Alan W. Watts

define yourself bite teeth

“Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

man suffer serious god fun

“Man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

meaning life alive

“The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

muddy water clear alone

“Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

change plunge move join dance

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

aperture universe look explore

“You are an aperture through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

menu meal

“The menu is not the meal.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

past future illusion exist present

“I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

permanent lifeless

“The more a thing tends to be permanent, the more it tends to be lifeless.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

scholar buddhism learn unlearn everyday

“A scholar tries to learn something everyday; a student of Buddhism tries to unlearn something daily.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

problem insoluble question ask wrong

“Problems that remain persistently insoluble should always be suspected as questions asked in the wrong way.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

life music eternal past future expand present

“Life is like music for its own sake. We are living in an eternal now, and when we listen to music we are not listening to the past, we are not listening to the future, we are listening to an expanded present.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

belief god faith

“If we cling to belief in God, we cannot likewise have faith, since faith is not clinging but letting go.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

nothing talk poetry

“There is nothing at all that can be talked about adequately, and the whole art of poetry is to say what can't be said.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

travel unschedule wander discover surprise

“Real travel requires a maximum of unscheduled wandering, for there is no other way of discovering surprises and marvels, which, as I see it, is the only good reason for not staying at home.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

danger sane flexibility rigid brittle life

“No one is more dangerously insane than one who is sane all the time: he is like a steel bridge without flexibility, and the order of his life is rigid and brittle.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

jesus christ savior

“Jesus was not the man he was as a result of making Jesus Christ his personal savior.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)

look overlook

“Normally, we do not so much look at things as overlook them.”

― Alan W. Watts (1915-1973)