My name's Justin, and I'm a Buddhist. I take bits from Hindu, and Taoist philosophy as well though. I blog about religion, politics, philosophy, and whatever else I feel like blogging about. I've grown a lot over the years, but I'm still far from where I want to be. If you have any questions then ask away! Don't be shy.
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
Always aim at complete harmony of thought and word and deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well.
Mahatma Ghandi (via yellowpoppet)
“What we think, we become.”
-Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C
Alan Watts.
Here are four Alan Watts books for download in PDF format
The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
Modern Western culture and technology is inextricably tied to the belief in the existence of a self as a separate ego, separated from and in conflict with the rest of the world. In this classic book, Watts provides a lucid and simple presentation of an alternative view based on Hindi and Vedantic philosophy.
A witty attack on the illusion that the self is a separate ego that confronts a universe of alien physical objects.
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The Joyous Cosmology: Adventures in the Chemistry of Consciousness
The Joyous Cosmology is a brilliant arrangement of words describing experiences for which our language has no vocabulary. To understand this wonderful but difficult book it is useful to make the artificial distinction between the external and the internal. This is, of course, exactly the distinction which Alan Watts wants us to transcend. But Mr. Watts is playing the verbal game in a Western language, and his reader can be excused for following along with conventional dichotomous models.
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Myth and Ritual in Christianity
This book is a comprehensive and thorough, yet narrowly focused study on Christial ritual - specifically the gesticulations and gyrations associated with the Catholic mass. Protestants have always had a very difficult time understanding why Catholics do things the way they do, and now this book might help shed some light on this mystery. Even as a non-Catholic I was able to get a lot out of this book, but it must be approached with an open mind. Anyone who is dead set against the idea of elaborate, symbolic church rituals might find this book to be unfathomable. But if you look into the symbolism and psychological parallelism of these rituals, you will find that there is profound meaning and significace to what might have earlier appeared to be mere suprstitious incantation. This book is worth reading if you are curious as to the deeper philosophic significance of the actions performed at the Catholic mass, and non-Catholic Christians will be able to look into some of the religious secrets they have been missing.
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The Way of Zen
The Way of Zen begins as a succinct guide through the histories of Buddhism and Taoism leading up to the development of Zen Buddhism, which drew deeply from both traditions. It then goes on to paint a broad but insightful picture of Zen as it was and is practiced, both as a religion and as an element of diverse East Asian arts and disciplines. Watts’s narrative clears away the mystery while enhancing the mystique of Zen.
Since the first publication of this book in 1957, Zen Buddhism has become firmly established in the West. As Zen has taken root in Western soil, it has incorporated much of the attitude and approach set forth by Watts in The Way of Zen, which remains one of the most important introductory books in Western Zen.
“No one has given us such a concise … introduction to the whole history of this Far Eastern development of Buddhist thought as Alan Watts, in the present, highly readable work.” —Joseph CampbellDownload link
Really, the fundamental, ultimate mystery — the only thing you need to know to understand the deepest metaphysical secrets — is this: that for every outside there is an inside and for every inside there is an outside, and although they are different, they go together.
Alan Watts
