Alan Watts in a nutshell: each present moment is eternity

Man, I dig Alan Watts.

I just finished re-reading my favorite Watts book, "The Wisdom of Insecurity." He wrote it at a time, 1951, when "dig" was becoming part of the lexicon of the Beat Generation. But Watts' cogent understanding of what genuine spirituality -- for lack of a better term -- is all about: timeless.

And so simple. Here's how the basic message of the book, as summarized in the final chapter, Religion Reviewed, flows. Watts' quotations are indented. My words precede the quotes.

We long for security. For absoluteness. For something unchanging. But reality isn't like that. Living isn't like that. Movement is the stuff of life. Religions offer false promises.

We adopted the prevalent view that the existence of God, of any absolutes, and of an eternal order beyond this world is without logical support or meaning. We accepted the notion that such ideas are of no value for scientific prediction, and that all known events can be explained more simply without them. At the same time, we said that religion had no need to oppose this view, for almost all the spiritual traditions recognize that there is a stage in man's development when belief -- in contrast to faith -- and its securities have to be left behind.

When religion makes statements about the past or future, such as historical events or life after death, it enters the realm of science. Challenging those statements is fair game.

It states that this world was made by God, and that he made it for a purpose which will be fulfilled in the distant future, in "the life of the world to come." It insists, furthermore, that man has an immortal soul, and prophesies that it will survive his physical death and live everlastingly. The scientist therefore seems justified in saying that such predictions cannot be verified, and that they are made with precious little reference to past events known to have happened... Religious people hope or believe that these things will be true.

But there is another way of looking upon religion, upon spirituality, upon wise compassionate meaningful living: a way that focuses on what experientially is -- the present moment -- not what supposedly was or will be.

Nevertheless, in the history of every important religion, there have been those who understood religious ideas and statements in a very different way... From this other and, we think, deeper point of view, religion is not a system of predictions. Its doctrines have to do, not with the future and the everlasting, but with the present and the eternal. They are not a set of beliefs and hopes but, on the contrary, a set of graphic symbols about present experience. 

This here-and-now reality can be described by words and other symbols, yet is not captured by them. Religious believers call it "God." Better to call it nothing, or if some term is desired, boundless mystery. 

Metaphysical language is negative because it is trying to say that words and ideas do not explain reality. It is not trying to persuade us that reality is something like a boundless mass of transparent jelly. It does not speak of some impalpable abstraction, but of this very world in which we live. This experience which we call things, colors, sounds, smells, tastes, forms, and weights is, in itself, no thing, no form, no number, no nothing -- but at this moment we behold it. We are, then, beholding the God which traditional doctrines call the boundless, formless, infinite, eternal, undivided, unmoved, and unchanging Reality -- the Absolute behind the relative, the Meaning behind thoughts and words.

We need to be cautious, though, about getting carried away with metaphysical notions. They can be useful insofar as they point us toward the present moment; however, when they divide reality (and us) into unreal abstractions, those notions feed our unrealistic desire for a realm of security separate from the here-and-now.

It is easy to see that this kind of language, whether in its religious or metaphysical forms, can lead to all manner of misunderstanding. For when the mind is divided, and "I" wants to get away from present experience, the whole notion of a supernatural world is its happy hide-out. The "I" is resisting an unhappy change, and so clings to the "unchanging" Absolute, forgetting that this Absolute is also the "unfixed." When life provides some bitter experience, the "I" can only support it with the guarantee that it is part of the plan of a loving Father God. But this very guarantee makes it impossible to realize the "love of God," which, as is well known, requires the giving up of "I."

Our longing for eternal life is fine. That longing is easily fulfilled. The mistake lies in believing that eternity is endless individual existence, rather than the everlasting present moment.

The misunderstanding of religious ideas is vividly illustrated in what men have made of the doctrine of immortality, heaven, and hell. But now it should be clear that eternal life is the realization that the present is the only reality, and that past and future can be distinguished from it in a conventional sense alone. The moment is the "door of heaven," the "straight and narrow way that leadeth unto life," because there is no room in it for the separate "I." In this experience there is no one experiencing the experience. The "rich man" cannot get through this door because he carries too much baggage: he is clinging to the past and the future. 

All that we really want, and will ever really have, is... each present moment. Grab it! Now!

When you are dying and coming to life in each moment, would-be scientific predictions about what will happen after death are of little consequence. The whole glory of it is that we do not know. Ideas of survival and annhiliation are alike based on the past, on memories of waking and sleeping, and, in their different ways, the notions of everlasting continuity and everlasting nothingness are without meaning... For there is no joy in continuity, in the perpetual. We desire it only because the present is empty... We do not really want continuity, but rather a present experience of total happiness. The thought of wanting such an experience to go on and on is the result of being self-conscious in the experience, and thus incompletely aware of it.

