Be Here Now

Beloved guru Ram Dass tells the story of his spiritual awakening and gives you the tools to take control of your life in this “counterculture bible” (The New York Times) featuring powerful guidance on yoga, meditation, and finding your true self. When Be Here Now was first published in 1971, it filled a deep spiritual emptiness, launched the ongoing mindfulness revolution, and established Ram Dass as perhaps the preeminent seeker of the twentieth century. Just ten years earlier, he was known as Professor Richard Alpert. He held appointments in four departments at Harvard University. He published books, drove a Mercedes and regularly vacationed in the Caribbean. By most societal standards, he had achieved great success. . . . And yet he couldn’t escape the feeling that something was missing. Psilocybin and LSD changed that. During a period of experimentation, Alpert peeled away each layer of his identity, disassociating from himself as a professor, a social cosmopolite, and lastly, as a physical being. Fear turned into exaltation upon the realization that at his truest, he was just his inner-self: a luminous being that he could trust indefinitely and love infinitely. And thus, a spiritual journey commenced. Alpert headed to India where his guru renamed him Baba Ram Dass—“servant of God.” He was introduced to mindful breathing exercises, hatha yoga, and Eastern philosophy. If he found himself reminiscing or planning, he was reminded to “Be Here Now.” He started upon the path of enlightenment, and has been journeying along it ever since. Be Here Now is a vehicle for sharing the true message, and a guide to self-determination.

“Ram Dass lived a full life and then some. His final statement is thorough and, yes, enlightening.” —Kirkus Reviews Perhaps no other teacher has sparked the fires of as many spiritual seekers in the West as Ram Dass. If you’ve ever embraced the phrase “be here now,” practiced meditation or yoga, tried psychedelics, or supported anyone in a hospice, prison, or homeless center—then the story of Ram Dass is also part of your story. From his birth in 1931 to his luminous later years, Ram Dass saw his life as just one incarnation of many. This memoir puts us in the passenger seat with the one-time Harvard psychologist and lifelong risk-taker Richard Alpert, who loved to take friends on wild rides on his Harley and test nearly every boundary—inner or outer—that came his way. Being Ram Dass shares his life’s odyssey in intimate detail: how he struggled with issues of self-identity and sexuality in his youth, pioneered psychedelic research, and opened the doorways to Eastern spiritual practices. In 1967 he trekked to India and met his guru, Neem Karoli Baba. He returned with a perspective on spirituality and psychology that changed millions. Featuring 64 pages of color photographs, this intimate memoir chronicles the cultural and spiritual transformations Ram Dass experienced that resonate with us to this day, a journey from the mind to the heart, from the ego to the soul. Before, after, and along these waypoints, readers will encounter many other adventures and revelations—each ringing with the potential to awaken the universal, loving divine that links us to this beloved teacher and all of us to each other.

“May Ram Dass’s intimate and heartfelt account inspire others to find their own path of true love, compassion, and joyful service.” —Thich Nhat Hanh, author of The Heart of Buddha’s Teaching Ram Dass’s long-awaited Be Love Now is the transformational teaching of a forty-year journey to the heart. The author of the two-million-copy classic Be Here Now and its influential sequel Still Here, Dass is joined once more by Rameshwar Das—a collaborator from the Love Serve Remember audio recordings—to offer this intimate and inspiring exploration of the human soul. Like Deepak Chopra’s Book of Secrets, the Dalai Lama’s Art of Happiness, and Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Coming to Our Senses, Ram Dass’s Be Love Now will serve as a lodestar for anyone seeking to enhance their spiritual awareness and improve their capacity to serve—and love—the world around them. “Be Love Now, like Be Here Now, is equal parts memoir and manual of meditation. It’s hard to believe the two books are separated by more than thirty years. The writing in Be Love Now is as fresh and charged with insight as the earlier one.” —Los Angeles Times “If the West even approaches enlightenment in the Twenty-first Century, there’s no way to overestimate the role of Ram Dass in making it happen. He planted seeds that turned into a million trees; if and when they blossom, they will exude the fragrance of his teaching forever.” —Marianne Williamson “Be Love Now reveals the true meaning of yoga, the union of the open heart—this is required reading for anyone who follows a path of devotion.” —Daniel Goleman, New York Times–bestselling author of Emotional Intelligence

Find the practice that’s right for you with this exploration of the many paths of meditation—from mantra, prayer, singing, visualizations, and “just sitting” to movement meditations such as tai chi “Everyone has experienced a moment of pure awareness. A moment without thinking ‘I am aware’ or ‘that is a tree.’ Such moments bring a sense of rightness, of clarity, of being at one. Such moments are the essence of meditation.”—Ram Dass Ram Dass is an American psychologist and spiritual teacher who has studied and practiced meditation for many years. Here he shares his understanding and suggests how you can find methods suitable for you. He illuminates the stages and benefits of meditative practice, and provides wise and often humorous advice on overcoming difficulties along the way.

