Quote

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

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Alan Watts
Age: 58 †
Born: 1915
Born: January 6
Died: 1973
Died: November 16
Anglican Priest
Author
Dramaturge
Musician
Philosopher
Theologian
Videographer
Writer
Kent
England
Trying
Actually
Admit
Things
Words
Certainty
World
Hands
Ignorant
Liveliness
Live
Mere
Exchanged
Everything
Joy
Insecure
Feel
Security
Uncertain
Feels
Hand
Isolated
Real
Alone
Forced

More quotes by Alan Watts

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The individual may be understood as one particular focal point at which the whole universe expresses itself - as an incarnation of the self, or of the Godhead, or whatever one may choose to call it.
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In known history, nobody has had such capacity for altering the universe than the people of the United States of America. And nobody has gone about it in such an aggressive way.
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Through our eyes, the universe is perceiving itself. Through our ears, the universe is listening to its harmonies. We are the witnesses through which the universe becomes conscious of its glory, of its magnificence.
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...for thousands of years human history has been a magnificently futile conflict, a wonderfully staged panorama of triumphs and tragedies based on the resolute taboo against admitting that black goes with white.
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You can't live at all unless you can live fully now.
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A philosopher is a sort of intellectual yokel who gawks at things that sensible people take for granted.
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The trouble with many religions, accused of wishful thinking, is that they are not wishful enough. They show a deplorable lack of imagination.
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But at any rate, the point is that God is what nobody admits to being, and everybody really is. If you awaken from this illusion, and you understand that black implies white, self implies other, life implies death - or shall I say, death implies life - you can conceive yourself.
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Without birth and death, and without the perpetual transmutation of all the forms of life, the world would be static, rhythm-less, undancing, mummified.
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Where do I begin and end in space? I have relations to the sun and air which are just as vital parts of my existence as my heart.
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The greater part of human activity is designed to make permanent those experiences and joys which are only lovable because they are changing.
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There is no way of making a hedge grow like pruning it. There is no way of making sex interesting like repressing it.
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...the habitual dualist's solution to the problem of dualism: to solve the dilemma by chopping off one of the horns.
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If the earth is man's extended body, to be loved and respected as one's own body, those who do no greening of themselves will hardly bring about the greening of America. The idea of 'greening' involves color, flowering, freshness of spring, and, above all, respect for what is organic and vegetative as distinct from the mechanical and metallic.
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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.
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There is a deep, peaceful calm in the dawning of a new day.
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If a flower had a God it would not be a transcendental flower but a field.
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...[W]ords can be communicative only between those who share similar experiences.
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The Godhead is never an object of its own knowledge. Just as a knife doesn't cut itself, fire doesn't burn itself, light doesn't illuminate itself. It's always an endless mystery to itself.
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You can't make love without art.
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