A couple Mormon kids came by my house today offering me their book. I declined and l told them to listen to Alan Watts - What is Reality, and they said they would.
I used to be Mormon. After my eyes/mind were opened and i ditched the religion, the missionaries would always drop by etc with the usual attempts to get me back in. I argued that hallucinogens give a stronger true and direct connection to god or whatever, and that mormon doctrine dictates substances as against the word of wisdom. So how could I be part of something that says shrooms are “bad”? They were cool, they said they can’t argue against my point and that it might NOT be wrong, just that mormons are instructed to steer clear. I really appreciated his open mind. Now any time i talk to missionaries i tell them i am unmovable because nothing is more important than one’s own direct connection to god/source and that no other human can dictate to me what is true or not etc. I emphasized the significance of free will and that freedom is most important otherwise we don’t have any choices to make, and per their doctrine, making everyone automatically get back to heaven without free will was Satan’s idea and that mormon doctrine is doing exactly that. FREEDOM. 🤘
It might take me a lifetime to at least partially grasp of all Alan Watts teachings but how joyous I am to have discovered his cosmology. I'll be spending the rest of my lifetime in good company ❤
Here is a little tip I discovered while listening to Alan early on, in trying to grasp what he is getting at your mind will keep you too busy to understand what he's getting at. You have to listen without trying to interpret what he's saying. That is to say, not to try and grasp what he's saying, but simply listen. The understanding will come with simple awareness. This sounds paradoxical to people, but reality is precisely a paradox, and all paradoxes can be reconciled. Because what looks like two, are actually one, because they are always found together. Like the poles of a magnet, or hot and cold, light and dark. In speech we separate them, in reality, no such division exists. So therefore listen without trying to understand, and understanding will happen spontaneously. Like when we TRY to listen, or to pay attention. Trying to pay attention isn't paying attention. Because your caught on the trying. Like with seeing, you don't have to try to see, you just look and there it is. If you squint it just makes things fuzzy. If you hold a stone and want to feel it, you have to let yourself feel it. If you squeeze it hard, you become less sensitive to feeling. Therefore anything you strain to do, or try to do, the very effort is what gets in the way of actually doing it. So likewise, if you try to understand, you interfere with true understanding. I hope this helps. But keep on listening. Alan Watts has helped me to have a greater understanding of many things. I wish to do nothing more than help spread this life changing awareness. May the greatest love and compassion be with you on your life journey.
I didn't know about the worm. I did realize this (the diaphragm clenching) about myself about 6 months ago because I sing full time, and I've basically been spending every day since with my mind returning to the sensations of my body, because I've realized that our little mental cursor does some special things when we place it on the sensations that appear in our mind and body. Especially this clenching of the diaphragm that he's talking about. My entire singing has changed. And the method is simply to feel them, every body sensation that emerges in each moment. The worm's bruise (as a metaphor for humans) is learned clenching, at so many spots in one's body, but yes definitely the diaphragm. Also the head, for me. The learned clenching (anxiety) comes from a fear of feeling what you'd feel if you unclenched. But what would you feel? When was the last time you unclenched? You'd be surprised. You realize you've spent your whole life clenched, using a physical method of protection (tightening your diaphragm and muscles) against emotional sensation. It doesn't work. It makes things worse. The clenched you is the reactive, hostile you. The relaxed you... well, that's what the goal is of all this. And the only solution is actually to feel the sensations themselves. Because pushing them aside is clenching. Thinking about something else is clenching. If the sensation is there and you're not honoring it by spending time to feeling it, then the way you live during that time is clenched, tight, stressed, anxious. But in order to not clench, you don't have to sit and do nothing. Rather, teach yourself to feel your body at all time. In conversation. While driving. While washing dishes. While typing this comment. The rest of your life doesn't stop. The feeling you starts. And just watch how you begin to act. How you begin to treat people when you're feeling your body and you've made it a habit. You won't want to stop.
