Alan Watts Being in the Way

Alan Watts pulls back the veil of ‘the human game,’ digging into language, ethics, finding balance, and the art of the controlled accident.

Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/alan

In this episode, Mark Watts introduces Alan Watts in ‘Learning the Human Game’ – originally recorded at a seminar at the University of Michigan. In this lecture, Alan explores the connection between language and ethics, helping us understand why the perfect balance between randomness and order is the optimal middle-ground for experiencing life.

This series is brought to you by the Alan Watts Organization and Ram Dass’ Love Serve Remember Foundation. Visit Alanwatts.org for full talks from Alan Watts.

“Mental health is a good game—and a good game is what keeps a certain balance between randomness and order. And a healthy society, therefore, is one which keeps a proper balance between law and whimsy.” – Alan Watts

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In 'On Being God,' Alan shares on therapy, religion, mystical experiences, & Jesus, before playing the hilarious and light-shedding role of a clinical patient who realizes they're God.

Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/alan

Following in the fashion of the last episode (Zen Bones), Mark Watts introduces another big-hall presentation from Alan Watts which creatively and colorfully explores western therapy and religion in relationship to the eastern mystical or altered state experience. This talk, aptly titled, 'On Being God,' was recorded in 1971 in New York City at a conference for western therapy and eastern religion, and features a unique experiment in which Alan positions himself as a clinical patient who believes themself to be God, giving way to lively, hilarious, and enlightening responses to a stream of audience questions.

This series is made in partnership with the Alan Watts Organization. Discover the official Alan Watts archive at alanwatts.org

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Uncovering how we arise mutually with all things, Alan Watts examines our place in the universe and how very natural it is to be human.

Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/alan

Continuing the last episode's dharma talk on Taoism, relativity, and the connections between you and not-you; Mark introduces part two of his father's classic talk, Being in the Way – a fundamental lecture by Alan explaining mutual arising within the context of a human-populated, yet ever-changing universe.

This series is made in partnership with the Alan Watts Organization. Discover the official Alan Watts archive at alanwatts.org

"You can be untaught. In other words, your mind can be wiped clean, and you can experience yourself as a whirlpool of energy in a stream which is the Tao, which is the total course of nature, the energy field of the whole cosmos." – Alan Watts

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Alan Watts illuminates the nuances of Zen and the Unspeakable World in this dynamic 'Zen Bones' talk adorned with Buddhist chanting, chimes, and gongs.

Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/alan

Mark Watts introduces a classic talk entitled, 'Zen Bones,' a remarkable public lecture that Alan gave in 1967 at the Avalon Ballroom (usually the scene of wild rock concerts) for a 'Zen-efit' put on by the San Fransisco Zen Center to raise money to purchase Tassajara – a remote Zen center in the mountains of Big Sur. Diverting this week from the 'small-audience' seminar and workshop recordings of our first few podcasts, this episode marks Alan's first 'big hall' recording on Being in the Way, fittingly opened by the dynamic resonance of chanting Buddhist monks, chimes, and gongs.

This series is made in partnership with the Alan Watts Organization. Discover the official Alan Watts archive at alanwatts.org

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Illuminating the truth of the relationship between awareness and self, Alan Watts naturally opens us to the inevitable ecstasy of surrender.

Today's podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Click to receive 10% off your first month with your own licensed professional therapist: betterhelp.com/alan

This series is made in partnership with the Alan Watts Organization. Discover the official Alan Watts archive at alanwatts.org

"There are states of consciousness in which you can listen to sound and realize that is the whole point of being alive, just to go with this particular energy manifestation that is happening right at this moment—to be it. The whole world is the energy playing, doing all this, like a kaleidoscope jazzing." – Alan Watts

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