Dear reader,
today I would like to introduce you to Alan Watts, a man I discovered on the Internet years ago, who grew into my role model. First of all I apologize for the long introduction, but that's what I call the author's freedom:).
This is going to be soft-core philosophy.
I found Watts on youtube, through a facebook post and an excerpt from one of his lectures. I was fascinated by his voice from the beginning. I was wondering how I would describe him without immediately starting his profession.
Life, after several decades, made me a little more modest and I began to open up to what was still to be discovered outside of my own familiar paths.
Back to Watts. He got known "as an interpreter and populariser of Eastern philosophy for a Western audience." I would say, he did an exorbitant job. Also he was befriended to Aldous Huxley, best known for his book "Brave new world" and his wife and you can find an interview with Mrs. Laura Huxley and Watts on youtube.
What was it that Alan Watts said in that short audio clip that caught me on the hook?
It was something that many users on Steemit probably feel the same way, namely the question of what they really want to do in life. I mean, really, really.
I have to disappoint you, because it really is absolutely nothing special to want to get rid of the 9-17 o' clock routine without really knowing what a worthy substitute for it would be. Nor is it remarkable to feel superior to the stupid and adapted, because in one way or another we are all adapted to what is called the status quo (what you call "stupid" in others is merely your recognition of your own stupidity which waves "hello!"). At most, strange hermits do not belong in this category and those who have isolated themselves far from humanity. That's just what a lesson Watts taught me. That my attitude of being (or wanting to be) something special is merely an expression of a civilization that wants to see itself like this.
All sublimity can also be spared if you focus on the stupidity of others, because those whom we call such are not inferior to us. Thus, one group defines the other and those who are "in" will attain their definition only by those who are "out". Basically a very simple child's play. But children are probably by no means as inflexible as their adult educators.
Prickly and gooey people
Of course, you may say, dear reader, a definition of a group of people is only possible by using a different group for distiction. True. After Watts there are the "prickly" people and the "gooey". Those who draw strict lines and have defined everything exactly like the others, who let themselves drift through life a little bit and don't take it too seriously with the severity.
And already you are tempted to join one or the other group and as soon as this is done, you can say: "They are stupid and we are good", aren't you? Nonetheless you are both and neither nor. Depends.
What have I learned from Watts?
That it is of course obsolete to do this and that something like a manifest existence in a definition is merely illusion ("Mara" is catching you anyways, according to the definition of Buddhist doctrine: "the power of temptation, the tendency towards evil, moral conflict, and the influence of such factors as indolence, negligence, and niggardliness.").
Yawn. You've heard that a thousand times, haven't you?
That "life is illusion". So do I. When I heard this as a young girl, I didn't understand a word of it and thought that the people who came up with it had to be either terribly clever or terribly stupid. Illusion, my ass! I was there, full of physical strength and youthfulness and what could not be real about it? ... On the other hand ... in the very back of my young padawan-part of "me" I thought there MUST be something to it...
It all started with a funny statement from Watts (I'll get to it soon). Namely, the fact that our life is only a process, one of continual emergence and transgression, and that only our language stands in the way of us realizing that every minute in which our body experiences its way of life is subject to this process. Huh? In his words (and what he interpreted by studying various Asian teachings):
"An apple tree apples and the earth peoples."
Say it again: An apple tree apples and the earth peoples. And again. Can you sense or feel the fascination through this little unusual using of language that it hits something?
This unusual way of speaking runs through Watts's complete work and especially in his lectures it comes to appearances.
He once talked about an experiment with children and he asked them, "What's a thing?" The children considered and gave attributes like "things are round or square, fast or slow" or something like that. Only a nine-year-old girl said, "A thing is a noun." Do you understand that? I didn't quite understand that, but then I did, somehow....
Don't believe what priests are telling you - go on and find out for yourself
From the point of view of Buddhism, becoming and passing away is merely a matter of endless continuity and no beginning and no end. It is therefore pointless to ask after the beginning of all life and British author Douglas Adams was also on the trail of this assertion and gave his supercomputer the probably funniest answer, which he gave to the curious people after millions of years of searching: 42 <-- scroll down until you hit "Popular culture".
The answer to the question of the meaning of life, the universe and all the rest.
A popular phrase from Watts' mouth was also:
"The universe consists of burnt almonds."
Do we need to stress that it is completely pointless to ask such a question? In Buddhism's etiquette, it is also frowned upon to talk about it - as well as politics, the neighbor and economy. In their religion - as it is - there is no God, no creator of the world. The world is more or less self-sufficient and what would it be worth to have an answer to who or what the world created?
