Jessica Stover  0:09  
This recording is an offering of Networks for Training and Development's Online University.

Rosa McAllister  0:23  
Hi, everyone, this is Rosa McAllister of Networks for Training and Development. And it's our monthly Healing Circle Call time. And here we are the beginning of another new year. It's January 6, I think, 2020 Oh my goodness, just saying those words. That word. That number 2020. That year. Seems unbelievable to me.

Rosa McAllister  0:51  
Every time I write it, every time I say it, I just keep saying oh my, oh my goodness. It seems so big. It seems so powerful, it seems so futuristic. And I must say, it feels important. It feels plentiful. It feels possible. It feels hopeful, I really believe. 

Rosa McAllister  1:16  
So like we always do on the first Monday of the month at 8pm Eastern time, we gather together sometimes it's me, sometimes it's one of our other compatriots at Networks. And we lead just about 15 to 20 minute, little time together, to breathe, to be together and to help remember that we are not alone. 

Rosa McAllister  1:40  
Maybe it's meditation, maybe it's an exercise, maybe a song or a poem that we share with one another. Maybe some things about celestial happenings, things in the sky or things in our world. Or maybe it's just time to remember that we are not alone, that we are here together and that we can breathe with one another. 

Rosa McAllister  2:02  
And just this time together sometimes helps make things seem more palatable or more possible, or that we can get through it. So we recently have shared an amazing time, amazing holiday season, end of one year and the end of a decade actually, and the start of this new amazing year of 2020. 

Rosa McAllister  2:31  
And not surprisingly big events have shaped us or have happened in this world. Some very startling and negative and scary and some very positive and wonderful. 

Rosa McAllister  2:45  
And one of the big events that has happened in my world here in Maui, that has also affected many other people in many other locations, is the passing of an icon. 

Rosa McAllister  2:56  
The passing of a dear heart, the passing of a teacher and an incredible soul, Ram Dass.

Rosa McAllister  3:04  
I um, I have been a student of Ram Dass for over 40 years. I first knew of him in the early 70s, not long after he put out his first book, Be Here Now. 

Rosa McAllister  3:20  
I was in college, actually, I was in high school when that book came out, but I really didn't run into it until after I went to college. And there was a great little bookstore that had all kinds of wonderful things, teas and food and areas to sit and all kinds of books about philosophy, about life, about mysticism, about spirituality. And one of the books that was there that I came across, very early on in around 1974  '73 excuse me, was Be Here Now... that beautiful blue paperback book.

Rosa McAllister  4:02  
I visualize it so easily with drawings and sayings and magic inside. And it was that book amongst a few others that really helped me to open up to who I truly was and what I was seeking and what I was trying to find both within myself and in the world. 

Rosa McAllister  4:25  
So here I was a freshman at college at Kutztown State College, now Kutztown University in Central Pennsylvania. And it was a very artsy college, very, had the brand new co-ed dorm had just opened. 

Rosa McAllister  4:41  
Students were out and about always playing frisbee and music happening and it was just a little past the "era of love" and San Francisco and Haight-Ashbury.  Grateful Dead were still very, very popular.

Rosa McAllister  4:56  
And it was my first experience really being away from home. And I loved it. 

Rosa McAllister  5:03  
And right after I got to college, right after I got to Kutztown in my freshman year, I found a wonderful group of friends and one in particular, who was from the from New York area, New York State and was from the Woodstock area.

Rosa McAllister  5:23  
And not terribly far from there was where Ram Dass had had his kind of rambling, crash pad home.

Rosa McAllister  5:35  
And we heard through the grapevine that Ram Dass was back in in New York. It was late 1973, early 1974. I don't remember the exact time and a few of us decided to go on an adventure or a road trip to try to find Ram Dass. 

Rosa McAllister  5:52  
He had just come back from India where he had been studying and his life had changed dramatically. 

Rosa McAllister  6:00  
So we ventuterd up to New York on this wild adventure, just a few of us, three of us. And we found him, we found Ram Dass and spent much time in his company. 

Rosa McAllister  6:14  
And it was one of those amazing turning points in my life where I found someone who was speaking my language, and that I wanted to learn from and study from.

Rosa McAllister  6:29  
We stayed with Ram Dass for several days and, and some of his followers in that area and then came back to school came back to Pennsylvania. 

Rosa McAllister  6:39  
And not long after, we kept in touch with Ram Dass and some of his followers and he came to Pennsylvania, and he came and spoke at an area not far from our college and of course, we went and had time with him again, personal time with him.

Rosa McAllister  6:54  
And two friends of mine, who were "interracial" and very much in love, asked him if he would marry them. And so we did. 

Rosa McAllister  7:04  
And so one beautiful afternoon in a big field of wheat and flowers, wild flowers, with music of all kinds of sorts of friends with guitars and recorders and all of that. They got married with Ram Dass blessing them officiating. And all of us dancing and drinking wine and having a beautiful afternoon. 

Rosa McAllister  7:30  
I kind of lost touch with Ram Dass for a few years. [I] kept up with him via his books and things like that. There were a couple of events where I saw him, big, large public events. But while I still felt a very deep connection to him, it wasn't as personal a connection as my life kind of meandered on. I got married. I had a son.

Rosa McAllister  7:59  
I was working at a number of different places and a number of different things in the disability field, and then I landed at Temple University in Philadelphia. And we started an amazing project on Personal Futures Planning, a style of person centered planning, it was late 1980s, 1989, to be exact 1990.

Rosa McAllister  8:20  
And we had, I had convinced finally, Beth Mount from rural Georgia now living in New York to help us out with this project. And Beth came to Philadelphia to get us started, and she was very newly pregnant, just found out she was pregnant.

