Alan Watts - The Art of Meditation

Alan Watts starts of this video by stating: "A person who thinks all the time has nothing to think about except thoughts, so he loses touch with reality and lives in a world of illusion." He then goes on to ask you to question what reality is. What is reality to you?

To get in touch with "reality" Alan asks you to consider meditation then Alan goes on to explain what meditation is and then asks you to just listen. Listen to the sounds around you without labeling or identifying with the sound... just listen.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Alan Watts
• Spirituality
• Zen
• Buddhism
• Buddhist
• Japan
• Japanese
• Self Help
• religion
• atheist
• god
• meditation

[timfosho]

@AgentLogik I actually come across this POV often and it is just a simple misunderstanding. He is not saying never think, never consider the future, he is merely teaching you what the now is and how to be in the now. There is a time and place for both, The point of this is to calm the mind and achieve clarity. After that consider the future as much as you will, until the next time you feel the need to clear your mind again. Its a perpetual process. Thinking muddies the mind. This cleans it.

[TheCaptinLove]

go to 1:16 to skip the woman talking.

[stfwho]

@vetiarvind u dream while sleeping. dreams are subconscious thoughts brought into the vision of your mind through hallucinogenic chemicals such as DMT. You can't escape thoughts by sleeping.

[vetiarvind]

@timfosho Nature has a natural antidote for thinking. It's called sleep ;-)

[AbattoirDream]

@timfosho exactly man, i say its fine to be 'in the now' and think about the future, as long as (mentally) you ARE in the now, and not somewhere actually thinking FROM WITHIN the future, about the future..

good stuff, just remember ppl.. you cant really 'get it wrong' -that itself should release some burden.

[AgentLogik]

Great video and indeed rare! Thanks for posting. Alan Watts' speeches are always captivating. I'm not so sure about his ideas about thought and future though. One can say living by his advice can lead to having the presence of a cat, or ant. Driven by the present, concept of future rests in its instincts which undoubtedly would take over if all thoughts are suspended (that is assuming seemingly external force will not drive the person). I would say thoughts and future do have their place.