replaying 

the immutable past, letting go of losing

you and what we could have had. 

Ram Dass is one of the most important cultural figures from the 1960s and 70s. A pyschedelic pioneer, author of Be Here Now, beloved spiritual teacher, and outspoken advocate for death-and-dying awareness, Ram Dass is now himself approaching the end of life.