Hello everyone! I've decided to start diving into Alan Watts philosophy and reiterating it for you in a way that summarizes the information and makes it more 21st century appropriated. He is by far the best philosopher in human history in my opinion and to that point I'd love to continue sharing his work. What I'll be doing mostly is going over his lectures via YouTube so you can easily follow along and I can embed them here in the blog. A lot of these visualizations of his lectures are via Spiritual Mind on YouTube. This will be a series in dedication to him called Alan Watts Continued.
Let's begin!
You always get what you want
Your karma is everything that comes to you is a return from what came out of you. That seems crazy only if you define you as just your conscious and voluntary behaviors. If you include the environment in the situation, then everything seems to make much more sense. Alan says we must be careful when thinking this way, we get a sensation about how inside and outside move together. You may end up thinking that you control everything, where the point was to shrink your ego in realizing that you are apart of it all not the controller or the controlled. This can happen one way or the other with the use of psychedelics
You've always done what you wanted
People start to think okay well then yeah, I'm going to do what I want now! Well first you must realize that's what you always did. A common saying from one's mother is "well darling, we all have to do things we don't like." What really happens there is the child is choosing the lesser of two evils, because otherwise you might get into trouble for disobeying. So at the end of the day you went with the lesser of two evils and it was what you wanted.
Your environment is you
You and the environment aren't separately acting and responding to one another, you are doing it together. When you come to this realization, you may feel like when you walk up a hill, the hill is lifting you up higher, just as much as you are going up the hill.
The ego
When you are aware of the "I," you feel slightly uncomfortable. There is this consistent resistance you feel all the time. If you knew everything all the time, there would be no point in it all. You do know everything in the way you shine the sun, or grow your hair without understanding the process.
The Blame Game
If you praise for anything, it won't mean anything unless you also blame as well. If everyone was praise worthy always and we praised them, you wouldn't notice it anymore it would just become as obvious as to say your welcome after someone says thank you. It's just an intuitive response. When you talk to a guru for example, they don't or blame because they realize that they both create each other and if you have one you need the other.
You can't spiritually improve yourself to get a one up on life
That's it. You can't ingeniously improve yourself spiritually to be "better." It has to be something you're interested in doing. By meditating your'e not going to become as amazing as a bhudda, a bhudda simply sits and we call that meditating. This is very odd, but again it's about intent. The bhudda doesn't try to meditate to become better. An enlightened person meditates because they want to simply meditate. We recommend all the time that the brightest meditate and that we should try to mimic them. While they may meditate, they don't simply do so because they believe it will give them a one up on life, they do it because they appreciate their mindfulness. Many people do not appreciate time to reflect and be mindful and we try to distract ourselves as much as we can. So this is in fact not what everyone wants. It's the double bind of life. Like when we are demanded to love God, we cannot do so genuinely through virtue of being told to do so. Or for example someone who thinks donating more to the church gives them a one up on people who haven't at the end means their actions had poor intent meaning it never mattered anyway.
Good intentions don't work if forced
The more we try to force "good intentions" the more we might mess everything up. It's clear to see as pointed out previously that the one who pushes the button. Identifying as the good guy so the other can be the bad guy just so you can defeat the bad guy is creating good and evil where the was nothing. The bad guy thinks they're the good guy and you're the bad guy. So you're both playing the game of if I'm the good guy I must defeat the bad guy before he defeats me. Stirring up the water and imagining each wave is a different side to support, but eventually they all return back to the water.
Not living in the present is our torment
We are so prioritized with time and focusing on the past and future that we rarely are in the present where we can enjoy ourselves. All animals live in the present and forget about the past and live mostly in rhythms. They live day in day out and do not predict the future, thus they are not anxious, or depressed. This is more possible with intelligence, but is most easily understood when thinking of ants. Doing the same things always, but never getting bored because they forget. Boredom is created from being able to analyze the past and looking to the future and seeing nothing and feeling anxious.
How is there anything going on?
You have too many variables to understand everything at once. Our science can help us understand many variables and use those to predict things. The fact is there will always be too many variables for us to do as humans. It's like when you leave it up to chance or see a guru and then it allows you to give away your responsibility. You always knew it was your choice to leave it to chance or choose that mentor. We love to give away our responsibility and we struggle until we take responsibility.
One's self is everything underneath the stream of consciousness.
Our consciousness just keeps a record of what we do. Is one branch on a tree that is longer or shorter better or worse? Is a fire better if it lasts longer or burns up bigger yet shorter. Which is right and wrong? Neither they are just different. It's all okay. Be content for issues undecided, you don't need to press the button and "get it over with."
Your desire is everything you believe to not be you
Generally we desire anything we believe isn't ourselves. We already know we love ourselves or that we should. So the zest in life is exploring anything outside ourselves.
"Life is simply a way of postponing death" - Alan Watts
Awesome video, let me know your thoughts. Some of this is speculation and relation to today from my point of view, but the majority is a summary of what Alan said. Cheers.
I've also shared this on Minds: https://www.minds.com/scottcbusiness/blog/alan-watts-continued-how-your-desires-always-become-reality-868303740889792512
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