Watts emphasized that Western religion takes the principle of creation from the mechanical glasses of a great architect. So little children would ask their European mothers: "Mommy, how was I made?" (built). And not what Asian children ask: "How did I get into this world?" Or were at least doing so in Watts times.
To look at the self and the universe in the way Watts was providing it, I am quoting him:
This (new) self has no location. It is not something like a traditional soul, using the body as a temporary house. To ask where it is, is like asking where the universe is. Things in space have a where, but the thing that space is in doesn't need to be anywhere. It is simply what there is, just plain basic isness!
"The thing that space is in ... "
One can chew on that, no?
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How easily, then, an unsophisticated person might exclaim, "I have just discovered that I am God!" Yet if, during such an experience, one retains any critical faculties at all, it will be clear that anyone else in the same state of consciousness will also be God. It will be clear, too, that the "God" in question is not the God of popular theology, the Master Technician who controls, creates, and understands everything in the universe. Were it so, a person in this state should be able to give correct answers to all questions of fact. He would know the exact height of Mount Whitney in millimeters. On the other hand, this awareness of a deeper and universal self would correspond exactly with that other type of God which mystics have called the "divine ground" of the universe, a sort of intelligent and superconscious space containing the whole cosmos as a mirror contains images... though the analogy fails in so far as it suggests something immense: we cannot picture sizelessness.
You may ask, what all this talk is good for. Now, for me it has a lot of value cause I consult people. It helps me a lot to look at humans and life in the way that I know that things never last long. As life (end death) is an ongoing process and my body and my mind change every second (even though that's hard to believe) I am not so much in danger to judge my clients I am working with. Would I behave in a way that I put them to a means end, I would do wrong. When a human being suffers and I would believe that his or her suffering is something manifest, I promptly would feel helpless myself.
Not to accept that all life is subject to a constant process of change,
throws you into the corner, to take everything that happens terribly seriously and to refuse to let go of unpleasant things (years of hatred, sticky disappointment, a stranglehold of doubt, etc.).
The reason why Buddhism is perhaps only superficially knocked down the doors of Westerners may also be due to the fact that it does exactly the same thing with goodness in life: None of it stays. One would like to get rid of the corrosive disappointment, but one would like to taste the end of a roaring celebration, the enjoyment of culinary delicacies or the sweetness of a received compliment for ever. But the good stuff also passes. Meh.
I laughed hard when Watts talked about the luxuries of life and used the example of all the yachts that were moored in the harbour would only be used by the rich as a party room, since very few of their owners were able to sail.
Nevertheless, such a symbol of money and status is not something you like to give up, although costs and benefits are absurdly related.
Of course, these comparisons mean the attachment to life itself
and why it is so reluctant to die in the western world. Eastern wisdom, on the other hand, says that birth is in fact already tragic and death should be celebrated with drums and trumpets, since the probability is at least given that there is no need to fear rebirth in the eternal wheel of life. Therefore, at least the Buddhists celebrate death and pity those who see the light of day again.
Now one must not take this as indifference to life. At the most as an invitation to behave with compassion towards all beings precisely for this reason.
For today, I'd like to leave you with a question that Watts asked himself:
How is twentieth-century man to gain a feeling of his existence consistent with twentieth-century knowledge? We need very urgently to know that we are not strangers and aliens in the physical universe. We were not dropped here by divine whim or mechanical fluke out of some other universe altogether. We did not arrive, like birds on barren branches; we grew out of this world, like leaves and fruit. Our universe "humans" just as a rosebush "flowers." We are living in a world where men all over the planet are linked by an immense network of communications, and where science has made us theoretically aware of our interdependence with the entire domain of organic and inorganic nature. But our ego-feeling, our style of personal identity, is more appropriate to men living in fortified castles.
Do you think, he is true also for the twenty first century? Sometimes Watts appeared to me as a pure optimist and sometimes I thought of him being way to pessimistic about how he perceived the world. ... That sounds familiar, no?
One of Watts favorite poem writers was A. E. Houseman and I finish this article with his words of poetry:
"I, a stranger and afraid. In a world I never made. They will be master, right or wrong; Though both are foolish, both are strong."
Thank you for reading!
P.S. I guess I would like to continue with Alan Watts, as there is a hell lot more to say about him. Next topic could be his view on consciousness altering substances. Interested? Please give sign in the comment section! Thank you.
All what I've written I collected out of my memory, except of course the quotes. That is why I did not give you any biography cause I am bad with numbers and locations.