Rosa McAllister  8:39  
And interestingly enough, not long after that, or just before that, she confided in me that she had gotten married, and who had officiated her wedding but Ram Dass. 

Rosa McAllister  8:52  
He was a friend of her now husband, who had done a documentary on him and it really brought things back to me. I pulled back out Ram Dass' books that I had and went and got a few more and really reconnected with him. 

Rosa McAllister  9:10  
It made sense with the work that we were doing in Personal Futures Planning and person centered planning to reconnect with someone who was so important who was such a foundation in my earlier years, but also who was such a soul connection to me.

Rosa McAllister  9:29  
Time went on, and I moved to Maui. And while I knew that Ram Dass was here I had no idea the connection that would grow. 

Rosa McAllister  9:40  
I was very, very, very fortunate to be in his company oftentimes here on Maui at various events, go to his house, be with him, help him at the beach to get in the water. 

Rosa McAllister  9:52  
He had suffered a major stroke. And for a number of years, his speech was almost inaudible was very, very difficult, very delayed. He had great trouble finding words. 

Rosa McAllister  10:04  
But over time, it seemed the more he sunk into and realized that this was his way of life now and the quieter that he became, the more his voice came back to him in many ways.

Rosa McAllister  10:19  
I have several incredible experiences with Ram Dass that I remember greatly in the past 10 years.

Rosa McAllister  10:28  
Times where just being in his company, I was once again awakened to things stirring deep within me.

Rosa McAllister  10:36  
I also have a few personal contacts and anecdotes with Ram Dass, some very funny, he had a very, very silly side to him, and oftentimes made jokes at his own expense.

Rosa McAllister  10:51  
He was a lovely man, an incredible man. And he's left us with many, many lessons many, many great things.

Rosa McAllister  11:00  
I have a number of quotes of Ram Dass' that I have here with me, some of which I'd like to read to you. Some of my favorites. 

Rosa McAllister  11:09  
Probably the one that's most famous now, especially after his death, is when he said "We're all just walking each other home." 

Rosa McAllister  11:19  
He knew that he was dying. He almost died several different times. He was not well, had several different health issues, and was at peace with that... was completely at peace with that. 

Rosa McAllister  11:30  
He also another quote from him, he also said "The next message you need is always right where you are."  

Rosa McAllister  11:39  
Some more that I'll read to you "Our interactions with one another reflected dance between love and fear."  

Rosa McAllister  11:48  
"The quieter you become, the more you can hear."  

Rosa McAllister  11:54  
"The most exquisite paradox... as soon as you give it all up, you can have it all. As long as you want power, you can't have it. The minute you don't want power, power, you'll have more than you ever dreamt possible."  

Rosa McAllister  12:07  
"I would like my life to be a statement of love and compassion, and where it isn't that's where my work lies." 

Rosa McAllister  12:18  
 "Be here now."  

Rosa McAllister  12:23  
Probably one of my most favorite quotes of all time of Ram Dass is "Treat everyone you meet, like God in drag."  

Rosa McAllister  12:36  
"Suffering is part of our training program for becoming wise." 

Rosa McAllister  12:42  
 "What you meet in another being is the projection of your own level of evolution."

Rosa McAllister  12:48  
 "Only that in you which is in me, can hear what I'm saying."   

Rosa McAllister  12:55  
I'll read that again. "Only that in you which is me, can hear what I'm saying."  

Rosa McAllister  13:04  
And "When we see the beloved in each person, it's like walking through a garden watching flowers bloom all around us." 

Rosa McAllister  13:15  
And one of my favorite memories, one just not too terribly long ago, I was in Ram Dass' company, and he called me over as he kind of waved gently, and I knelt beside him, he sitting in his wheelchair, and I knelt beside him and he kind of motioned for me to put my head on his lap. And so as I put my head on his left leg, he rubbed my hair, my head, and he asked me why I was why I was so sad. 

Rosa McAllister  13:52  
I told him a little bit about what was going on in my life, and some confusion and some unsuredness that I had.  And yes, definitely some sadness that I had.

Rosa McAllister  14:04  
His response was "Rose Rosy (as he called me), it's all love. Just love. Especially when it hurts."

Rosa McAllister  14:20  
I nodded my head.  He patted my hand. He kissed my hand, and I kissed his, and I thanked him.

Rosa McAllister  14:32  
Yep, he's right. It is all love, just love, especially when it hurts. 

Rosa McAllister  14:40  
So, there are so many lessons from Ram Dass. I once called him my guru many many many years ago and he chastised me. He reminded me that I am my own guru, and no one else and so instead, I have called him my Baba, my father, my guide, my teacher. 

Rosa McAllister  15:06  
So to my baba, Baba Ram Dass, and to all the teachers out there who have blessed me in my life and who continue to come forward as I need them... thank you, mahalo, gracias, suksma, tak. Thank you in so many ways for seeing in me what sometimes I couldn't see. For believing in me when sometimes I couldn't believe and for showing me that it really is all love, just love, and sometimes especially when it hurts. 

Rosa McAllister  15:46  
So thank you for joining us on this first Monday of January, the first Monday of this new year, the first Monday of this new decade.  

Rosa McAllister  15:59  
May it be amazing in so many ways.  May it be full of love. May you see your light and may you shine it bright so that others can see theirs. 

Rosa McAllister  16:12  
Aloha. Talk to you again, next Monday or next month excuse me, the first Monday of the month 8pm Eastern time. Aloha.

Jessica Stover  16:28  
Thank you for listening. We hope the information provided was helpful. Don't forget to stop by our website and take advantage of all we have to offer.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai