Anne Lamott, Raghu Markus, and RamDev reveal that letting go of how life should be opens the door to compassion, healing, and contentment with reality.

This Dharma Session was recorded at the December 2025 Ram Dass Open Your Heart in Paradise Retreat. Learn about upcoming community events HERE.

This week on Mindrolling, Raghu, Anne, and RamDev hold a talk on:

• Standing in presence with change and impermanence
• Ram Dass’ eye-opening story of a farmer and his son 
• How investing in that which changes leads to suffering
• Collective healing through all the grief in the world 
• The negative emotions that arise when we resist change
• Creating an intimate, compassionate relationship with the sense of loss
• Anne’s experiences of radicalizing change in her own life
• Wise Hope: taking leaps of faith and hoping that things will work out as they should

About Anne Lamott:

Anne Lamott is the New York Times best-selling author of many books, including collections of essays, novels, and long-form non-fiction, including the classic writing manual Bird by Bird and child-rearing memoir Operating Instructions. In addition to being a novelist and nonfiction writer, Lamott is also a progressive political activist, public speaker, and writing teacher. Keep up with Anne on Instagram.

“It's very hard to be human here; it's scary. I feel like Cindy-Lou Who sometimes, like this tiny little being. ‘Be still my heart and wait without hope’–what I hope is that things will sort out the way they should for the common welfare.” - Anne Lamott

About RamDev:

RamDev Dale Borglum is the founder and Executive Director of The Living/Dying Project. He is a pioneer in the conscious dying movement and has worked directly with thousands of people with life-threatening illness and their families for over 30 years. In 1981, Dale founded the first residential facility for people who wished to die consciously in the United States, The Dying Center. He has taught and lectured extensively on the topics of spiritual support for those with life-threatening illness, on caregiving as a spiritual practice, and on healing at the edge, the edge of illness, of death, of loss, of crisis. Check out RamDev’s podcast, Healing at the Edge, on the Be Here Now Network.

Learn more about The Living/Dying Project at livingdying.org

“When we’re in the heart, it gives us the possibility of being with grief and change in a way that leads to healing. There is a profoundly wonderful line by Rumi where he says ‘grief is the garden of compassion.” –RamDev

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