Alan Watts: This Is IT: Become What You Are

[Masked Dude]

Thanks, forumdude, for saying that. I tried to explain how science does not prove all this Secret/Wallace stuff. Instead of listening, my self-proclaimed "open-minded" friend said I was being negative, outlandish, and that being realistic was bad being the universe was going to hear my negativity and I was destroying my life. Glad to see that others also see it the way I do.

[cckeiser]

Fuck!!
I have been trying to avoid this, but you dudes are making it too damn hard!

Dudes....there are no answers...there are only choices.
You need to rid your minds of Realism/Materialism...it's a dead end.
You need to embrace Idealism dudes.

My video: There are no answer. There are only Choices
http://youtu.be/lkm1e5EYa5Q

(Note: You must first be an Idealist to really comprehend this completely.)

There are no answers. There are only choices.

We are The Singularity.

We believe what we perceive, but we only perceive what we believe.

The Final Summation:
There is but One Consciousness, of which every mind is entangled, and from which every mind draws the Information to manifest its own Reality.
Consciousness is Information. The mind is the Observer of Information. We all share the very same Consciousness but perceive from our own unique perspective. Since every mind has its own unique perspective it will perceive in its own unique way. No two minds will ever completely agree on everything.
Information is Thought. The Observer/Mind both perceives and creates the information the One Consciousness contains.
The essence of Reality is Thought. Thought is the "emptiness" at the heart of all matter.
The stone does not exist outside the mind, or inside the mind. The stone does not exist at all. Only the information contained in consciousness of thought about a stone exists.
The stone is an illusion.
We do not exist in Reality. Reality exists in our minds.
Every mind will choose its own answers and create its own illusions of Reality.
Any one illusion is just as true, and just as good as any other.

When one surrenders the ego and recognizes its own solipsism, then it will recognize its own Reality for what it is; an illusion. Only then will it realize there are no answers. There are only choices.

The more we learn...the less we know.
The more we know...the less we learn.

[DigitalBuddha]

Van Morrison wrote a song about or based on Alan Watts' book "Cloud Hidden, Whereabouts Unknown," (I think it was called that), any dude know about it? Was based on.......

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/581525.Cloud_hidden_Whereabouts_Unknown



Ah cool, found it - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCGUwRo5Ork

[DigitalBuddha]

Fuck!!
I have been trying to avoid this, but you dudes are making it too damn hard!

Dudes....there are no answers...there are only choices.
You need to rid your minds of Realism/Materialism...it's a dead end.
You need to embrace Idealism dudes.

Well said, C dude!

[forumdude]

actually it was called "alan watts blues." first time i'd heard about alan watts was from that song. i love van the man.

[Hominid]

We believe what we perceive, but we only perceive what we believe.

This always challenges me. In a good way.. I've moved and grown through various theories, philosophies, and beliefs for the very reason that when there's adequate evidence that what I currently believe is bullshit and doesn't serve me any more as a seeker of truth, then I move on. As soon as I suspect my belief(s) is based on my own filters; based on a preconception because new evidence says so, then so be it.

[DigitalBuddha]

actually it was called "alan watts blues." first time i'd heard about alan watts was from that song. i love van the man.

Ahhh, yes, "alan watts blues," yup, I remember now. It reminds me of the tune by the Moody Blues about Timothy Leary for some reason.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLC-y3r66Ys

[Zen Dog]

Fuck!!
I have been trying to avoid this, but you dudes are making it too damn hard!

Dudes....there are no answers...there are only choices.
You need to rid your minds of Realism/Materialism...it's a dead end.
You need to embrace Idealism dudes.

My video: There are no answer. There are only Choices
http://youtu.be/lkm1e5EYa5Q

(Note: You must first be an Idealist to really comprehend this completely.)

There are no answers. There are only choices.

We are The Singularity.

We believe what we perceive, but we only perceive what we believe.

