The Book

(em português → sol2070.in/2024/01/alan-watts-livro-the-book/ )

I've already mentioned "The Book - On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are" (1966) by Alan Watts a few times. I remembered it fondly from reading it about six years ago, and I've just completed one of my future re-readings. This time I made a point of buying a physical copy (at a second-hand bookshop) to browse through.

Watts had a degree in theology and even worked as a university chaplain, but he was basically self-taught. He was one of the forerunners of the psychedelic ebullience of the 1960s and is also often described as one of the greatest interpreters of Eastern philosophies for the West. But that's not what this book is about.

It condenses an idea that Watts never tired of conveying, in many different ways, about the true nature of our identity.

We generally consider ourselves to be the body, or some consciousness (or soul) that inhabits it. Although the book mentions Eastern religions (mainly the Hindu Vedanta), this question and its consequences are investigated without adopting spiritual beliefs.

There is no secret. Nowadays this is common sense in significant sections of philosophy and science. Our bodies are expressions of an ecosystem which, in turn, is an expression of the way reality is organized and manifested. The same could be said, in a sense, about our minds or even everything. Nothing exists in isolation and independently.

So far, no shocking revelation. But the consequence of this understanding and insight is that I'm actually not what I thought I was. This insight can gradually guide the way we perceive, think and act. Then everything changes radically, potentially towards something much more open and vast.

Another quality of the book is the engaging prose, which captures much of Watts' oral eloquence.

The essential message is not very different from what the philosopher Spinoza said in the 17th century. But Watts is much more persuasive, musical and psychedelic.

Considering the era, he could not fail to be an incorrigible nonconformist. His reflections often slip, in a way that seems involuntary, into deliciously corrosive socio-political tirades.

Although today he has been elevated almost to the status of a guru, Watts never presented himself as such. Nor was he any kind of role model, joining the predominant club of thinkers with fine words and somewhat despicable behavior. Not that he was an abusive charlatan, but people in his family didn't necessarily admire him.

However, I don't think he was a hypocrite and, besides, who am I to speculate on that...

It's a nice book, but I much prefer listening to Alan Watt's talks, to be completely honest. He's very philosophically rigorous, much more than I'd imagine, but it really shows that he's been through academia, what with him having a master's degree in theology and all. I have to be in the mood for academic writing and I'm sad to say I wasn't in one while reading this book.

His main contention revolves around separation, of the illusion of anything existing independently from anything else — most of all, of you existing as a sovereign, independent entity.

He writes the following in one place:

"But I define myself in terms of you; I know myself only in terms of what is 'other', no matter whether I see the 'other' as below me or above me in any ladder of values. If above, I enjoy the kick of self-pity; if below, I enjoy the kick of pride. [...] Thus, as a great Hassidic rabbi put it, 'If I am I because you are you, and if you are you because I am I, then I am not I, and you are not you.' [...]

But the question is how to get over the sensation of being locked out from everything 'other,' of being only oneself — an organism flung into unavoidable competition and conflict with almost every 'object' in its experience. [...]"

He ends a particular chapter with the following words, which I found quite pertinent:

"As it is, we are merely bolting our lives—gulping down undigested experiences as fast as we can stuff them down in—because awareness of our own existence is so superficial and so narrow that nothing seems to us more boring than simple being. If I ask you what you did yesterday, I am likely to get nothing more than the thin, sketchy outline of the few things that you noticed, and of those only what you thought worth remembering. Is it surprising that an existence so experienced seems to so empty and bare that its hunger for an infinite future is insatiable?

But suppose you could answer, 'It would take me forever to tell you, and I am much too interested in what's happening now.' How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain can experience itself as anything less than a god?

And, when you consider that this incalculably subtle organism is inseparable from the still more marvelous patternms of its environment—from the minutest electrical design to the whole company of the galaxies—how is it conceivable that this incarnation of all eternity can be bored with being?"

All in all, I consider the book worth reading if you're a fan of Watts, but I have a hard time believing I will ever revisit this particular volume.