Sacred Community Podcast

This Q&A from the 2025 Sacred Community Retreat contains a discussion on the final moments of Ram Dass's life, the events that led to the creation of Hanuman Maui, and ways to apply Ram Dass's teachings of Loving Awareness. Featuring Ram Dass caregivers Pavan Das and Sitaram Dass and joined by zander cole and Vasu jon Seskevich. 
We are sharing this now because Hanuman Maui has started a fundraising campaign to secure Ram Dass's home as a permanent sanctuary for future generations to come. 
Ram Dass’s Maui home has long been a place of satsang, service, spiritual practice, and loving awareness. Now, Hanuman Maui is under contract to purchase it. This is an opportunity to give the mission a permanent home, expand the people that can be served, and carry loving awareness forward for generations to come.
Learn more and donate to the campaign
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and Producer: Sitaram Dass
A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

This second Q&A from the 2025 Sacred Community Retreat features a discussion on acting with kindness and the creative tension between acceptance and ambition and how it intersects with our careers, artistic pursuits, and spiritual lives. It ends with a few Ram Dass stories for good measure. 
It also contains an in-depth discussion about cultural appropriation. This topic is a big one, and though the facilitators don't claim to offer any universal answers, as a group they explore the question from multiple viewpoints and cultural perspectives.
We are sharing it here because at SCP we don't shy away from systemic issues. In our retreat invocation we state, "We have come together to invoke the Sacred through our shared humanity. During this retreat, we each agree to attend to five things: ourselves, each other, the group, the world, and the shared Presence unifying it all. We do this as an act of devotion, knowing that God is manifest in all five." And, "We tend to the world by acknowledging we are not separate from collective sorrow, collective aid, or systemic influences associated with race, class, gender, sexuality, or ability."
Learn more about this year’s Sacred Community Retreat in British Columbia.
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and Producer: Sitaram Dass
A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

Connor Burns leads a 20-minute meditation using the Zen concept of "just sitting" as a doorway into accepting the moment with an open heart and being in "relationship with the vastness of reality." This guided meditation from the 2025 Sacred Community Retreat ends with an invitation to continue with your own walking meditation. 
Learn more about this year’s Sacred Community Retreat in British Columbia.
Connor Burns (he/him) is a psychotherapist (RCC) and holistic wellness advocate living in Vancouver, BC Canada. Connor's curiosity of the human condition started from a young age and has led to hundreds of hours of yoga and mindfulness trainings as well as over ten years of experience working with vulnerable populations and at-risk youth. In March 2025 Connor received Jukai from Roshi Joan Halifax at Upaya Zen Centre and was given the name Daitoku, meaning Great Devotion. Connor’s approach is integrative, somatic and attachment based, and influenced by his training with Dr. Gabor Maté's Compassionate Inquiry, Dr. Sue Johnson’s Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT) and Jon Kabat-Zinn's Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. Learn More at www.connorburns.ca IG: @connorburnscounselling
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host: Lakshmi Abrol
Producer: Sitaram Dass
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

In this satsang from the 2025 Sacred Community Retreat, Vasu Jon Seskevich teaches the essence of Hanuman, sings the Hanuman Chalisa in English, and shares stories of his time with Ram Dass.
This year's retreat is August 13-16th, and Vasu will be joining a "wisdom panel" with Dassima from Hanuman Maui to share lessons learned from their lifetime of spiritual practice and friendship with Ram Dass.  
Learn more about this year’s Sacred Community Retreat in British Columbia.
Jon Vasu Seskevich, a retired Registered Nurse, is a pioneering health professional in holistic healing, mind-body approaches and palliative care. He helped create Duke University Hospital's Stress Management Consult Team in 1989. In his clinical practice, he participated in NIH funded Mantra Meditation research and also had more than 40,000 hospital inpatient consults and taught hundreds of classes with staff. These skills and tools began and were nurtured by his ongoing friendship and mentorship with Ram Dass from 1975-2019. Learn more at: https://jonvasu.com/ 
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host: Lakshmi Abrol
Producer: Sitaram Dass
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

In this first Q&A from the 2025 Sacred Community Retreat, the facilitation team answers the question, "What does it mean to live spiritually and authentically in everyday life?" This episode features Lakshmi Abrol, Swapnil Abrol, Connor Burns, zander cole, Pavan Das, Sitaram Dass, and Beverly Hsu. 
Learn more about this year’s Sacred Community Retreat in British Columbia.
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

Noah Hoffeld chats with zander about music as a sacred path of listening and explores the intricacies of what it means to play improvisational cello in kirtan. He also discusses time spent with spiritual teachers such as Ram Dass, Krishna Das, and David Nichtern, and he expounds on the essence of Loving Awareness.  
Noah Hoffeld is a musician and meditation teacher known for his soulful cello playing and deep commitment to sharing the path of awakening. From 2016 until his teacher’s passing, he was a personal student of Ram Dass and, in 2016, while on retreat with RD at his home, he met and played with world renowned chant singer Krishna Das, becoming a member of his band. 
A Juilliard graduate, Noah has been featured in performance with artists such as Pete Seeger and Natalie Merchant, on Grammy-winning and Billboard #1 albums, films like The Skeleton Twins with Kristin Wiig and Bill Hader, and with his cello and piano duo Bodhiheart. His work as a producer includes Anubhav by Nina Rao and his own album of songs Mobile Home, coproduced with Mark Plati (Bowie, Prince, etc). Mobile Home addresses issues from climate change and spiritual awakening, to the promises and perils of falling in love. 
Wishing to pay it forward, Noah shares the heart-centered wisdom of his mentor Ram Dass with groups and individuals, along with the practices that help us to truly be here now. 
Follow @noahhoffeld or visit livingthepath.com
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
And join us at the fourth annual Sacred Community Retreat! https://sacredcommunityproject.org/salt-spring-summer-retreat
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski
 

