Quotes from Alan Watts

We do not "come into" this world; we come out of it, as leaves from a tree. As the ocean "waves," the universe "peoples."

We love to see a child lost in the dance and not performing for an audience. To be happy and know that you are happy is really the overflowing cup of life. To dance as if there was no audience.

What would you like to do if money were no object? How would you really enjoy spending your life?

So many people of wealth understand much more about making and saving money than about using and enjoying it. They fail to live because they are always preparing to live.

Just as money is not real, consumable wealth, books are not life. To idolize scriptures is like eating paper currency.

The morning glory which blooms for an hour differs not at heart from a giant pine that lives for a thousand years.

Nothing satisfies an individual incapable of enjoyment.

The power of memories and expectations is such that for most human beings, the past and the future are not as real, but rather more real than the present.

To understand music, you must listen to it. But so long as you are thinking, "I am listening to this music," you are not listening.

The more a thing tends to be permanent, the more it tends to be lifeless.

When you look out of your eyes at nature happening out there...You're looking at you.

We are all as much extraordinary phenomena of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water, the flickering of fire, the arrangement of the stars and the form of a galaxy.

Things are as they are. Looking out into it the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations.

As a human being it is just my nature to enjoy and share philosophy. I do this in the same way that some birds are eagles and some doves, some flowers lilies and some roses.

Wonder, and its expression in poetry and the arts, are among the most important things which seem to distinguish men from other animals, and intelligent and sensitive people from morons.

Beyond positive and negative, what is Reality?

When we attempt to exercise power or control over someone else, we cannot avoid giving that person the very same power or control over us.

If we cling to belief in God, we cannot likewise have faith, since faith is not clinging but letting go.

You don't look out there for God, something in the sky, you look in you.

To know that you are God is another way of saying that you feel completely one with this universe.

If a flower had a God it would not be a transcendental flower but a field.

Many people think that the Bible is the authentic word of God and they worship the Bible, making it an idol.

The difficulty for most of us in the modern world is that the old-fashioned idea of God has become incredible or implausible.

You don't need to try to be God, you are! But if you try to be God it means you don't know you are.