Genuine contentment, genuine happiness, genuine peace of mind -- it is blocked by feeling "I am content," "I am happy," "I am at peace." Feelings like these make us anxiously long for more of what the illusory "I" believes it possesses, and should possess in the future. 

So long as there is the feeling of an "I" having this experience, the moment is not all. Eternal life is realized when the last trace of difference between "I" and "now" has vanished -- when there is just the "now" and nothing else. By contrast, hell or "everlasting damnation" is not the everlastingness of time going on forever, but of the unbroken circle, the continuity and frustration of going round and round in pursuit of something which can never be attained. Hell is the fatuity, the everlasting impossibility, of self-love, self-consciousness, and self-possession. It is trying to see one's own eyes, hear one's own ears, and kiss one's own lips.

There's nothing preventing us from experiencing the heaven of here-and-now. Just be here. Now. Not as two. As one: the experience of here-and-now.

If there is any problem at all, it is to see that in this instant you have no "I" to surrender. You are completely free to do this at any moment, and nothing whatever is stopping you. This is our freedom We are not, however, free to improve ourselves, to surrender ourselves, to lay ourselves open to grace, for all such split-mindedness is the denial and postponement of our freedom. It is trying to eat your mouth instead of bread.

...If, still thinking that there is an isolated "I," you identify it with God, you become the insufferable ego-maniac who thinks himself successful in attaining the impossible, in dominating experience, and in pursuing all vicious circles to satisfactory conclusions. When the snake swallows his tail he has a swelled head. It is quite another thing to see that you are your "fate," and that there is no one either to master it or to be mastered, to rule or to surrender.

...Discovering this the mind becomes whole: the split between I and me, man and the world, the ideal and the real, comes to an end. Paranoia, the mind beside itself, becomes metanoia, the mind with itself and so free from itself. Free from clutching at themselves the hands can handle; free from looking after themselves the eyes can see; free from trying to understand itself thought can think. In such feeling, seeing, and thinking life requires no future to complete itself nor explanation to justify itself.

In this moment it is finished.

Comments

[Mike Williams]

"For there is no joy in continuity, in the perpetual. We desire it only because the present is empty... We do not really want continuity, but rather a present experience of total happiness. The thought of wanting such an experience to go on and on is the result of being self-conscious in the experience, and thus incompletely aware of it.
quote Watts

Now days Ramesh Balsekar is the new Watts.

But, heaven, or hell ... would not the worst
situation be non experiencing ?

Non experiencing is no fun. Our greatest fear.
To never ever experience again.

No plants, no trees, no animals, no
blue sky, no cold Budweiser.

Wait a minute ... no cold Budweiser !!!!!!!!!!

Gurinder.... hold on ......
I am coming back !!!!!!!!

[Mike Williams]

"We do not really want continuity, but rather a present experience of total happiness."
quote Watts (and U. G. Krishnamurti )

It seems all happiness comes from
experience. Happiness is an experience.

Therefore, we want experience to continue
first, because without it, we cannot be
happy.

Even the selfless person prefers experience
over non experience after death.

The question is, what is it in us that
prefers experience ?

[cc]

"Our longing for eternal life is fine. That longing is easily fulfilled. The mistake lies in believing that eternity is endless individual existence, rather than the everlasting present moment."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21518574

[cc]

"Alan Watts in a nutshell: each present moment is eternity"

...especially when in the presence of a voluble religious person.

[Nick Ny]

Have you read "journey of souls" by Dr. Michael Newton? It's a pretty interesting concept of past life regression and life between lives which we experience as a soul, I would be interested to get your feedback on it.

[Mike Williams]

Hi Nick,
Why don't you tell us what he said if
possible.

[Nick Ny]

Mike, here's the link to the website, it's a good read and I would highly recommend reading Michael Newtons books especially journey of souls and destiny of souls

http://www.spiritualregression.org/page.php?slug=life-between-lives

[cc]

In trying to understand why religious nuts are attracted to this blog, I wonder if it might have to do with the name, Church of the Churchless. Might it be that "spiritual" people who distinguish themselves from church-goers, think this is the place to congregate?

[Mike Williams]

Thanks Nick,
I will read it.

Note: In the next weeks and months
I would like to explain why I consider
mindfulness extremely dangerous. Why
I consider enlightened people extremely
dangerous to society. Why I hate
the Zen bastard hypocrites.

This will not make me popular with
exsatsangis. As I will also explain
why exsatsangis were more deluded
and stupid than they could have
ever imagined.

Why I consider satsangi and exsatsangis
caught in the web of hypnotism.

Why they are both deluded.

