The Human Experience · Episode

Episode 38 – Raghu Markus

A conversation with Raghu Markus

RAGHU MARKUS has been involved in music and transformational media since the early 1970s when he was program director of CKGM-FM in Montreal. In 1974 he collaborated with Ram Dass on the box set Love Serve…

Published
June 22, 2015
Runtime
29:38
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RAGHU MARKUS has been involved in music and transformational media since the early 1970s when he was program director of CKGM-FM in Montreal. In 1974 he collaborated with Ram Dass on the box set Love Serve Remember. In 1990 he launched Triloka Records and Karuna Music in Los Angeles, California. Triloka established itself as a critical leader in the development of world music and for 17 years was home to such artists as Krishna Das, Hugh Masekela, Walela, Jai Uttal and transformational media projects that featured Ram Dass, Deepak Chopra, and Les Nubians. He is currently the Executive Director of the Love Serve Remember Foundation and has been an associate producer for on-line and television events for Ram Dass and Oprah Winfrey as well as Eckhart Tolle.

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In this episode we cover some of the aspects of the human condition (suffering) the various teachings of ram dass, raghu’s personal story and how we can better move through life using a daily practice such as meditation and having gratitude.

FIND TRANSRIPT HERE 

Mindpod Network is a podcast network and website featuring a close family of teachers  who met in India in the early 70’s during their spiritual quest; Ram Dass, Jack Kornfield, Lama Surya Das, Krishna Das, Sharon Salzberg  and the Mindrollers , David Silver and Raghu Markus. Help Mindpod Network provide a path to spiritual growth, connectedness and inspiration. They’re doing some fundraising for their network and they have 7 days left to make it, check that out here:  http://bit.ly/supportMPN

Mindpod Network: http://www.mindpodnetwork.com/

Ram Dass: https://www.ramdass.org/

A big thanks to Raghu for his time/presence on the show Music: Bassnectar – into the sun

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Transcript

A full transcript has been published for this conversation.

Click here for transcript

Ideas worth returning to

Quotes

Five substantial excerpts from the published transcript, lightly edited for clarity without changing their meaning.

  1. “As a teenager, music and psychedelics gave me experiences I interpreted as transcendent and transformational. They suggested that life extended beyond the ordinary senses, mind, and ego. When Ram Dass appeared, he gave language to those intuitions while speaking honestly about his own failures, making spiritual teaching feel human rather than remote.”
    From the conversation
  2. “Ram Dass became an extraordinary ambassador for unconditional love, but loving ourselves without judgment is difficult, especially in Western culture. The practice begins by noticing the voice that divides experience into success and failure and learning not to confuse that voice with the whole of who we are.”
    From the conversation
  3. “A genuine experience of presence can create trust that another way of being is available—one radically different from ordinary mental activity. That glimpse is only the beginning. It has to be followed by a practice that develops the capacity to return, relate to the experience, and carry it into daily life.”
    From the conversation
  4. “Meditation is not a complete solution to life; it is a method for finding ground from which the mind does not take over entirely. It remains part of my daily routine, but practice alone cannot supply meaning, relationship, ethics, or action. Those dimensions must also be cultivated.”
    From the conversation
  5. “The Buddha begins with suffering, but practice can change our relationship to it. Difficulty may contribute to freedom from the habits of mind and emotion. When Ram Dass said he loved suffering because it brought him closer to God, he was not praising pain itself; he was describing a vantage point from which even pain could become part of awakening.”
    From the conversation

About the guest

Raghu Markus

RAGHU MARKUS has been involved in music and transformational media since the early 1970s when he was program director of CKGM-FM in Montreal. In 1974 he collaborated with Ram Dass on the box set Love Serve Remember. In 1990 he launched Triloka Records and Karuna Music in Los Angeles, California. Triloka established itself as a critical leader in the development of world music and for 17 years was home to such artists as Krishna Das, Hugh Masekela, Walela, Jai Uttal and transformational media projects that featured Ram Dass, Deepak Chopra, and Les Nubians. He is currently the Executive Director of the Love Serve Remember Foundation and has been an associate producer for on-line and television events for Ram Dass and Oprah Winfrey as well as Eckhart Tolle.

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