"The dance of Krishna with the Gopis is a nectar-enriched tale that sparks delight from each turn of phrase. Every page is an Ambrosia-soaked rag, its absorbent capacity so overwhelmed it sweats honey; the slightest touch and Amrit rains down like a monsoon, watering the imagination and fermenting it with Nectar.
"It describes God, not as distant, punishing, or evenly placidly loving, but as Intimate Lover. Krishna is the All-Attractive Spell Caster from whom devotees swoon. It is said that many pleasures seem like nectar but turn into poison. With wisdom we learn to seek the medicines that taste like poison but turn out to be nectar. However, Krishna's Unadulterated Sweetness is the rare kind of pleasure that turns poison into nectar." — Sitaram Dass
In this episode, Sitaram Dass tells the story of Krishna and the Gopis, those gurus of devotion that dropped everything at the call of Krishna's flute. Accompanied by Swapnil Abrol on flute and recorded at the 2024 Sacred Community Retreat. This live track is featured on the album, Sacred Community Project Live (V.2). 
 
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
SCP works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org 
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski
"Rasa Lila Duet" (song): Sitaram Dass and Swapnil Abrol
 
Sacred Community Retreat: https://sacredcommunityproject.org/salt-spring-summer-retreat
 

This recorded audio meditation is from the 2024 Loving Rock Training. Sitaram Dass leads a heart-opening visualization of merging with a being of unconditional love. This meditation was from the module on Dream Logic, and it led to a discussion about how intention and imagination can open us to "non-ordinary states of consciousness."
Find out more about the upcoming Loving Rock Training program and register before March 1, 2026. The This 70-hour introductory course unfolds from March through September, and is designed for compassionate beings who see service as a core element of their spiritual path and feel called to deepen their ability to be a “loving rock” for themselves and others on their spiritual journeys.
Read more about the course or sign up here: https://sacredcommunityproject.org/loving-rock-training
Sitaram Dass (K. Sandin, LCSW) (he/him) spent several years serving his beloved teacher Ram Dass on Maui, where he was shown the path of Bhakti, the yoga of service and devotion to God. He is a kirtan singer, social worker, author, and spiritual counselor. As the director of the Sacred Community Project, he works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices. His book, From and for God, is an intimate and contemplative collection of writings on the spiritual path. Connect with Sitaram Dass at http://sitaramdass.com
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
Sacred Community Project works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org
 
Related Credits and Links
Podcast Host and A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

In this talk from the 2024 Loving Rock Training, Swapnil Abrol (he/him) shares his personal reflections from along the spiritual path. Starting from his first psychedelic experience, exploring different modalities of connection to being trained as a shaman, Swap offers insights on how to navigate alternate states of reality and integrate them into our everyday lives.
Find out more about the upcoming Loving Rock Training program and register before March 1, 2026. The This 70-hour introductory course unfolds from March through September, and is designed for compassionate beings who see service as a core element of their spiritual path and feel called to deepen their ability to be a “loving rock” for themselves and others on their spiritual journeys.
The twice a month classes support those who are committed to exploring and deepening their practice of being a loving rock, “So another person can push against you and pull against you, and you stay rooted in love” (Ram Dass).
Read more about the course or sign up here: https://sacredcommunityproject.org/loving-rock-training
Swapnil Abrol will be a guest teacher for the Dream Logic Module in the Advanced Course. He discovered the Bhakti tradition through a formal Amazonian shamanic apprenticeship. Through connecting with Maharajji, he found himself returning to his once neglected Hindu roots. Now following the path of Bhakti yoga, he deepens his practice through devotional musical expression. Also an active participant in the world of business, Swapnil enjoys learning new ways of bringing love and compassion into worldly situations.
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
SCP works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org 
 
Related Credits and Links
Host: Sitaram Dass
A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski

Bala Yancey and Nivay Sahaye sit down with zander to chat about the Just Love Forest Ashram. They discuss the journey of its founding and highlight themes of: Listening to the heart, fostering community, reverence, spiritual practice, death, green burials, stewarding, sovereignty, and communing with nature. 
Just Love Forest is a 716- acre conservation ashram in Poetry, GA that offers a unique blend of natural beauty, spiritual exploration, and ecological consciousness. In a time of constant noise, we enter the forest as a sanctuary and a teacher, returning more whole, more attuned, and more devoted.
Sitaram Dass will be leading a Loving Awareness weekend retreat with an optional week-long Forest Sadhana Immersion at Just Love on March 20th. Learn more at: https://www.justloveforest.com/iamlovingawareness  
Bala Is a meditation teacher, forest-therapy guide, and founder-steward of Just Love Forest Ashram in Poetry, GA. Trained in mindfulness with Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach and certified by the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy, he weaves together devotion, ecology, and lived practice.
Nivay is a steward of Just Love Forest, where he tends the land as both sanctuary and mirror for the inner journey. His path weaves devotion to Hanuman and Neem Karoli Baba with practices of surrender, honesty, and heart-centered living.
The Sacred Community Podcast is an inter-spiritual hub of the universal teachings, “Love, Service, Remembrance, and Truth.” Home to Sacred Community Project interviews, live workshop recordings, dharma talks, and meditations, each episode is carefully curated to ensure its alignment with SCP values.
SCP works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through free, donation-based, and affordable offerings, spiritual support, and prison outreach. Learn more and make a tax-deductible donation at: https://sacredcommunityproject.org 
 
Related Credits and Links
Just Love Forest: https://www.justloveforest.com
Podcast Host and A/V: zander cole
SCP Logo: Beverly Hsu
Podcast Intro Music: Carl Golembeski