Ram Dass — Bridge Between Worlds

An icebreaker

A Harvard psychologist ran psychedelic research with a colleague until they were both fired in 1963, then traveled to India, met a teacher who renamed him, and returned to write a book that shaped how a generation understood meditation and presence.

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Could losing a prestigious job be the start of a real change?
What draws people to teachers who ask for so little proof?
How would a serious illness change what you'd want to teach others?
Does a life have to be tidy to be meaningful?

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Worth knowing · 1 of 5

What was his role at Harvard, and how did it end?

As a psychology professor, he ran the Harvard Psilocybin Project with a colleague starting in 1960, giving psychedelics to students and volunteers. Harvard fired him in 1963 for giving psilocybin to an undergraduate off campus.

Worth knowing · 2 of 5

What happened when he went to India?

In 1967 he met a teacher in India who gave him a new spiritual name meaning 'servant of God.' The meeting reoriented him away from drugs as the point and toward meditation and devotion as a daily practice.

Worth knowing · 3 of 5

What is 'Be Here Now,' and why did it matter?

Published in 1971, it mixed his own story, teachings, and hand-drawn pages into a single unconventional book. It introduced many Western readers to Eastern meditation and 'presence' in plain, accessible language, and became a lasting bestseller.

Worth knowing · 4 of 5

What happened to him in 1997?

He had a severe stroke that left him partly paralyzed and with expressive aphasia, a difficulty producing speech. He relearned to speak and continued teaching and writing for another two decades, describing the stroke itself as part of his teaching.

Worth knowing · 5 of 5

What did his later work focus on?

He kept teaching on aging, service, and dying, co-founding organizations that supported the terminally ill and people in prison, and continued public talks and writing into his eighties from Maui, where he lived after the stroke.

Words to know

Harvard Psilocybin ProjectA 1960s research program studying psilocybin's psychological effects, run by him and a colleague until their dismissal.

Expressive aphasiaDifficulty producing speech or language, despite understanding it, often following a stroke affecting specific brain regions.

Be Here NowHis 1971 book blending memoir, teaching, and illustration that introduced many Western readers to meditation practice.

More words

GuruA teacher within Hindu and yogic tradition; the term he used for Neem Karoli Baba, the teacher who renamed him.

A voice · 1 of 3

Ram Dass · Psychologist turned spiritual teacher

After his 1963 dismissal from Harvard and a 1967 meeting with a teacher in India who renamed him, he wrote 'Be Here Now' (1971) and spent decades afterward teaching meditation and presence, later describing his 1997 stroke as part of that teaching.

A voice · 2 of 3

Timothy Leary · Colleague fired alongside him from Harvard

As co-director of the Harvard Psilocybin Project, he ran the same research program and was dismissed from Harvard in the same year, for separate conduct, and the two remained linked in the public account of that research's collapse.

A voice · 3 of 3

Stephen Levine · Collaborator on death-and-dying work

Working with the Hanuman Foundation, he directed the Dying Project from around 1980, offering counseling and guidance to dying people and their families, work built out of a teaching on conscious dying he shared with Ram Dass.