Ram Dass Now

The ‘Hail the Goer’ mantra has particular significance for me. Right beside it is all of pg 88. The comfort of this almost chaotic looking page is that it’s presentation may make you look particularly carefully to make sure that you’re reading the words that are actually written. . . if you’re like me, you have to ‘work at it’ to see it, literally. But the message is so comforting that the work leading up to it is completely worth it.

That the water just goes on down stream, just like your senses just do what they do (and on this page, you get great exercise in the visual ‘doing’ something) . . . that you can overcome attachment through a simple exercise (karma yoga, candle focus) truly practiced, is relieving; this makes a lot of sense to me.  And what’s in sharp focus? Waiting for you to be drawn towards it (maybe as soon as you look at the page)? The clear Om Mani Padme Hum mantra. I mean, it’s literally the clearest thing on the page, visually. Where his heart rests, watching the unfolding happen. That’s just a warm sounding place, no matter what’s going on– it’s comforting to know that somebody’s there, in that warm place, and knowing it, and giving you a mantra to focus yourself so that you can find it too.

And not just that . . . also that there’s no claim to need to attain a permenant state of non-thinking just yet; and that the thoughts that you DO have can be appreciated for what they are (” . . . few people who know me don’t appreciate the fact that I think and have keen discrimination and have not lost my mind and I am a sophisticated aware being”).

So you work pretty hard to actually read the page, and to get the tone and rhythm of it (though I guess many may not work at it at all and read it easily, but I think y’all will know what I’m referring to), only to find that, like water,  you do what you do, but you neither have to be attached to it, nor absent from living life. Take heart that there’s somebody guiding you home either way. Om Mani Padme Hum.

When I got Be Love Now, I opened to a random page to see what was revealed to me. Page 116 talks of what the guru does. I think he’s the one that’s sitting in that warm heart place calling you home, waiting for your awareness to merge into one with with the mantra. Far out as that sounds to me, the idea resonates with something in me; I’m not entirely clear on what yet, but it’s comforting in the same way as pg. 88 of BHN.

I haven’t finished Be Love Now yet, but I can say that it is truly as beautiful in it’s essence and presentation as Be Here Now–and it goes beyond that too. When you read it, notice the voice that it sounds like it’s in–I like to imagine Ram Dass speaking the words out loud, in conversational style with me. For me, it’s a laid back, deeply heart-felt tone speaking to comfort, not just inform. I could go on . . . but suffice it to say that I’d suggest getting a copy. Please stop by www.BeLoveNowBook.com and take a look around, watch the video, and get a copy of the book. Really. Watch the video. “. . . You. . .Love everybody.”

Namaste’
Jon
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I received an early finished copy of BE LOVE NOW from the publishers (thank you!) and have read to page 60 as of about an hour ago. I’d been looking at it on my desk for days longing to get started reading and finally found a time late last night. Sleep deprivation, parental obligations,hunger and the need to get blogging here gave me barely enough incentive to put it down and I can’t wait to get back to it. I was totally immersed from the beginning pages where Rameshwar Das so sweetly relates his story of personal connection to Ram Dass and the ensuing journey to his heart.

There is so much in this new book that coalesces years of my life experiences and seeking. While reading the words I hear Ram Dass’s warm, loving voice in my head and I feel myself sitting in rapt attention in front of him. His deep presence is palpable through the words and wisdom he shares. I was totally immersed from the beginning pages where Rameshwar Das so sweetly relates his story of personal connection to Ram Dass and the ensuing journey to his heart

While reading I’ve been trying to integrate this new journey Be Love Now is taking me on with the pages of Be Here Now and I’ve  found it to be an effortless intention. It’s as if the profound simplicity and spaciousness of Be Here Now is filled in with layer upon layer of delicious detail and personal insights that help me bring together years of my own adventures on this bhakti marg, the road to Love. And I am thrilled that beyond the integration in this new book Ram Dass also offers more possiblities for opening to that Love.

I read on the pages of Be Here Now that there’s nothing to do, nowhere to go, you’re sitting here always. The cosmic joke is that we all struggle to get somewhere, but in reality…as I read on page 60 of Be Love Now, “When you stop for a moment, when you dive into the presence of this moment, the drama goes on, but it is all just love”.

And on page 26, “It’s a being thing not a doing thing”.

This is not to say that doing things isn’t part of the equation. I know I am here in this life to be in my humanity to its fullest and with all the passion I can muster. But doing so with a deeper connection to being makes it a more joyful and fulfilling dance. I am growing into the sense that each moment is infused with love and that  I am that loving awareness as Ram Dass reminds me in Be Love Now.

There is such freedom and peace in knowing I don’t have to be or do anything or go anywhere to reside in that ocean of love.

It is …Here Right Now Always.

Ram Dass shares,

“I used to feel I could only get that love in India but now all I have to do is plumb the depth of the moment. “  Be Love Now p. 16

These words, “plumb the depth of the moment” create an excitement in me about the possibilities to explore those depths. I am grateful also for the many ways available to me to bring myself into that moment awareness through darshan, kirtan and by opening my heart to the eternal flow of Maharaj-ji’s grace and love.

I could so easily go on and on here carried by a wave of gratitude for this new opportunity to deepen in my  life. I feel myself on the verge of veering off into another whole blog about the darshan and kirtan threads that tie it all together for me, but Ram Dass does a much better job of explaining all of this and so much more. In the interest of actually getting this posted today and since the next 236 pages of Be Love Now are mine yet to discover I will end here now….at a new beginning place.

Thank you Ram Dass and Rameshwar Das. I love you.

Dear Lovers of the Beloved,

I have just received a copy of BE LOVE NOW, The Path of the Heart, the new book that Rameshwar Das and I have been working on for almost five years. I have written a number of books since BE HERE NOW, but this one excites me the most.

BE LOVE NOW is a real summation of where I’ve come from since that first trip to India. It tracks our journey into the heart, drawn by the guru’s grace. And it introduces some of the realized beings I came to know in India who illuminate the path for so many of us.

I hope you will enjoy reading BE LOVE NOW as much as we enjoyed putting it together. You can pre-order it via the links below. Please share your thoughts about it with others on this Path of the Heart.

Peace and love,
Ram Dass

Pre-order BE LOVE NOW from:

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