Mindrolling Ep 372

As we crest the anniversary of Ram Dass leaving his body, Sharon Salzberg visits Raghu to share stories about Ram Dass and his amazing capacity to both give and receive love.

“Perhaps no other teacher has sparked the fires of as many spiritual seekers in the West.” Preorder Being Ram Dass & share what Ram Dass means to you. 

Journey to India: The Pretense of Accident

With a burning desire to learn how to meditate, but no avenues to due so in school at the University at Buffalo, Sharon levied to create an independent study program which allowed her to go to India to learn meditation from the source of the practice. Key advice from Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche blessed her departure, which intuitively led Sharon to Goenka’s Vipassana retreat in Bodhgaya where she would first meet Ram Dass and the Maharajji satsang – all by following the ‘pretense of accident.’

“I wrote out the question, ‘I’m leaving for India to learn how to meditate, do you have any suggestions on where to go?’ [Trungpa Rinpoche] pulled my question out, read it out loud, was silent for a moment, and then said, ‘I think you had perhaps best follow the pretense of accident.” – Sharon Salzberg