Polishing the Mirror: How to Live from Your Spiritual Heart Author: Visit Amazon's Ram Dass Page | Language: English | ISBN:
1622033809 | Format: PDF
Polishing the Mirror: How to Live from Your Spiritual Heart Description
Review
‘‘Ram Dass is a superb writer. His example of gentleness and loving compassion is infused with profound wisdom of the heart and mind, a welcome sense of humor and a savvy effectiveness in the real world.”—San Francisco Chronicle
“This collection of teachings by Ram Dass (author of Be Here Now), one of the United States’ most famous spiritual seekers, is surprisingly fresh and accessible more than 40 years after the psychedelic psychologist first wrote about consciousness expansion through LSD. His willingness to admit his own mistakes and turn them into lessons for personal growth is refreshing, and allows readers to see themselves in his story.” —Publishers Weekly
“Ram Dass has been polishing the mirror of his heart for decades. Now 82 years old, he has the process down pat. For those negotiating this process, Polishing the Mirror offers an eclectic tool kit…. His message, as clear as it has always been and delivered with his inimitable humor, does not deviate much from the original words of wisdom he received from his guru, Neem Karoli Baba, many years ago: ‘Love everyone and tell the truth.’”
—Tricycle Magazine
“Considering his long-standing advice to ‘be here now,’ the spiritual author and teacher
Ram Dass has always been ahead of his time . . . . Polishing the Mirror brings a light tone to recapping the lessons learned, wisdom gained, love realized, and new challenges awaiting as the end of this life nears.”
—Spirituality & Health Magazine
About the Author
Ram Dass means “Servant of God.” Born Richard Alpert, Ram Dass is the founder of the Love Serve Remember Foundation and a cofounder the Seva Foundation, the Dying Project, and the Prison Ashram Project. He is the author of the worldwide spiritual classic Be Here Now and many other books. For more information, visit ramdass.org. Rameshwar Das is a writer and photographer who met Ram Dass in 1967. Ramesh has collaborated with Ram Dass on many projects, most recently as coauthor of Be Love Now.
- Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Sounds True; 1 edition (September 1, 2014)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1622033809
- ISBN-13: 978-1622033805
- Product Dimensions: 1 x 6 x 9 inches
- Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Baby Boomers know Ram Dass as an American celebrity from the 1960s who came back from India in 1971 to publish a strange square-shaped book: Be Here Now. Some call that book "the Baby Boomers' Bible"--and there is a good argument behind such a claim. It wasn't until the era of Be Here Now that millions of Americans could immerse themselves in full-scale Asian spirituality and the rest of the world's spiritual diversity.
Since its debut, Be Here Now has racked up a stunning total of 2 million copies sold--and counting. Ram Dass has built on his original message in 11 additional books, a series of audio recordings, documentary films and short videos. Ram Dass also is famous for his 1978 establishment of the Seva Foundation, a highly respected charity that primarily focuses on curing illnesses of the eye in Asia, Africa and Native American communities.
Then, in 1997, Ram Dass made headlines once again for suffering a devastating stroke. As Baby Boomers, we were confronting our own looming mortality as we watched this perennially smiling genie of the `60s utterly humbled by his own body. As Ram Dass puts it himself: "I went from driving my sports car wherever I wanted to go--to being a passenger."
Now, flash forward 16 years to 2013 and in the opening pages of his newest book, Ram Dass briefly retells the dramatic story that many Baby Boomers know so well: As a rising star in the Harvard faculty, 30-something psychologist Dr. Richard Alpert teamed up with psychologist Dr. Timothy Leary. Ram Dass understates their titanic collision: "Meeting Tim was a major turning point in my life." No kidding!
Polishing the Mirror could've been called Polishing the Paradox, it's so wholeheartedly devoted to cherishing the impossible possibilities of life while fearlessly inviting the inscrutable potential of death, which to Ram Dass is simply "another moment." I think Ram Dass's platform - that of spiritually intrepid westerner transformed into eastern spiritual exemplar - remains, if no longer unique, then uniquely compelling. The authenticity of his personal transformation, his forty-odd years of devotion to loving everybody, serving everybody and remembering God, (the dharma bestowed upon him by his guru), his disarmingly ambitionless ambition, charming anecdotal humor, approachable scholarship and engaging, open-hearted personality, are to be beheld afresh in this elegant spiritual summary and approachable guidebook. I'm comforted and perplexed by his adventurous faith and spiritual courage, by the manner in which, like a child, he abides in and anticipates wonder, finding it - the unremote grace of it - in the pleasure perhaps of a big breakfast, a day at the beach and equally, in the incalculable mystery of suffering or in the "presence of Truth" he enjoys through his work with the dying. The book is invitingly wise, patient and compassionate, adeptly constructed upon Ram Dass's three-legged yogic foot stool of choice - a careful blending of the Bhakti, Jhana and Karma schools. It allays the suffering of our condition while never diminishing its imperative for self work.
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