Satsang with Ram Dass, Summer 1969

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by Ahad Cobb, author of Riding the Spirit Bus

Jim pulled over to the side of the road to pick some flowers for his friend. All I knew was that this friend was a guy. When Jim came back to the car with an enormous gathering of goldenrod in his arms, I began to wonder what I was getting into. Giving flowers to guys was unheard of where I came from. This was the first inkling I had that my reality was about to change.

It was the summer of 1969. I was beyond dazed and confused. I had just graduated college, Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude, in drug psychosis—and I had no idea where I was going or what I was going to do other than physically remove myself from marijuana. I was lost and bewildered.

I had the good fortune to end up staying with my friend Jim Lytton in the summer house at his grandparents’ estate on the end of Long Island. Jim was an artist in the phase of emulating Jackson Pollock with a psychedelic twist. He would climb up on a ladder and dribble vivid luminous paints onto black-painted screens, creating abstract tangles that would glow in the dark under black light.

I was trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my life. I was agitated, restless, anxious, and depressed. My mind never stopped talking. My emotional body, hidden under the nonstop mental chatter, was traumatized, numb, and repressed with occasional outbursts of ecstasy. Inspiration came and went in fitful bursts.

Jim had studied with some guy who had come back from India. Jim practiced yoga. He had this habit of disappearing into his room every afternoon, only to emerge several hours later with a calm glow and far[1]away eyes. I asked him what he was doing.

“Meditating,” he said.

“What’s it like?”

“It’s more powerful than LSD.”

This definitely caught my interest.

I asked him if he would show me how to meditate. He instructed me to sit on the floor in a firm cross-legged posture, close my eyes, concentrate on the breath flowing in and out of my body, put my attention on the tip of my nose, and be aware of breathing in and breathing out.

I sat down, closed my eyes, and tried my hardest to concentrate, but my body would not sit still. I tried this dutifully many times, but my body would spasm, jerk, jump, and twitch in time with my hyperactive mind. No matter how hard I tried, I could not sit still! Meditation did not come easily at first.

I was in need of getting out and doing something, but I had no car to go anywhere. I asked Jim if he wanted to go up to New Hampshire and climb some mountains.

“Let’s do it,” he said. “Oh, by the way, do you mind if we stop and visit someone on the way? My friend, Ram Dass, is living on his father’s estate in Franklin, New Hampshire.”

“Sure,” I told him, “Why not?”

Early one morning in June we took off and drove in peaceful silence up through New England.

It was when we were approaching Franklin that Jim pulled off to the side of the road, got out of the car, picked that enormous armload of goldenrod to give to his friend, and I found myself wondering about his gathering a bunch of flowers to bring to a guy. Hello?

We drove around the shores of Lake Franklin and then pulled up the long drive to a big white house sitting on top of a wooded hill. We were told that Ram Dass was in retreat in a little cabin behind the big house and was just finishing up an interview with a local radio station. Would we mind waiting?

After a while we were told that the interview was finished and Ram Dass would see us. We walked to a little cabin set apart from the main house. Jim carried the flowers in his arms. The door was open and we walked in. Sitting on the floor in the corner was a large man in a long white robe with a long graying beard and long frizzy hair falling down from a balding head—and the brightest eyes and the biggest smile I had ever seen.

Ram Dass instantly gave us a big smile of delight. The whole room lit up as if a very bright light had snapped on, filling it with white light. I had never seen anything like this. He was positively beaming at us! I didn’t have a concept for it at the time, but I knew that here was a being who was brighter than electricity, as bright as sunlight. He literally lit up the whole room!

His first words were, “Are you two coming to my yoga camp this summer?”

Of course, we said yes.

I disremember everything that was said that day, but I did notice that by his side were two stacks of books: a stack of holy books and a stack of Dr. Strange comic books. It was the Dr. Strange comic books that persuaded me that I could trust him.

That was my first meeting with Ram Dass, Baba Ram Dass at the time, formerly Richard Alpert, Ph.D., Harvard professor of psychology and psychedelic pioneer who, together with Timothy Leary, had gotten kicked out of Harvard for giving LSD to some students. He had gone to India and found God in the form of his guru, Neem Karoli Baba, also called Maharaj-ji, and was now back in the States, living in a little cabin on his father’s estate. The yoga camp started in a few weeks. How I got back there without a car I don’t recall. But that’s what friends are for.