Sources & where you can read about Alan Watts:
Quotes in the article: Alan Watts - A Psychedelic Experience - Fact or Fantasy? This essay appeared in LSD, The Consciousness-Expanding Drug / David Solomon, Editor, G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York ©David Solomon 1964
https://www.alanwatts.org Free downloaded book: Mara: The Buddha’s Encounters with Måra the Tempter by Ananda W.P. Guruge: https://accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/guruge/wheel419.pdf Quotes Alan Watts: Bodhimitra (Buddhist monk): youtube-link - only German, sorry couldn't find a source of him in English Picture source: NASA: unsplash 42: By Originally uploaded by en:User: Martinultima - en:Image:Answer to Life.png, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=100406 Last quote: " I am not much of a muchness"
https://www.alanwatts.com
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Watts
http://greatpdf.top/?book=0801959659
On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are: http://www.leary.ru/download/watts/Book%20On%20The%20Taboo%20Against%20Knowing%20Who%20You%20Are.pdf
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1501668.Alan_W_Watts
https://secularbuddhism.com/101-alan-watts-quotes/
By Alan Watts Foundation - http://www.alanwatts.org, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64190421
Access to Watts is easier than ever before. For the attention limited i would reccomend listening to him speak in one of his many lectures available on the internet, i truly do appreciate his efforts and i thank you for sharing.
you're welcome! It was a pleasure.
Yes, there are many speeches online on youtube. I've listened more than once to several of them. And I will continue to do so. It's the quickest service and very convenient.
Interesting buddy.. Really love this, you've done well
thank you!
Gorgeous article. Have you ever seen Matt Stone & Trey Parker's animations of his talks?
Thanks!!! Yeah, very nicely done animation! Alan Watts is so inspiring to all kinds of people! And thank you for complimenting me, though for a strange reason I can only read your reply in the "replies"-section but not here in your comment. Here I see only the video.
"I was fascinated by his voice from the beginning."
His voice is really special. So calming and funny.
I've been a fan of his work for a few years now.
indeed. It is bewitching. I like it a lot.
What is for you the most insightful messages/lectures of Watts? Do you have a certain topic?
The only way to fully live is to live in the present moment, the now.
The godhead is never the object of its own knowledge. Fire can't burn itself, a knife can't cut itself etc.
Off top of my head.
Thank you for posting this. I'm glad to see you are getting some support. It's important stuff.
I was very lucky. Alan Watts was my introduction to Zen and it happened when I was only 17 years old. That was 1967. I struggled with his concepts but they truly resonated with me and affected my entire life. From there I branched out to Huxley, Fromm, Suzuki, Lao Tzu, and for a long time considered myself a Taoist and to this day think my "way" is that of Nature.
All of this quest for reality insulated me from the excesses of the 60s and 70s. I actively sought out psychedelic drugs to use as tools, not simply to get loaded like my contemporaries.
I also heeded this message when my trips all went to the same place, a place I had been to so many times. You'll never get to the moon in a hot air balloon.
I was also lucky that I have a non-addicting personality. It's easy for me to put down things that people get hooked on, mostly because I don't get much euphoria out of them.
Watts' teachings only took me so far. I realized that he was not enlightened himself. He was simply the finger pointing at the moon, a moon he probably never visited.
I soon discovered the master Meher Baba who, like Ekhart Tolle and Peace Pilgrim, experienced instantaneous enlightenment. When the fruit is ripe it drops from the tree of its own accord. Baba took an oath of silence and only communicated with had gestures and a chalk board. "In my silence hear my word of words."
When you are ready the teacher will appear.
My own coming of age happened in Mexico in 1970. I met a woman who was a follower of Maharishi. She taught me how to meditate. Her simple instructions were simply to sit in a comfortable position and watch your mind. As a thought arises, simply look at it, recognize it and then let it go, while following it inwardly down to its source. I did that for three days, approximately 2 hours total. On the final day the thought of my own self surfaced. I recognized it and let it go. Boom! Nirvana. In Zen that experience is called Satori. But I could not stay. As soon as I recognized it it was over and sadly, I have never been back. The experience, however, changed my life entirely.
This was truth beyond all doubt. I envisioned how following the teachings of these people would change the world and was very enthusiastic. But Mara is powerful and the tree of life is full of green fruit that still needs to ripen. The world has since regressed from bad to far worse.
Undoubtedly Alan Watts realized this too and is probably why he died in his sleep from alcoholism in 1973.
Thank you, @citizenzero, so you have quite some life in the past. 1967 is three years before I saw the light of day.
Do you have a recommendation of a book from Lao Tzu, I do not know anything of him. Or a website you can point me to?
Yes, I hear you. Drugs are often used out of context and a deeper meaning. In particular nowadays as we grew out of tribes and do not have connections to the higher realms or gods or whatever. I don't know though if I would like to exist that way. But this question is idle.
The quote from Watts is hilarious!! Thank you, I will keep it forever!
