Alan Watts

[Caduceus Mercurius]

A conversation with myself

Work as Play

Zen - the best of Alan Watts (Haven't seen this one yet, I'm going to watch it now.)

 

[Forkbender]

Alan Watts rocks my socks. Really like his talks.

 

[BrainEater]

Thanks man for that!!! I really enjoyed the talkings of Alan Watts, seems like a smart guy to me....he kicks ass!!!

peace :weedman:

 

[magickmumu]

Thanxs

Alan Watts is OK. It was he (along with Ram Dass) who got me interested in Buddhism and Hinduism
I have no time to watch it now, maybe I will watch it tomorrow.

 

[????????]

Ahh that last one is really great, I want a gong now.

An open question:

Worldview

In several of his later publications, especially Beyond Theology and The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are, Watts put forward a worldview, drawing on Hinduism, Chinese philosophy, pantheism, and modern science; in which he maintains that the whole universe consists of God playing hide-and-seek (Maya (illusion)), hiding from himself by becoming all the living and non-living things in the universe, forgetting who he really is; the upshot being that we are all God in disguise. In this worldview, Watts asserts that our conception of ourself as an "ego in a bag of skin" is a myth; the entities we call the separate "things" are merely processes of the whole.

Is this really a brainchild of his? I've seen this "worldview" times before, for instance in God's Debris. I want to know because it's more or less what I think too.

 

[BrainEater]

it's matter of interpretation... i think its sort of the view of alan watts but considering that he didn't write that but someone else did, i suppose you needed to research...


peace!

 

[Forkbender]

Besides, it's not like this worldview was just made up in the sixties. It has long roots in Eastern religion/philosophy and some Western traditions. Watts was original in the way he talked about these things and put them together, but the ideas themselves have been known from time immemorial.

 

[????????]

Yeah... now I understand. It's really something that's been said a lot but in different ways... the different faces of god, personas, reflections... but yeah, I guess I really like the way he says it :wink:

 

[Caduceus Mercurius]

I was listening to the Out Of Your Mind series (which you can download as a torrent) this morning, and there (first minute of the second session) he explains the theory of God playing hide and seek with himself, using Sanskrit phrases like 'atman' (self) and 'maya' (the veil of illusion).

When he says that life is a drama of God, it refers to the 'lila' of the Vedic gods and goddesses (especially the playful ones, like Krishna). Life is a dance, just like the 'rasa-lila' of Krishna and the gopis is described and portrayed in the arts as a dance.

 

[????????]

it's a wiggle :wink:

 

[Telico]

"The Wisdom of insecurity" , by Alan Watts ==> The best book I've ever read !!

 

[GOD]

Its a recuring idea through many cultures in many times . Hawkwind talked about it in "The hawkwind log" at the start of the 70s . I came to the same conclusion without anyones help just by meditating and thinking about whats going on .

 

[Guest]

please do read "from time to eternity", you won't regret it.

 

[????????]

Look what I found!

Alan Watts is god for 10 minutes

"In this excerpt from a lecture, Alan Watts plays the role of a "delusional patient" who thinks he's God. He gets his students to ask him any question they please. The results are fascinating......"

bonus:

a little mashup.

short but so good.

 

[Carebear]

Never seen\heard\read any of his work before, Thanks for sharing!

 

[????????]

I've been looking but haven't found... so I ask directly: does anyone has "The Wisdom Of Insecurity"?