The universe is delightfully arranged...so that as it looks at itself, in order not to be one sided and prejudice it looks at itself from an uncountable number of points of view.
There is nothing to pursue because you are it...you always were it. If you do not know that you were God from the beginning you will try to become God by force.
Alan Watts
Jnana yoga is about developing the felt experience of knowing...the state where one is clearly awake and aware of the world as it is. It encapsulates a nonconceptual awareness that goes beyond thinking..
For that reason Watts tells us that it is incredibly important to unthink at least once a day.
He says that the thinking is all words about words and with thinking we become increasingly distant from life. We need to become, once again, like an infant. The baby has the oceantic experience...unable to distinguish between the universe and its action on the universe
There is an intellectual way of getting to this type of knowing. We can use mystical wisdom.
All mystical writing is just instruction. Mysticism, Watts shares, comes from a Greek word that means silence. We need to follow the instructions. What are those instructions?
"Stop look and listen!" That is yoga!
Through our seeking...even if seeking is said to be counterintuitive...we wille exhaust so many avenues that we eventually come to teh simple truth taht we were it all along.
A fool who persists in his folly, will eventually become wise...William Blake
We eventually will discover we are it but it is very uncomfortable because we can not grab this knowing, just like we can not see our eye with our eye, or grab our right hand with our right hand.
Tat taum asi is a beautiful truth we already have within us but we find it uncomfortable to ponder. Watts says it is like crawling into a hole and pulling the hole in after you.
Regardless...
..eventually you will realize that it is not necessary to hang onto to anything...to rely on...you are it...
All our terrific anxiety to survive is because we didn't know from the beginning that we were it. [but we did know from the beginning, Watts adds...when we were a baby]
Basic to Hindu's that we are all God in disquise and the world is an illusion. The way they create beautiful complicated music and liagh and play with it, instead of being all serious about it exemplifies this knowing.
If you do find out by any chance who you are instead of becoming merely lazy you start laughing and laughing leads to dancing and dancing needs music and you can play with each other for a change...
All is well!
Alan Watts /Official Alan Watts Org ( April 4, 2026) Intellectual Yoga: On the Limits of Thought https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jk0EhRKwT_c
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