To look at life without words is not to lose the ability to form words- to think, remember, and plan. To be silent is not to lose your tongue. On the contrary, it is only through silence that one can discover something new to talk about. One who talked incessantly, without stopping to look and listen, would repeat himself ad nauseam. It is the same with thinking, which is really silent talking. It is not, by itself, open to the discovery of anything new, for its only novelties are simply arrangements of old words and ideas. β¨ Alan Watts (1951). The Wisdom of Insecurity, Vintage
More Author Quotes
- We think that the world is limited and explained by its past. We tend to think that what happened in the past determines what is going to happen next, and we do not see that it is exactly the other w β¦ βΆ
- That's a waste of time. If you really understand Zen... you can use any book. You could use the Bible. You could use Alice in Wonderland. You could use the dictionary, because... the sound of the rai β¦ βΆ
- Thought is a means of concealing Truth. β¨ Alan Watts (1982). Play to Live: Selected Seminars
- The world is filled with love-play, from animal lust to sublime compassion.
- What we have forgotten is that thoughts and words are conventions, and that it is fatal to take conventions too seriously. A convention is a social convenience, as, for example, money ... but it is a β¦ βΆ
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