Alan Watts is one of the most fascinating and controversial figures in 20th century thought. Although he is known as a great popularizer of oriental philosophy (especially Zen) in the West, Watts left behind a vast philosophical body of work, as well as talks, conferences, and radio programs on topics such as philosophy of science, history of religions, Taoism, environmentalism, and avant-garde music.
To summarize his thought in a handful of sentences would be impossible. However, like all great thinkers, the germ of his teachings can also be found in his fragments.
This brief compilation of phrases offers not only a range of Watts’s interests, but also a myriad of windows through which to we can see ourselves and rediscover the amazement at simply being who we arein the here and now.
10 appointments to rediscover yourself in the here and now
alan watts
1
Man aspires to rule nature, but the more we study ecology, the more absurd it seems to talk about any characteristic of an organism, or of an environmental organism/terrain, as if this one ruled over the others.
two
The true splendor of science is not so much that it designates and classifies, archives and makes predictions, but that it observe and want to know the factswhatever they turn out to be.
3
We do not ‘come’ to this world; we came out of it, like the leaves of a tree. As the sea ‘makes waves’, the universe ‘makes people’. Each individual is an expression of the full range of nature, a unique action of the total universe.
4
Muddy water clears up better letting her rest.
5
You feel much less anxious if you feel perfectly free to be anxiousand the same can be said about guilt.
6
If you can’t trust yourself, then you can’t trust your self-doubt either; so without this underlying trust in the whole system of nature, you are simply paralyzed.
7
I find that the feeling of myself as an ego inside a leather bag is actually a hallucination.
8
Zen is a release from time. Well, if we open our eyes and observe clearly, it becomes evident that there is no other time than this momentand that the past and the future are abstractions without any concrete reality.
9
For there is never anything but the present, and if one cannot live in it, can’t live anywhere.
10
You are under no obligation to be the same person that you left 5 minutes ago.
Bonus track
Peace can only be made by those who are peaceful, and love can only be shown by those who love. No labor of love will arise from guiltfear or emptiness of heart, as well as no valid plans for the future can make those who lack the ability to live in the now.
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