The Final Summation:
There is but One Consciousness, of which every mind is entangled, and from which every mind draws the Information to manifest its own Reality.
Consciousness is Information. The mind is the Observer of Information. We all share the very same Consciousness but perceive from our own unique perspective. Since every mind has its own unique perspective it will perceive in its own unique way. No two minds will ever completely agree on everything.
Information is Thought. The Observer/Mind both perceives and creates the information the One Consciousness contains.
The essence of Reality is Thought. Thought is the "emptiness" at the heart of all matter.
The stone does not exist outside the mind, or inside the mind. The stone does not exist at all. Only the information contained in consciousness of thought about a stone exists.
The stone is an illusion.
We do not exist in Reality. Reality exists in our minds.
Every mind will choose its own answers and create its own illusions of Reality.
Any one illusion is just as true, and just as good as any other.

When one surrenders the ego and recognizes its own solipsism, then it will recognize its own Reality for what it is; an illusion. Only then will it realize there are no answers. There are only choices.

The more we learn...the less we know.
The more we know...the less we learn.

We are fractals of the IS. Without limitations nothing can be measured, nothing can be learned. Nothing gained. We create our own classroom dudes. 'Life' is learning. 'Reality' is where we come to do it.

[DigitalBuddha]

Check out "Is The Universe Alive?'

THROUGH THE WORMHOLE : As scientists peer across the galaxy, a new revelation emerges: The universe is shockingly organic. Are the secrets to the life and death of the universe hidden not in physics, but biology? Could it be that the universe is alive?

It's alive, it's alive! - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LKtiR3Y3SE

[RighteousDude]

I'm going to go with Ed Abbey on this one: To refute the solipsist or the metaphysical idealist all that you have to do is to take him out and throw a rock at his head: if he ducks, he's a liar. His logic may be airtight, but his argument, far from revealing the delusions of living experience, only exposes the limitations of logic.

[BikerDude]

Check out "Is The Universe Alive?'

THROUGH THE WORMHOLE : As scientists peer across the galaxy, a new revelation emerges: The universe is shockingly organic. Are the secrets to the life and death of the universe hidden not in physics, but biology? Could it be that the universe is alive?

It's alive, it's alive! - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LKtiR3Y3SE

"Scientists"? Which scientists?
I can watch a wildly successful show about bigfoot on the same channel.
And ancient astronauts and ghosts and on and on...
The aim of any of this is one thing. Ratings and advertising.

[BikerDude]

The answer to the question..."What is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything?" is not 42.
They just heard it wrong.
The answer is "Fortitude"....as in "to Abide".

That's because it's a human concept.
The universe is made of what, where and hows.
The "why's" are an invention of humans.
And only have meaning to humans.
In the end it's what we make it.
But in that type of large sense it's not in any way "true".
Things can be said about it in general terms. I'd suggest that the actual question that being asked in most of these type of questions is actually "how can I feel good". That is the fundamental imperative IMHO to most "quests" of the spiritual kind. The answer does vary by individual but will likely not vary all that much in the same culture.
But when a claim is made about something like telekinesis or telepathy, that is a concrete scientific claim.
If it's true it can, with almost complete certainty, be quantified and shown through experiment.
If it can't be proven then it's pretty clearly untrue. (Or yes not yet proven but Princeton allowed 28 years to a bunch of yoyo's determined to prove it in a formalized prestigious lab setting who came up with squat and even got the squat through sloppy science according to peer review)

[A Stoned Buddha]

The answer to the question..."What is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything?" is not 42.
They just heard it wrong.
The answer is "Fortitude"....as in "to Abide".

That's because it's a human concept.
The universe is made of what, where and hows.
The why's are an invention of humans.
And only have meaning to humans.
In the end it's what we make it.
But in that type of large sense it's not in any way "true".
I remains personal opinion.
But when a claim is made about something like telekinesis or telepathy that is a concrete scientific claim.
If it's true it can be quantified and shown through experiment.
If it can't be proven then it's pretty clearly untrue. (Or yes not yet proven but Princeton allowed 28 years to a bunch of yoyo's determined to prove it in a formalized prestigious lab setting who came up with squat and even got the squat through sloppy science according to peer review)

I don't know man. Are we not the universe? Did humanity come from a different place than the rest of the universe? If not, does that not mean that the universe is also made of why's, and that the universe also makes it's own "meaning"? In the exact same way that the apple tree apples, the universe peoples. It's turtles all the way down, man.

