Alan Watts - Clarity of Mind

February 21, 1973 - Delivered at the University of California, Los Angeles.

24:09
So these two senses of identity—the particular who I am, and the fact that I also realize that I am finally identical with what there is; you know, with the whole thing that’s going on. I mean, the two go together. They’re not antithetical in any way. The second one is basic, because that’s the way you felt when you were a baby. You have what Freud calls the oceanic feeling. And you knew that you were—you didn’t have words to put it in—but you knew that you were this jazz, whatever it is that is. And you made no distinction between the knower and the known, the voluntary and the involuntary, the doing and the happening. There was just this jazz. You knew that perfectly well as a baby. But then they came and put it on you that you were different, see? They wanted you to be something particular. And, well, so you learned that. Well, they put it on you so heavily that you forgot the first thing.

Text & Audio:
https://www.organism.earth/library/document/clarity-of-mind

Photo: Pike National Forest, Rampart Range