Duncan Trussell Family Hour – Episode 724: RamDev (Dale Borglum)

Release Date: November 18, 2025

Episode Overview

In this deeply moving and practical conversation, Duncan Trussell sits down once again with RamDev (Dale Borglum), founder of the Living/Dying Project, devoted meditator, and longtime associate of Ram Dass. The episode offers an exploration of confronting fear, suffering, grief, and death with compassion, awareness, and conscious presence. RamDev uses his experience in working with the dying to provide listeners with guidance on living and dying without fear. The discussion interweaves personal anecdotes, spiritual insights, and practical meditation guidance, making this one of Duncan's “favorite episodes in a long time.”

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Modern Experience of Aging and Death

• [02:09] RamDev shares personal stories about aging, surviving cancer, and his “meditation accident” leading to a hip replacement.
• Medical advancements: RamDev notes how modern healthcare prolongs vitality, allowing people to “peak in their 80s.”
• The relationship between body and mind: Pain, injuries, and bodily discomfort become valuable teachers on the spiritual path.

Pain, Suffering, and Presence

• [05:12] RamDev: Differentiates between bodily pain and suffering, noting that while pain is "mandatory," suffering is "optional."
• Meditation as training for dying: Learning to be present with discomfort – not running from it – prepares one for the ultimate letting go.

“The mind is so manipulative... But the body's telling the truth.” – RamDev [05:12]

Fear of Death as Root of all Fear

• [09:09] RamDev: “All fear is fundamentally fear of death. And fear of death is exactly the place where you're not enlightened.”
• By investigating this fear, spiritual practitioners move towards awakening.
• Moment-to-moment death: It's not just about literal death; every moment is an opportunity to let go and find presence.

Anxiety, Parenting, and the Inner Critic

• [15:49] Duncan: Shares his struggles with anxiety, especially as a parent, highlighting the real-life application of spiritual practices in the midst of daily challenges.
• [24:23] RamDev acknowledges the reality of such suffering and describes the chakras as stages: fear, guilt, shame, with the heart as the gateway to deeper wisdom.
• Emphasizes the healing power of self-compassion and the need to recognize patterns rooted in early childhood.

Meditation Techniques and “Pointing Out the Mind”

• [53:52] RamDev leads listeners through a brief “beingness” awareness meditation:

  “Your job right now is all you need to do is listen to the sound of my voice... Is it easier to notice a beingness, an awakeness that's harder to notice when we're listening and talking and moving?” [54:02]

• Highlights the simplicity but not the ease of resting in “beingness”; ego resists this because it temporarily disappears in that spaciousness.

Pain vs. Suffering

• [27:05] RamDev: Using a story of refusing anesthesia at the dentist, he demonstrates how presence can dissolve suffering even when pain is present.

“Pain is mandatory. Suffering is optional.” — RamDev [27:13]

• Enlightenment does not remove pain or life's challenges; it changes our relationship to them.

Life is “Hopeless” - In a Good Way

• [29:37] RamDev: Shares a Buddhist teaching that “life is hopeless,” meaning this moment is as it is—and wishing it was any different amplifies suffering.
• [31:04] Duncan: References culture (“As Good As It Gets”) to underline the liberation found in dropping the quest for “something better.”

Opening the Heart: The Role of Grief

• [78:00] RamDev: Explains the heart chakra’s “demon” is grief; past losses make it hard to open up.

“Grief dares us to love again. We've loved before and we've gotten really hurt.” – RamDev [82:25]

• Compassion is a blend of sadness and joy—one can feel deep sorrow and an open, joyful heart at the same time.

Collective & Personal Suffering

• RamDev details that suffering is not about circumstances, but our relationship to them, using examples of people stuck in traffic or enduring societal crises.
• [96:22] RamDev: Urges that both individually and collectively, acknowledgment of suffering (not denial, escapism, or reactivity) is prerequisite for authentic healing and transformation.

Politics, Fear, and the Global Crisis

• The conversation expands to viewing political divisiveness, the environmental crisis, and social unrest as rooted in unprocessed collective grief and fear.
• Working directly with our own fear and grief is framed as “the most direct thing you can do” towards real change.

“Our society is grieving, the planet is grieving in a certain way... There's an underground sense of grief, that there's not a sense of connection, that there's us and them, there's separation.” — RamDev [89:25 – 90:00]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the real purpose of living/dying work:

  “Conscious dying is really kind of a scam because it's only conscious living applied to this one thing.” – RamDev [106:21]

• On the power of meditation to change your life (and sex life):

  “Maybe you should write a book about getting better sexual partners through meditation.” – Duncan [15:27, joking]

• On spiritual bypassing:

  “A common misperception is that we can kind of... start at the heart level. You've got to go back to the beginning.” – RamDev [63:55]

• On the reality of civilization’s impermanence:

  “Civilizations collapse inevitably. And so since we know that, at least we can say if our civilization as we know it is collapsing. This isn't abnormal at all. It's just part of what happens.” – Duncan [99:32]

• On the necessity of both compassion and perspective:

  “Can I be there in a very caring, compassionate, loving, human way and yet not lose that knowing... that this is all taking place in part of wholeness, that there's nothing wrong here, and somebody's dying and somebody's suffering both at the same time.” – RamDev [65:00]

• On societal shadow:

  “Suffering is not caused by external circumstances. Suffering is caused by our relationship with external circumstances.” – RamDev [40:58]

Meditation Exercise Segment

• Pointing Out the Mind [53:52–57:16]:
  • RamDev guides Duncan and the listeners through a brief instruction in direct awareness, observing the space in the gap between words and breaths, inviting a direct experience of beingness.

    “Is there anything you can do to make it be there? Is there anything you can do to make it go away? Or is it, in fact, that awakeness, that beingness, that is our true nature?” – RamDev [54:37]

Timestamps for Major Segments

• [01:37] Catch up & modern aging
• [05:12] Pain, meditation, and presence
• [09:09] “All fear is the fear of death”
• [15:49] Duncan’s anxiety as a parent; suffering & daily life
• [24:23] The chakras: fear, guilt, shame, heart
• [27:05] Pain vs. suffering explained
• [29:37] “Life is hopeless” teaching
• [46:56] Deepest healing: merging with wholeness
• [53:52] “Pointing out the mind” meditation
• [78:00] Grief and the open heart
• [89:25] The world’s unrecognized grief
• [96:22] Lessons from hospice, illness, and societal crisis
• [103:18] Fear of death as the engine of divisiveness
• [106:21] Living Dying Project info & upcoming offerings

Resources & Living/Dying Project

• RamDev’s website: livingdying.org
  • Offers resources, workshops, support groups (in person & online), and volunteer hospice training.
  • Free materials on conscious dying and living.
  • Upcoming book: How to Live So You Can Die Without Fear.
• RamDev’s Podcast: Available via Living Dying Project.

Conclusion

This conversation masterfully links the concrete realities of fear, suffering, grief, and death with the spiritual possibilities of compassion, presence, and transformation—emphasizing that the work of conscious dying is, in truth, the work of conscious living. Listeners are invited to examine their own pain, grief, and anxiety as universal human experiences and to meet them not with avoidance but with presence and self-compassion.

Final thought:
“Can we fully admit our humanity? There's somebody with all this neurotic stuff, but it's contextualized and contained in the vastness of who we are. They're both going on at the same time.” – RamDev [65:00]

To learn more or get involved, visit livingdying.org for workshops, support, resources, and information.