I think Watts for sure had his own precious moments. And also I do not know about people who lead a life without difficulties or were in a way awakened that nothing could shake themselves. Therefor I find it kind of clever to take a figure which one can idealize but should also not forget that even the most ideal figure (like Buddha or Jesus) were known for becoming sick or sad.
I find many good teachers through the Internet, in particular audio recordings from German monks or former ordained ones who came back after a long time participating in monastic life.
The meditation technique you describe I hear a lot. Also I heard all different kinds of other techniques but as I do not meditate myself I cannot speak from any practice. Never felt Satori. But I heard exactly what you say from the monks and that people who had this experience once would like to come back to it and can't repeat it. I guess it is a little bit comparable with hitting the basketball hoop after throwing the ball backwards without thinking? Only better?
I would also say, that "Maras" companion like "Maya" is powerful, too and all their children like "doubt, "hate" and "ignorance" - it's a long way to become more calm during life.
The world was always evil and bad in one way and good and full of love in another way. Depends where you look, no?
Lao Tzu is responsible for the Tao Te Ching which is the foundation for Taoism. None of the great sages of the world wrote, since they realized the abstract and therefore limiting value of words. The Tao Te Ching came about when war was about to be waged in the part of China where Lao Tzu resided. As he passed through the gates of the city on his way into exile, the guard recognized him and begged him to sit awhile and relate his wisdom before he left. True or not, it's a good story.
Lao Tzu and Confucius knew each other and the Buddha also lived in this century, 500 years before the Christ. I knew some Christian crossovers when I was a chiropractor. The whole ashram (5 people) were my patients. These fellows believe that Jesus, during his missing years from about 13 to 30 years old, hitched a ride down the silk road to India where he became enlightened and then came back to Jerusalem where the Jews promptly killed him for his heresy. Makes sense. I'm sure the Buddha was known to the west by then. These guys aren't enlightened, but they are certainly trying. They're good, joyful people, dress in sack cloth, live communally, are celibate and vegetarian and work hard making religious Icons that they sell via a catalog to churches around the world.
Watts was sort of like an orbiting satellite. He could see the truth and looked at it from all angles, but he never let go enough to fall all the way to the planet.
Another wonderful teacher in the Watts tradition is Joseph Campbell. He was a comparative religion teacher who searched for the unifying theme of all religions and mythology. Though not totally enlightened himself, he, like Watts, is capable of relating on an intellectual level. When he found he was dying of cancer, he made many hours of video of his life's work. Definitely worth the time to watch them all.
One of my favorite sages is Peace Pilgrim. She is the ultimate Slacker to be emulated. She achieved liberation spontaneously on night while walking in the moonlight after deciding that instead of living her life to see what she could get, she'd live her life to see how much she could give. The threat of nuclear war after WW2 was her motivation.
The world of man is evil in its delusions. If there is a Satan it is the ego itself. Deny the ego and god is right there smiling. The world of Nature is as it is. Nothing more. That's why I prefer it.
Now you have lots of reading to do. :)
Indeed, have a great thanks. That is a lot to read and look through. I will take my time for that. If not now, for sure later on.
I appreciate your effort in giving me an overview of your favorites.
The story with Jesus and Buddha I already heard and thank your for reminding me. I found it hilarious and was picturing Jesus coming back to Jerusalem with what he had learned from Gautama Siddharta and that the two of them had some good conversations, drank tea and calmly watched a tiger walking by. LOL!
What were you treating your patients for? Was it all physical (chiropractic) or did you do also meditation with them? Where was it?
My practice was purely physical, though I occasionally did some emotional therapy. I tried to teach people how to take care of their bodies, what to eat and what to avoid eating. I discovered that low back pain was mostly of emotional origin just as neck pain and headaches related to stress.
After many years I gave up and my opinion of people in general took a nosedive. Only a few followed my recommendations and they benefited greatly. The rest simply wanted me to fix them, the way a mechanic fixes a car. The body doesn't work that way. You need to quit abusing it and let it heal. They didn't want to give up sodas, to do stretching exercises, to lose that 30 pounds around their middle that was wearing out their hips. They refused to take responsibility for their own bodies. 16 years later I was preaching the same sermon that I did the day I opened my door. I finally didn't care if people got better or not. At that point I decided I couldn't be a doctor any longer so I closed my doors.
I'm meeting the same resistance to spirituality. Eventually I'll stop this too.
my interpretation of what you say is that of resignation. It sounds as if people aren't worth it. ... I want to ask you, if those people who benefited from what you had to offer made a positive and lasting effect on their people and if you have checked that. When I would be Jesus I would ask you: Doesn't even the one make a difference who was healed through your help & empathy?