Ram Dass had just returned from a year in India with his guru. His atmosphere was pervaded with ecstasy, bliss, and love. Ram Dass’s father had generously opened up his estate to the forty or so young people who came together that summer. We all camped in the woods and made a communal center, meditation hall, and kitchen in the barn. Ram Dass pretty much left the organization of the ashram (spiritual retreat) to evolve by itself, although we followed most of his suggestions. This was my introduction to karma yoga, the path of service. Cooking, cleaning, and housekeeping, done as selfless service, could be a path to God. It was also my introduction to kedgeree and chapattis, gently spiced rice and lentils eaten with flat bread.

Ram Dass himself stayed on retreat but came down once or twice a day to give darshan—long ecstatic and insightful talks—interspersed with kirtan, devotional chanting, and just generally hung out whenever he felt like it. Ram Dass, dressed all in white, prayer beads in hand, blissful smile on his face, would sit under a maple tree, with all of us gathered around him and give darshan. The word darshan means “seeing and being seen” by an aspect, form, or gaze of the divine. Millions of Hindus visit temples every day for the darshan of the enshrined deity, or sit at the feet of the guru having his darshan. For Ram Dass in India, this meant hanging out with Maharaj-ji. For me, darshan meant sitting with Ram Dass under the tree, hanging out, listening, chanting, meditating . . . and bathing in the grace of Maharaj-ji.

We were all immersed in a gentle, luminous, loving atmosphere as Ram Dass talked of God and his guru, of the pitfalls of the ego, and the bliss of awakening, the discourse flowing effortlessly from his mouth and hands and eyes. Ram Dass was brilliant—eloquent, intelligent, enlightening, and entertaining—a sit-down comedian telling stories about himself. At times, we would all close our eyes and meditate together, resting in the peace. At times, we would chant the names of God in mantric repetition leading to ecstasy.

This was all brand new to me. My mind eagerly soaked up the wisdom of India as my heart opened to the love flowing and the light of my soul began to awaken. Here was someone who could navigate all the levels of consciousness, from the most sublime to the most ridiculous. Here were people for whom God was a reality, a living reality! God is the love that abides in our hearts. God is the light that shines in our eyes and in our souls. God is the knowing that knows itself as truth.

Every morning Ram Dass would come out dressed in yogi white robes, sit under a huge tree, and hold forth endlessly on God, Guru, and Self; in this path, all are equivalent. He was like a TV talk show host whose perpetual guests were God, Maharaj-ji, and himself. But he was no pompous pundit perched on mounds of books and pontificating. He was continually telling illuminating stories of Maharaj-ji and divine wonders. Equally, he might be telling self-deprecating stories about the pitfalls and pratfalls of his own neurotic ego. Of course, we all have neurotic egos, so we could all identify with him, even though he didn’t tell stories about anyone else but himself.

I would think, Hey, if this schlub can love and be loved by God, maybe I can too. I feel bad about what a mess I am, but Ram Dass is no better off. Maybe there is hope after all.

He would say he had the gift of Saraswati, the goddess of speech and learning. He also called himself Rent-a-mouth (Ram). “Out of my mouth comes the most sublime wisdom and the most mundane bullshit and the frightening thing is that I can’t tell the difference between them in the moment.”

Ram Dass had the most amazing ability to connect with soul. He was not talking to me or at me—he was speaking inside me, inside my heart-mind, answering questions I had not yet even asked. He seemed to be speaking to the inner questions and needs of each person present—not exactly reading our minds, but close enough.

On Sundays, people would come from hundreds of miles around, as well as from Franklin, to hear him speak. He would begin by welcoming everyone and talking about the most ordinary things, about the strangeness of seeing young people with long hair and beards, about social and political issues, telling jokes, and only gradually easing into spiritual matters, becoming more and more refined. I saw that he was listening to his audience rather than talking to his audience, speaking to the most basic concerns first, attuning and harmonizing the hearts, seducing us all with the sparkle of divine love and light.

Ram Dass’s talks were always spontaneous, which was amazing enough in itself to an expert student like me, trained in research and the careful preparation of arguments, thoughts for presentation. In high school I had even gone as far as making extensive lists of what I wanted to talk to my girlfriends about so that I wouldn’t be caught unprepared. Ram Dass was the first person I had heard who talked without preparation, directly from inspiration.

He never had any notes and seemed to have no fixed agenda, speaking from heart to heart, from mind to mind, and yet he could hold forth endlessly and brilliantly, keeping us enraptured until he led us into the bliss of kirtan and the peace of meditation. I was astounded that he needed no notes to speak from, no books to back him up, although his talks were peppered with pungent quotes from holy beings.

About the spiritual journey he said, “If it’s not fun, I don’t want to go.”