Ram Dass Quotes

to him, to Krishna, to God. To use your daily life and work as a conscious spiritual path means relinquishing your attachment to the fruits of the actions, to how they come out. Instead of doing it for a reward or a result, you do your work as an offering, out of love for God. Through love for God, your work becomes an expression of devotion,

At times Maharajji’s behavior reminds me of a story Ramakrishna tells of a saint who asked a snake not to bite but to love everyone. The snake agreed. But then many people threw things at the snake. The saint found the snake all battered. “I didn’t say not to hiss,” said the saint.

The Hindu deity Hanuman offers a similar example of devotional service. Every act he performs becomes an offering to Rama (God). His service brings him to the very edge of unitive love. How powerful his vision: “When I know who I am, I am you,” he says, kneeling before Rama, “when I don’t know who I am, I serve you.

In the course of your journey it is most likely that your day-to-day companions or friends may change. Some may fall away as your interest in the Spirit pulls you from the worldly interest which brought or kept you together, but new friends who share your current interests will appear.

When you go out into the woods, and you look at trees, you see all these different trees. And some of them are bent, and some of them are straight, and some of them are evergreens, and some of them are whatever. And you look at the tree and you allow it. You see why it is the way it is. You sort of understand that it didn’t get enough light, and so it turned that way. And you don’t get all emotional about it. You just allow it. You appreciate the tree. The minute you get near humans, you lose all that. And you are constantly saying ‘You are too this, or I’m too this.’ That judgment mind comes in. And so I practice turning people into trees. Which means appreciating them just the way they are.

This getting straight not only applies to people but to things as well, such as favorite music, disliked foods, special treats, avoided places, all your toys, etc. Everything must be rerun through your compassion machine.

Knowledge all by itself, without deep wisdom, ends up becoming despair.

You are loved just for being who you are, just for existing. You don’t have to do anything to earn it. Your shortcomings, your lack of self-esteem, physical perfection, or social and economic success - none of that matters. No one can take this love away from you, and it will always be here.

We have what we seek. It is there all the time, and if we give it time it will make itself known to us. — Thomas Merton

A relationship starting out as one that awakens love can only remain a living vehicle for love to the extent that it is continually made new or reconsecrated.

Once a sadhu offered me some land that he had, so that I could have an ashram for fellow Westerners. I asked Maharajji about it. He said, “He wants to give you his attachment. It’s not a pure gift. If it were pure he’d just give it to you instead of talking about it.” (R.D.)

The epitome of the human realm is to be stuck in a huge traffic jam of discursive thought. — Chogyam Trungpa

Our existence as embodied beings is purely momentary; what are a hundred years in eternity? But if we shatter the chains of egotism, and melt into the ocean of humanity, we share its dignity. To feel that we are something is to set up a barrier between God and ourselves; to cease feeling that we are something is to become one with God.” — Gandhi

As you progress with your sadhana you may find it necessary to change your occupation. Or you may find that it is only necessary to change the way in which you perform your current occupation in order to bring it into line with your new understanding of how it all is. The more conscious that a being becomes, the more he can use any occupation as a vehicle for spreading light. The next true being of Buddha-nature that you meet may appear as a bus driver, a doctor, a weaver, an insurance salesman, a musician, a chef, a teacher, or any of the thousands of roles that are required in a complex society — the many parts of Christ’s body. You will know him because the simple dance that may transpire between you — such as handing him change as you board the bus — will strengthen in you the faith in the divinity of man. It’s as simple as that.

If a pickpocket meets a saint, he sees only his pockets.” Then he’d get up and leave. Or he’d write, “If you wear shoeleather, the whole earth is covered with leather.” These were his ways of teaching me about how motivation affects perception.