[The9thGate]

Hey Mike...I would love to know what you have to say on the dangers of mindfulness....I am an ex-satsangi as you may have gathered but am still prone to bouts of delusion and stupidity....looking forward to getting educated at your convenience.

[tucson]

Alan Watts/Buddhism/Taoism/Advaita/etc.

in a nutshell, imo..

Losing oneself in what is here is realizing that "Here" is what one is.

It could be said different ways but all just as simply.

[cc]

Yeah, Mike, me too...the Zen bastard hypocrites laid waste to our village and made off with our wives, all because of their goddam mindfulness. Looking forward to whatever you can say to make me feel better about my wretched condition and those rotten scoundrels.

[Gaz]

Hey The9thGate,

I have been busy man, I want to communicate with you regarding RS, i give Brian Hines permission to send my email address over to you.

Gaz

[Mike Williams]

Hi 9th Gate and CC,
Yes, I am very very negative on mindfulnesss.
Biggest mistake you can make. The Zen have the
worst scandals for a reason, although I love
Alan Watts. If you read Alan Watts carefully,
he debunks Zen. He did a brilliant job.
He turns it around and sets it straight.
Incredibly clever fellow.

Why don't I like mindfulness ? I spent years
with the Gurdjieff Ouspensky group practising
mindfulness. Every thought and eventually
every dream !!! They had techniques for even
watching every word you said. They even went
beyond this and banished every emotion.

Thought and emotion drained energy from the
transformation of this energy into a higher
energy. P. D. Ouspensky was a scientist
and had mapped out the inner planes.

They believed your so called astral and causal
were only in a neophite nebulous stage, unformed.
The trick was to save thought and emotion energy
and transform the astral and causal into a rock
solid entity, which could survive death.

They believed like Nietzsche in eternal recurrance,
with the twist the more conscious you become
in each life the better off you will be,
until you finally become fully conscious and
break the chain of eternal rebirth.

Beyond the causal to the higher dimensions.

Of course master jnani Ramana Maharshi said
a higher Force will enter and come down,
opening the centers from top down.
This Something Else he stated he could
transfer to his disciples. People mistake
the higher self for the Something else.

There is no higher self, there is only Something
Else. Something Else is NEVER YOU.

Ramana said it was not necessary to go
from the bottom up, such as kundalini.

Ramana was right and the Zen and Gurdjieff
people were wrong.

Ramana approached the self as a joke.

The Zen try to kill the self with a cannon,
instead of chasing it away with a broomstick.

The Something Else is an incredible flow
of pure compassion. It has no rules nor
regulations, no worship, no religion.
There is really nothing that can be said about it,
so it can't be preached on a street corner.
A Guru would never fathom it.

Something Else has a method to its madness.

Notice all the horrible people who practice
Radhasoami and Zen, etc. Do they really think
they can mask their truly horrid nature
from Something Else ?

These people all look for a method of practice.
They whitewash their evil with form.

The Heart of Compassion knows no practice, no way
and no means.

It is only a direct contact here and now.

Have you noticed that people from India often
state India is the most corrupt country in the
world ?

With all their religion and Gurus, they are
worse then Mexico.

Selflessness, enlightenment, may or may not
help humanity. If the person is still
ignorant and hynotised they may be as dangerous
as before.

The hypnotic spell not only covers the self,
it colors our daily lives. So, seeing there is no self is just one little piece of the puzzle. Our lives can still be disasterous.

Only the Heart, the Something Else, provides
the final solution. Enlightenment is kids stuff for demented cold blooded Zen freaks.

"If all men were angels, there would be no need for government."
quote Thomas Jefferson

[cc]

Wow, Mike! Your nuttiness is really inspiring!

[The9thGate]

Mike:- thank you for your prompt reply. This Something Else you speak of....is it something I can encounter? Can you tell me more about Something Else please?

[Mike Williams]

Hi 9th Gate,

Something Else can only be
touched right here and
right now.

Ramana Maharshi explains it
as a Force coming down through
the top of the head into
the higher heart chakra.

Nothing else is needed to be
accomplished, nor can anything
more ever be accomplished.

Something Else is completely
and totally competent.

Its modus operandi is to help
the world, not make people
religious.

It knows the future and knows
what needs to be done.

It sits directly on the top
of the middle of the head.

How do you find your missing hat
when it is sitting out of your eye
sight ..... on your head ?

All you can do is Feel it.

Right here and right now, in whatever
condition you are in. There are no
prerequisites. No stages, or steps.

Then you make absolutely no effort
to change your life in any way.

What needs to be changed will happen
without you even being aware of it.
But, you will change little.

Instead, the world will change around you.

All you can do is watch Something Else
do its magic.

[eric]

Since the past or the future is controlling you, you don't know how to enjoy the present moment – which is the most important time of your life. https://youtu.be/F5fGW7aq9cQ