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So many people of wealth understand much more about making and saving money than about using and enjoying it. They fail to live because they are always preparing to live.

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
Making
Enjoying
Understand
Preparing
Money
Saving
Live
Fail
Many
Using
Much
Failing
Always
Wealth
People
Enjoy

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In life as well as in art Zen never wastes energy in stopping to explain it only indicates.
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The world is filled with love-play, from animal lust to sublime compassion.
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But my dear man, reality is only a Rorschach ink-blot, you know.
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It's time to question a job or career move when it seems like most energy is devoted to making things appear other than what they really are.
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We cannot be more sensitive to pleasure without being more sensitive to pain.
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Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be
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We are all as much extraordinary phenomena of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water, the flickering of fire, the arrangement of the stars and the form of a galaxy.
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You know that if you get in the water and have nothing to hold on to, but try to behave as you would on dry land, you will drown. But if, on the other hand, you trust yourself to the water and let go, you will float. And this is exactly the situation of faith.
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If we live, we live if we die, we die if we suffer, we suffer if we are terrified, we are terrified. There is no problem about it.
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The morning glory which blooms for an hour differs not at heart from a giant pine that lives for a thousand years.
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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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Buddhism has in it no idea of there being a moral law laid down by somekind of cosmic lawgiver.
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Enjoyment is an art and a skill for which we have little talent or energy... your entire education has has deprived you of this capacity because it was preparing you for the future, instead of showing you how to be alive now.
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Of course, you can’t force your mind to be silent. That would be like trying to smooth ripples in water with a flatiron. Water becomes clear and calm only when left alone.
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There is nothing wrong with meditating just to meditate, in the same way that you listen to music just for the music. If you go to concerts to get culture or to improve your mind, you will sit there as deaf as a doorpost.
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Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.
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The secret of the enjoyment of pleasure is to know when to stop. Man doesn't learn this secret easily, but to shun pleasure altogether is cowardly avoidance of a difficult job. For we have to learn the art of enjoying things BECAUSE they are impermanent.
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