Alan Watts Quotes - Page 17

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• We must see that consciousness is neither an isolated soul nor the mere function of a single nervous system, but of that totality of interrelated stars and galaxies which makes a nervous system possible.

  Alan Watts

  Stars, Soul, Consciousness

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• But, as Douglas E Harding has pointed out, we tend to think of this planet as a life-infested rock, which is as absurd as thinking of the human body as a cell infested skeleton. Surely all forms of life, including man, must be understood as "symptoms" of the earth, the solar system, and the galaxy in which case we cannot escape the conclusion that the galaxy is intelligent.

  Alan Watts

  Men, Thinking, Intelligent

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• The whole process of nature is an integrated process of immense complexity and it is really impossible to tell whether something that happens in it is good or bad. Because you never know what will be the consequences of the misfortune. Or, you never know what will be the consequences of good fortune.

  Alan Watts

  Impossible, Process, Fortune

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• The Universe is the game of the self, which plays hide and seek forever and ever.

  Alan Watts

  Self, Games, Play

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• People become concerned with being more humble than other people.

  Alan Watts

  Humble, People, Concerned

  Alan Watts (2010). “Still the Mind: An Introduction to Meditation”, p.43, New World Library

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• Your body does not eliminate poisons by knowing their names. To try to control fear or depression or boredom by calling them names is to resort to superstition of trust in curses and invocations. It is so easy to see why this does not work. Obviously, we try to know, name, and define fear in order to make it “objective,” that is, separate from “I.

  Alan Watts

  Order, Names, Knowing

  Alan Watts (1951). “The Wisdom of Insecurity”, Vintage

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• Make a spurious division of one process into two, forget that you have done it, and then puzzle for centuries as to how the two get together.

  Alan Watts

  Two, Together, Division

  Alan Watts (2011). “The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are”, p.44, Souvenir Press

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• The hostile attitude of conquering nature ignores the basic interdependence of all things and events--that the world beyond the skin is actually an extension of our own bodies--and will end in destroying the very environment from which we emerge and upon which our whole life depends.

  Alan Watts

  Life, Nature, Attitude

  Alan Watts (2011). “The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are”, p.9, Souvenir Press

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• But nirvana is a radical transformation of how it feels to be alive: it feels as if everything were myself, or as if everything---including "my" thoughts and actions---were happening of itself. There are still efforts, choices, and decisions, but not the sense that "I make them"; they arise of themselves in relation to circumstances. This is therefore to feel life, not as an encounter between subject and object, but as a polarized field where the contest of opposites has become the play of opposites.

  Alan Watts

  Opposites, Play, Choices

  Alan Watts (2017). “Psychotherapy East & West”, p.65, New World Library

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• You will never get to the irreducible definition of anything because you will never be able to explain why you want to explain, and so on. The system will gobble itself up.

  Alan Watts

  Definitions, Want, Able

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• The more we try to live in the world of words, the more we feel isolated and alone, the more all the joy and liveliness of things is exchanged for mere certainty and security. On the other hand, the more we are forced to admit that we actually live in the real world, the more we feel ignorant, uncertain, and insecure about everything.

  Alan Watts

  Real, Insecure, Hands

  Alan Watts (1951). “The Wisdom of Insecurity”, Vintage

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• We are at war between consciousness and nature, between the desire for permanence and the fact of flux. It is ourself against ourselves.

  Alan Watts

  Nature, War, Desire

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• The problem is to overcome the ingrained disbelief in the power of winning nature by love, in the gentle (ju) way (do) of turning with the skid, of controlling ourselves by cooperating with ourselves.

  Alan Watts

  Love, Nature, Winning

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• The animal tends to eat with his stomach, and the man with his brain. When the animal's stomach is full, he stops eating, but the man is never sure when to stop. When he has eaten as much as his belly can take, he still feels empty, he still feels an urge for further gratification.

  Alan Watts

  Animal, Men, Brain

  Alan Watts (1951). “The Wisdom of Insecurity”, Vintage

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• ...mysticism and empiricism go together in opposition to scholasticism...they base themselves on the non-linear world of experience rather than the linear world of letters.

  Alan Watts

  Together, World, Letters

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• Enlightenment remains unrealized so long as it is considered as a specific
  state to be attained, and for which there are standards of success.

  Alan Watts

  Long, Enlightenment, States

  Alan W. Watts (2012). “Nature, Man and Woman”, p.132, Vintage

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• I would suggest that today, we know about as much concerning the human mind as we knew about the galaxy in 1300.

  Alan Watts

  Mind, Today, Humans

  Alan Watts (1998). “The Culture of Counter-culture: The Edited Transcripts”, Tuttle Publishing

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• For me, being literate and articulate is a form of judo, of overcoming the [system] by its own method.

  Alan Watts

  Overcoming, Form, Method

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• The best way to convince someone is by making him realize that what you speak came from his own mind.

  Alan Watts

  Mind, Way, Realizing

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• Religion is always falling apart.

  Alan Watts

  Fall, Falling Apart

  Alan Watts (1999). “Buddhism the Religion of No-Religion”, p.38, Tuttle Publishing

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• What is the next step, the practical application? —I will answer that the absolutely vital thing is to consolidate your understanding, to become capable of enjoyment, of living in the present, and of the discipline which this involves. Without this you have nothing to give.

  Alan Watts

  Discipline, Giving, Understanding

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• To resist change, to try to cling to life, is therefore like holding your breath: if you persist you kill yourself.

  Alan Watts

  Life, Change, Trying

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• I have no other self than the totality of the things of which I am aware.

  Alan Watts

  Self, Totality

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• Hospitals should be arranged in such a way as to make being sick an interesting experience. One learns a great deal sometimes from being sick.

  Alan Watts

  Sick, Interesting, Way

  Alan Watts (2017). “Alan Watts - In the Academy: Essays and Lectures”, p.360, SUNY Press

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• The problem comes up because we ask the question in the wrong way. We supposed that solids were one thing and space quite another, or just nothing whatever. Then it appeared that space was no mere nothing, because solids couldn't do without it. But the mistake in the beginning was to think of solids and space as two different things, instead of as two aspects of the same thing. The point is that they are different but inseparable, like the front end and the rear end of a cat. Cut them apart, and the cat dies.

  Alan Watts

  Inspiring, Mistake, Cat

  "The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are". Book by Alan Watts, 1966.

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