गुरू ब्रह्मा गुरू विष्णु,गुरुदेवो महेश्वरा गुरु साक्षात परब्रह्म,तस्मै श्रीगुरुवे नमः
श्री राम जय राम जय जय राम
An American Saint
A western Yogi
Ram Dass was an American spiritual teacher who did not follow any particular religion in his early years. Ram Dass was born Richard Alpert in 1931. His parents were Gertrude (Levin) and George Alpert, a lawyer in Boston, USA. He considered himself an atheist during his early life. After gaining a PhD in psychology from ‘Stanford University,’ he served as an assistant professor of psychology at ‘Harvard University.’ At ‘Harvard,’ he came into contact with Timothy Leary, with whom he carried out extensive research on the effects of hallucinogenic drugs such as LSD. He was dismissed from ‘Harvard’ due to the controversial nature of his work. His quest for spirituality took him to India, where he met Neem Karoli Baba, whom he later adopted as his guru. His guru gave him the name “Ram Dass,” meaning “servant of God” and had a lasting influence on his life. Ram Dass founded the ‘Hanuman Foundation,’ which initiated the ‘Prison-Ashram Project.’ The project encouraged convicts to turn to meditation and spirituality. He was also a co-founder of various other foundations, such as the ‘Living/Dying Project’ in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which helped people to die consciously. He suffered a stroke that left him with expressive aphasia, which he attributes to the will of God. In his later days, he lived in Maui, an island in Hawaii, where he conducted retreats and preaches through the internet.