Meeting Ram Dass

When I was in college, to me, Ram Dass was the link to the guru. I always wanted to meet the guru. I remember reading "Be Here Now" and feeling the presence of God through the book. I always wanted to connect with that, to serve that. At the time, I felt as if I were being drawn into the presence of the Guru, into the presence of God. Unfortunately for me, my path was a winding one.

As I was nearing the end of my college career, I decided that there were two places I wanted to live. The first being India, the second being New Mexico. I couldn't tell you why I was drawn to New Mexico, but I remember there being something important about the place, some reason that I needed to go there. It didn't work for me to move to either place. I ended up going to Japan, and feeling somehow disconnected with myself. My parents wanted me to go to Japan. I wanted to go to New Mexico. We had a holy war. They won out. What can I say...I was broke. Sometimes God takes a backseat to money. Especially when you got no power.

Well, when I was living in Japan I did some research on the internet one day, just trolling around, and I found out the Neem Karoli Baba, the guru of Ram Dass, had only one temple outside of India...in Taos, New Mexico.

When I got back to the states, I continued my spiritual adventure, but the desire to meet the guru faded to some degree. I started to find the guru within. I started to find Self within, and I didn't need so much to find the guru without. However, there has always been this part of me that has wondered what would've happened had I made the adventure to Taos, New Mexico when I had just left college. Probably my head would've exploded when I found out that Neem Karoli Baba had a temple there.

Not too long ago, I was again, trolling around on the internet, and I found that I could have a personal chat with Ram Dass, a heart to heart, over a network meeting site. Amazing, I thought. I finally get a chance to meet the guru...in the most unlikely of places.

So I signed up. Just to see what it would be like.

And when the day came, I realized I had no idea what we were going to talk about. I mentioned this to one of my spiritual friends, and he said that I should tell him about my path. That seemed like a good starting point, so that was what I was going to do.

I had been watching the Celtics-Lakers NBA finals game. I usually get pretty wrapped up in those games. When I was a kid I even had a shirt that said "I Hate L.A." I wore it proudly. The Celtics were getting destroyed in this game.

About halfway through the game, I got a call from Ram Dass' helper. And I logged into the site. There was Ram Dass. He picked up the phone. And said hello...I just started laughing. I mean seriously. Back in the day, I would wake up at dawn and go pray to the morning sun that I would get a chance to meet the guru, that I would find purpose and direction in my life, and here I was, somehow talking to the guru through the phone. How weird.

I started off by telling him thank you. I said that he had a real deep impact on my life. Of course he had no idea. And then I started telling him about my spiritual path. And he just listened. He asked me what I do for a living. I said "I work at Merrill Lynch". He said, "That's one hell of an ashram you got there." I thought that was pretty funny. So I started talking about how I compartmentalize, how I am one person with one group, and someone else with another, how I lose myself in the world.

He talked to me about focusing on my Soul, tuning into my Soul, and remembering that whoever we meet...they are just Soul's. Everywhere. Just Soul's. So I asked him how he goes about remember that. He said, "Well, you have to know who you are. Do you know who you are?" I used to ask myself that question a lot, a la Ramana Maharshi. "I don't know...I don't know." He said, "I am loving awareness...who are you?" And then he kept repeating it, "I am loving awareness. I am loving awareness. I am loving awareness." Sometimes slowly, sometimes softly, sometimes strongly, but always the same...I am loving awareness. And I felt as if I were in the presence of loving awareness, that he was just loving awareness.

And he said to me, "Simon, who are you?" And I said, "I am loving awareness." And he said, "And there it is. We are two souls. What is a Soul. Loving awareness. Loving awareness meeting loving awareness. Through all the identifications, through all the games, through it all, we are one and the same." And as he talked I could feel the power, this love, this light, just streaming through me. I felt at peace and at home. We talked for a while more, but at some point, we just ran out of things to say. I just felt at home. At home.

And so he bowed and said "Namaste" and then he said, "I am loving awareness." And I smiled, and felt as if I were looking at loving awareness, at the very nature of God, at the very nature of God. And he hung up the phone.

And I hung up the phone. And I went back out to watch the end of the Celtics game. The Celtics were completing one of the greatest comebacks in NBA final's history. But in my head, all I could think was, "I am loving awareness", and as I watched the game, it was different. All souls. They were all souls. The Celtics. The fans. Even the Lakers. All Souls. All Souls.