Discover how giving of yourself can lead to some of the most joyous moments in your life—in a book that “deserves a special place on that shelf reserved for truly practical wisdom" (Harold Kushner, author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People). Not a day goes by without our being called upon to help one another--at home, at work, on the street, on the phone…. We do what we can. Yet so much comes up to complicate this natural response: "Will I have what it takes?" "How much is enough?" "How can I deal with suffering?" "And what really helps, anyway?" In this practical helper's companion, the authors explore a path through these confusions, and provide support and inspiration for us in our efforts as members of the helping professions, as volunteers, as community activists, or simply as friends and family trying to meet each other's needs. Here too are deeply moving personal accounts: A housewife brings zoo animals to lift the spirits of nursing home residents; a nun tends the wounded on the first night of the Nicaraguan revolution; a police officer talks a desperate father out of leaping from a roof with his child; a nurse allows an infant to spend its last moments of life in her arms rather than on a hospital machine. From many such stories and the authors' reflections, we can find strength, clarity, and wisdom for those times when we are called on to care for one another.

T he material in this volume is culled from over two thousand stories about Maharajji gathered during five years from more than one hundred devotees. To these devotees who shared their treasured memo ries, I wish to express my deep love and appreciation. Some of them felt that no book could or should be written about a being with qualities as vast, formless, and subtle as Maharajji’s, and yet they contributed their stories nevertheless. I honor them for this kindness and I hope that in my zeal to share experiences of Maharajji with others who were not fortu nate enough to have met him, I have not misused their trust. Some devotees tell me that stories told by other devotees are not fac tually accurate. I have no way of ascertaining the authenticity of any single story. All I can report is that those o f us who gathered the stories were impressed by the credibility of those of us who told the stories. Though the responsibility for this manuscript lies solely with me, I am delighted to acknowledge a lot o f loving help from my friends:

"In You Are Here (For Now), artist and author Adam J. Kurtz is vulnerable, wise and hilarious as he doles out advice and comfort to anyone who's really going through it." –BookPage The national bestseller An honest and relatable guide to figuring out where you’re headed—and feeling okay in the meantime. When life feels uncertain, or just plain out of control, making intentional choices can help us move forward and find our way. Sometimes all it takes is a gentle nudge, but for anyone waiting for that big, obvious sign from the universe: This is it! This candid collection of essays and artwork is full of reflections, encouragement, and insights on the theme of personal transformation—realistic perspectives to help you move from “staying alive” to nurturing and celebrating the person you know you really are. From the generous and slightly jaded mind of artist Adam J. Kurtz, these pages explore mental health, identity, handling setbacks, and finding humor in the unknown—and will be a touchstone for seekers, graduates, creatives, and anyone who’s trying to figure out what’s next (and maybe even feel a little hopeful about it).

Peck's views on being a separate courageous individual.

In his classic book Be Here Now, Ram Dass introduced the world to a young guru named Bhagavan Das. Continuing his own story in It's Here Now (Are You?), Bhagavan Das shares the profound and surreal moments of his spiritual awakening in the East, his fall from grace in the West, and his peaceful reconciliation with the sacred center. For many years in the early '70s Bhagavan Das moved through India and Nepal, embracing the austere life of a holy man, exploring Hinduism, Buddhism, transcendental meditation, tantra, worshipping the divine mother, and living under the loving blanket of his guru, Neem Karoli Baba. Only twenty-five years old when he returned home to the States as a celebrity, he found himself traveling on the "guru circuit" with Ram Dass, Allen Ginsberg, Jerry Garcia, and Timothy Leary--living more like a rock star than the saint he was proclaimed to be. In compelling detail, Bhagavan Das explores the tortuous journey that led him from his quest for the sacred to his spiritual death and eventual rebirth. A vivid memoir like no other, It's Here Now (Are You?) is an odyssey that will inspire seekers of any age on their own road to fulfillment.

For centuries, readers have turned to the Bhagavad Gita for inspiration and guidance as they chart their own spiritual paths. As profound and powerful as this classic text has been for generations of seekers, integrating its lessons into the ordinary patterns of our lives can ultimately seem beyond our reach. Now, in a fascinating series of reflections, anecdotes, stories, and exercises, Ram Dass gives us a unique and accessible road map for experiencing divinity in everyday life. In the engaging, conversational style that has made his teachings so popular for decades, Ram Dass traces our journey of consciousness as it is reflected in one of Hinduism’s most sacred texts. The Gita teaches a system of yogas, or “paths for coming to union with God.” In Paths to God, Ram Dass brings the heart of that system to light for a Western audience and translates the Gita’s principles into the manual for living the yoga of contemporary life. While being a guide to the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita, Paths to God is also a template for expanding our definition of ourselves and allowing us to appreciate a new level of meaning in our lives.