The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are

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We do not "come into" this world, we come out of it, as leaves from a tree. As the ocean "waves", the universe "peoples". Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature, a unique action of the total universe. The individual is separate from his universal environment only in name. When this is not recognized, you have been fooled by your name. Confusing names with nature, you come to believe that having a separate name makes you a separate being. This is — rather literally — to be spellbound.” Hoaxed into the illusion of being an independent, responsible source of actions, he cannot understand why what he does never comes up to what he should do, for a society which has defined him as separate cannot persuade him to behave as if he really belonged. Thus he feels chronic guilt and makes the most heroic efforts to placate his conscience." Hudson, Berkley (16 August 1992). "She's Well-Versed in the Art of Writing Well: Poetry: Author, editor, and teacher Jean Burden shares her lifelong obsession through invitation-only workshops in her home". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved 17 January 2018. Alan Watts does a fine job of breaking through the narcissistic wall that many of us build around ourselves, as if we have a superior, godlike ability to access a vantage point that sees a world around us, apart from us, rather than us of it, fully immersed within the Whole Everything of All Things.

Watts, Alan (1940). The meaning of happiness: the quest for freedom of the spirit in modern psychology and the wisdom of the East (1sted.). New York: Harper and Row.

2. The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety, by Alan Watts

Attention: “an intentional, unapologetic discriminator”. Attention is a narrowed perception. Like a scanning mechanism, it is a flashlight in the darkroom that narrows our perception. While a narrowed perception is great for being sharp, it can only focus on one area at a time. He also maintained relations with Jean Burden, his lover and the inspiration/editor of Nature, Man and Woman. [65] The Supreme Identity: An Essay on Oriental Metaphysic and the Christian Religion, Noonday Press/ Farrar, Straus & Giroux, OCLC 3429188 ISBN 0-394-71835-6

Alan Watts – Life and Works". Archived from the original on 2 August 2014 . Retrieved 25 July 2014. Karam, Panos (19 September 2019). "Alan Watts' Philosophy, Biography & Key Ideas of His Teachings". Life Advancer . Retrieved 17 October 2023. Life is a system of geological and biological cooperation. But man continues to separate himself, as though he is the only subject among a world of objects—such dualist thinking is a neurosis.In 1950, Watts married Dorothy DeWitt. He moved to San Francisco in early 1951 to teach. They began a family that grew to include five children: Tia, Mark, Richard, Lila, and Diane. The couple separated in the early 1960s after Watts met Mary Jane Yates King (called "Jano" in his circle) while lecturing in New York. I read this based on the numerous, quite intelligent, quotes that can be found on the Internet attributed to Mr. Watts. Reading this book was a very different experience though. Sure, it is totally the book you love as a freshman college student, trying to disavow your WASPy upbringing by incorporating Easternized Western Thought rather than good ol' fashioned Westernized Western Thought. And sure, it is the book to read before a weekend camping Trip with friends so that you can have that Highly enjoyable campfire discussion about Nothing and Identity and Patriarchy and Being and Event... You know what I am talking about: The notion of individuality and the weight given it is both culturally and historically contingent. This seems confirmed again and again by my occasional studies in history, anthropology and psychology. The agents in the bible, particularly the Hebrew Bible, are often families, clans and nations, not particular human bodies.