The abstract point of this is that we don’t do anything to anybody else, anyway. Actually, people do things to themselves, and we are merely the envi… - Ram Dass

I don't know,' I replied. 'But looking at you, it's like I see inside a burning house. The house is being destroyed, just as your body is being consumed. But you and I are still here. The body will go, and you'll still be there. It seems to me, the way you and I are connected isn't really defined by this disintegrating body. You sound just like you've always sounded. I feel like I've always felt. Your body is decaying before us, but the way you and I love each other, I just believe that love transcends death.

He had no idea what a Ram Dass was, but he was open to learning.

I realized that although everything by which I knew myself, even my body and this life itself, was gone, still I was fully aware! Not only that, but this aware "I" was watching the entire drama, including the panic, with calm compassion. Instantly, with this recognition, I felt a new kind of calmness — one of a profundity never experienced before. I had just found that "I", that scanning device — that point — that essence — that place beyond. A place where "I" existed independent of social and physical identity. That which was I was beyond Life and Death. And something else — that "I" Knew — it really Knew. It was wise, rather than just knowledgeable. It was a voice inside that spoke truth. I recognized it, was one with it, and felt as if my entire life of looking to the outside world for reassurance — David Reisman's other-directed being, was over.