I like your perspective and how you applied the philosophy. It's amazing to me that so many people can listen to Alan's explanation of a philosophy, and the listener can consciously or unconsciously apply what they just heard to totally different aspects of themselves. When I read your comment and how it feels to you, it helped me realize that I do apply this to some things that I enjoy and can do well, like you do with singing. However if I hadn't read your anecdote, who knows how long it would have taken me to understand how it can feel and the possibility of applying it to other aspects of my own life. Thank you! I'll mention how I've felt it in hopes that someone will read this and finally understand too. Then hopefully they will be able to look at themselves and start working on unclenching other parts of their bodies and minds. Here's where it's completely different for me: For most of my life I've loved operating machines. Heavy equipment, excavators, skid steers, loaders, tractor trucks, and of course fast cars in autocross or precision driving. (Trigger warning. If fast driving in heavy traffic stresses you out, skip the next paragraph. Just please understand that it has a calming effect on me, and many of us do it knowing our skill level and knowing that it can cause stress to people who fear machines and are stressed already. Please believe me, this is the second most important thing on our minds, just after all of our attention and senses being focused on being one with our machine. To better understand our perspective and to hear it from others like me, look up "cat and mouse car chases" on RU-vid. You can close your eyes if it helps. The important part is to hear the narrator/driver/navigator repeatedly speak of respecting the other drivers who aren't involved in our games, lol. Thanks for giving it a chance). If I have a hard day at work the only way for me to relieve stress is to get out into moderate traffic with a 35 to 55 mph speed limit, and floor it! I can get up to 80-100 mph in residential areas (of course I think about this and stay away from schools, parks, basketball courts etc. And I don't do it for long. If I need more I'll go to the highway.) The second I start to feel some G forces, I unclench my diaphragm... Then I become one with my machine. I can feel the road in my feet and hands. I can feel how much tread I have left on my tires and I feel if they slide even 1/16 of an inch, which one and how far. I can feel the explosions of fuel in each cylinder of my engine. I can feel her breathing through the cold air intake, through the carburetor, fuel injectors, and/or spark of sparkplugs, to the exhaust. I can feel her running well and smoothly, or I can feel when something isn't right with the machine or the road, rain, ice, snow, sand etc. Likewise I get the same feeling if someone asks me to put a 1980s Chevrolet caprice classic into a car bailer without an engine! Lol, it's too heavy and doesn't fit. So with an excavator I'll pick the big old boat of a car up and put it in my work area. With the bucket with a thumb on the boom arm of my machine I'll carefully peel the hood off of the car. Then with the same bucket and thin I'll carefully yank the engine from it's mounts and set it aside for later. Then I start with the front of the Chevy caprice classic, and roll the car up like a jelly roll so that it can fit into the car bailer. I am one with the machine again. I can feel it when a little piece of door trim has caught on one of the excavators hydraulic hoses and correct it before any damage is done. I can feel the tracks as they roll across the landfill and visualize objects that I'm running over. Car rim. Car tire. Old soda vending machine from before the 1980s. Vending machine from after the 2000s, tree stump, etc. I am unclenched and the machine is a piece of me. We are dancing the whole time and nobody's toes get stepped on. I also feel this way during cooking and sex. Not necessarily in that order and sometimes both at the same time! Lol. But I don't need to go into greater detail on that. I only hope my anecdotes can help someone out there relate and understand a way they might already have more control of their body and mind by accepting the feelings of the world, of their immediate environment rather than ignoring uncomfortable feelings or pushing away situations that you find difficult or painful. Thanks again for your perspective on singing. And thanks to the Alan Watts foundation for making Alan's lessons accessible to the world.
Thank you for putting these recordings out for us. I haven't listened to this in so long that I'd forgotten about your father's writings and talks. I just listened to "In our own way" and I feel so much lighter because I did. I just needed a reminder that the burden of life and living is necessary for us to have the perspective to be able to also feel the pleasures and joys of life! I have ideas that are political, psychological, sociological etc that can be solutions to problems individuals face in our daily existence, or answers to bigger problems we have as a collective society regulated by laws and government. But it can sometimes take me days or weeks to be able to articulate these ideas so that enough other people can understand so that it makes even a small difference in the world. So I look for other more articulate folks who have said it already. Your father may be my most referenced teacher. Props! Thank you again!
"...YOUR MIND AWAKENS YOU SUDDENLY SEE YOUR FRIENDS...LOOKING INCREDIBLY ANCIENT,... LIKE ANGELS, LIKE ETERNAL BEINGS WHO WERE ALWAYS THERE FROM THE BEGINNING" 💜🥰
you as an individual and the universe arise mutually you evoke the external world (sound, colour, softnes) but you also are something in the external world ... a human being is symptomatic of his environment and expresses his environment so if you're intelligent you are in an intelligent environment - everything we see is human
The most difficult part of flowing with the Tao is sometimes “I want to be over there, dammit” so I fight it and get no where. However, when I let go I often find myself exactly where I need and want to be.
The Buddha [allegedly] taught that an atom is not partless. Like the Earth in its creation ,made from particles gathered from space that got caught in its gravity....I may be corrected.🎉
31:46 Personification as deified instead of beautified in the giving of LIFEmc2🧬unto🖌️idols🎨, is😢what Uncle🗣️Alan 🕉️royally✡️is✝️referring☪️2👣B B'RIGHT🌞HERE=mc2🎺in The🛟MIDDLE=mc2 of🛞ITS⚖️S'WAY, Night🌄in🌅Day🎶🕯️
Non-Polariry, the🎱Monad, is The🛞Middle♾️Position in the🌌Universe, relative the🧿Center, in🌞 realizing that the👶individual🪱wiggles need 2⚕️wiggle🧬around. ME=mc2🕉️, the Master🔯God✝️in☪️the⚖️Straight☯️Way 2👣ME=mc2!