[BikerDude]

Whatever floats your boat I guess! Just because it can't be proven/disproven by science, doesn't make it any less real. You *may* be dismissing things that science will eventually discover; remember, science is constantly unveiling truth and to be so negatively dismissive of something you haven't experienced or understand doesn't make it any less real.

I didn't mean to sound demeaning. I used an extreme example to illustrate the point which I believe is valid.
If I was in my kitchen and for some reason I decided to "use the force" and make a pencil move across the table and it did, I'd have a "HOLY SHIT" moment. And I would suspect that I was onto something.
If I couldn't do it again it would quickly be a lot less "HOLY SHIT". And if I could not find any reliable evidence of others who could move it then I would simply have to assume that I did not in fact move the pencil and it moved for some other reason.
Experience does mean something but only when it's supported by some type of corroborating evidence.

[BikerDude]

The answer to the question..."What is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything?" is not 42.
They just heard it wrong.
The answer is "Fortitude"....as in "to Abide".

That's because it's a human concept.
The universe is made of what, where and hows.
The why's are an invention of humans.
And only have meaning to humans.
In the end it's what we make it.
But in that type of large sense it's not in any way "true".
I remains personal opinion.
But when a claim is made about something like telekinesis or telepathy that is a concrete scientific claim.
If it's true it can be quantified and shown through experiment.
If it can't be proven then it's pretty clearly untrue. (Or yes not yet proven but Princeton allowed 28 years to a bunch of yoyo's determined to prove it in a formalized prestigious lab setting who came up with squat and even got the squat through sloppy science according to peer review)

I don't know man. Are we not the universe? Did humanity come from a different place than the rest of the universe? If not, does that not mean that the universe is also made of why's, and that the universe also makes it's own "meaning"? In the exact same way that the apple tree apples, the universe peoples. It's turtles all the way down, man.

We are a part of the universe.
Some things are uniquely human.
Does the planet Jupiter like the taste of stawberries?
Whether strawberries taste good is a human concept and beyond that a personal concept. (and also of birds, bugs etc)
As a general rule we can say "Human's like strawberries" as supporting evidence I'd point to the fresh fruit (no pun intended) section.
Do birds and bugs ponder the meaning of life?
Maybe. I doubt it.

What brings meaning to our life ('ie' makes us feel good about ourselves) is likewise an invention of our species.
And in the sense that we come from the universe it is "connected" to the entire universe.
Certainly discovering clearly what is "inside" us leads to understandings of what is "outside".
It's probably fascinating to study. I'm sure we'd find a lot of things like a recent article I read that showed that receiving awards publicly leads to a longer life span. In a statistically demonstrable way. And the worst scenario is to be nominated for awards and lose BTW. I'm sure that one could make the case that the importance of honor in the "tribe" has been a very useful concept to the species because the criteria for assigning honor generally benefits the tribe overall. As in "great hunter" , "great warrior", "great doctor" whatever. So the tribes that had a strong affinity for this did better than the tribes that didn't and their genes likewise did better in the grand lottery of existence. The affinity for honor led to more members achieving things that benefit the tribe and as such the entire tribe thrived. I'm sure that for those honorees, a life led in such a way as to receive such awards would probably be what they would say gave them meaning. I'd posit that in this way the quest for meaning is it's self indelibly linked to us as a species and it is so because it "works". It is successful to the species.
So here we are. The universe has chosen. And the choice has become a part of who and what we are.
But as far as "Life's meaning" I think it's a human concept and that there are certain generalities that can be made but there is still no "true" meaning. It depends on the individual and upon the tribe. In larger sense as in the meaning to the species I'm sure it inevitably and finally results in success or failure. That's where the rubber meets the road and we see that the "why's" mean very little to the universe. Only the outcome matters. It has it's rules.
You can't cheat the mountain Pilgrim. Mountain has it's rules.