Overcoming Blunder-Filled Thinking

For those of you who may not be familiar with Ram Dass, in the late 1960’s he helped shape the awakening conscious of an entire generation with his bestseller Be Here Now. One of his stories is the one he tells about an early encounter with Neem Karoli Baba, his guru in India. Ram Dass brought some capsules with him to India that were designed to dramatically alter one’s state of consciousness. Neem Karoli Baba confronted Ram Dass about these pills and asked him to give all of them to him. Ram Dass thought that he’d brought a long-term supply of this very powerful psychedelic substance-yet he watched in horror ad amazement as this enlightened being swallowed all of them right before his eyes, with no visible reaction. His guru then asked him if he had any more, since these obviously weren’t working. After telling this story, Ram Dass concluded with one of his most sagacious observations: “If you’re already in Detroit,” he observed, “then you don’t have to take a bus to get there.”