Many people never grow up. They stay all their lives with a passionate need for external authority and guidance, pretending not to trust their own judgment.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of trusting one's own judgment instead of relying on external authority.
Alan Watts highlights the tendency of many individuals to cling to external sources of authority and guidance throughout their lives, often at the expense of their own intuition and judgment. He suggests that true growth involves developing self-reliance and the courage to trust one's own insights and decisions, rather than remaining dependent on others for validation and direction.
In practice
In a speech about personal development, you could emphasize the importance of trusting oneself with this quote.
Jesus Christ knew he was God. So wake up and find out eventually who you really are. In our culture, of course, they’ll say you’re crazy and you’re blasphemous, and they’ll either put you in jail or in a nut house (which is pretty much the same thing). However if you wake up in India and tell your friends and relations, ‘My goodness, I’ve just discovered that I’m God,’ they’ll laugh and say, ‘Oh, congratulations, at last you found out.
What we see as death, empty space, or nothingness is only the trough between the crests of this endlessly waving ocean. It is all part of the illusion that there should seem to be something to be gained in the future, and that there is an urgent necessity to go on and on until we get it. Yet just as there is no time but the present, and no one except the all-and-everything, there is never anything to be gained - though the zest of the game is to pretend that there is.
There is only this now. It does not come from anywhere; it is not going anywhere. It is not permanent, but it is not impermanent. Though moving, it is always still. When we try to catch it, it seems to run away, and yet it is always here and there is no escape from it. And when we turn around to find the self which knows this moment, we find that it has vanished like the past.
There are two specific objections to use of psychedelic drugs.First,use of these drugs may be dangerous.Howev er,every worth-while exploration is dangerous-climb ing mountains,testi ng aircraft,rocket ing into outer space,or collecting botanical specimens in jungles.But if you value knowledge & the actual delight of exploration more than mere duration of uneventful life,you are willing to take the risks.
The Godhead is never an object of its own knowledge. Just as a knife doesn't cut itself, fire doesn't burn itself, light doesn't illuminate itself. It's always an endless mystery to itself.
The religious idea of God cannot do full duty for the metaphysical infinity.
Human life as a whole is not inundated by technique. It has room for activities that are not rationally or systematically ordered. But the collision between spontaneous activities and technique is catastrophic for the spontaneous activities.
True humility-the basis of the Christian system-is the low but deep and firm foundation of all virtues.
Where there is no imagination there is no horror.
The nine-to-five is one of the greatest atrocities sprung upon mankind. You give your life to a function that doesn't interest you. This situation so repelled me that I was driven to drink, starvation, and mad females, simply as an alternative.
The body is the instrument of our hold on the world.
Always remember that you belong to no one, and no one belongs to you. Reflect that some day you will suddenly have to leave everything in this world - so make the acquaintanceship of God now.
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