--- title: "1 Understand Thought Quotes By Alan Wilson Watts" description: "1 Understand Thought quotes by Alan Wilson Watts. Plus more from Alan Wilson Watts and more Understand Thought sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26c/alan-wilson-watts-4665_live-and-die_ye-suffer-from-yourselves-none-else-comp_3217020.jpg" --- > [“Ye suffer from yourselves, none else compels,    None other holds you that ye live and die And whir upon the wheel, and hug and kiss      its spokes of agony,    Its tire of tears, its nave of nothingness. Discovering this the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/ye-suffer-from-yourselves-none-else-compels-none-other-holds-you-that-2/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26c/alan-wilson-watts-4665_live-and-die_ye-suffer-from-yourselves-none-else-comp_3217020.jpg) ## More by Alan Wilson Watts > [“Advice? I don’t have advice. Stop aspiring and start writing. If you’re writing, you’re a writer. Write like you’re a goddamn death row inmate…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/advice-i-don-t-have-advice-stop-aspiring-and-start-writing-if-you-re/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“The common mistake of the religious celibate has been to suppose that the highest spiritual life absolutely demands the renunciation of sexuality, as if…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/the-common-mistake-of-the-religious-celibate-has-been-to-suppose-that/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“Real freedom cannot exist alongside false freedom, but the abandonment of false freedom looks as if it would leave you as good as dead.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/real-freedom-cannot-exist-alongside-false-freedom-but-the-abandonment/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“But it is not that you are something which is just watching what happens. “What happens” is just using your organism to watch itself.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/but-it-is-not-that-you-are-something-which-is-just-watching-what/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“Read Theodore Schwenk’s marvelous book Sensitive Chaos (London, Rudolph Steiner Press, 1965),”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/read-theodore-schwenk-s-marvelous-book-sensitive-chaos-london-rudolph/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“Idolatry is not the use of images, but confusing them with what they represent, and in this respect mental images and lofty abstractions can…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/idolatry-is-not-the-use-of-images-but-confusing-them-with-what-they/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“The more we accustom ourselves to understanding the present in terms of memory, the unknown by the known, the living by the dead, the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/the-more-we-accustom-ourselves-to-understanding-the-present-in-terms/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“We do not dance to reach a certain point on the floor, but simply to dance. Energy itself, as William Blake said, is eternal…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/we-do-not-dance-to-reach-a-certain-point-on-the-floor-but-simply-to/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“Thought and science are therefore raising problems which their terms of study can never answer, many of which are doubtless problems only for thought.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/thought-and-science-are-therefore-raising-problems-which-their-terms/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“But this is at the same time a vivid way of saying that your soul, or rather your essential Self, is the whole cosmos…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/but-this-is-at-the-same-time-a-vivid-way-of-saying-that-your-soul-or/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“When you no longer make the distinction between the universe and how you are acting upon it, you are really on your own and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/when-you-no-longer-make-the-distinction-between-the-universe-and-how/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“My death will be the disappearance of a particular pattern in the water.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/my-death-will-be-the-disappearance-of-a-particular-pattern-in-the/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“I have always thought that all philosophical debates are ultimately between the partisans of structure and the partisans of "goo.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/i-have-always-thought-that-all-philosophical-debates-are-ultimately/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“We are living in a culture entirely hypnotized by the illusion of time, in which the so-called present moment is felt as nothing but…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/we-are-living-in-a-culture-entirely-hypnotized-by-the-illusion-of/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) > [“Where there is to be creative action, it is quite beside the point to discuss what we should or should not do in order…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/alan-wilson-watts/where-there-is-to-be-creative-action-it-is-quite-beside-the-point-to/) [Alan Wilson Watts](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/alan-wilson-watts/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/understand-thought/alan-wilson-watts/#itemlist", "name": "1 Understand Thought Quotes By Alan Wilson Watts", "numberOfItems": 1, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Ye suffer from yourselves, none else compels,    None other holds you that ye live and die And whir upon the wheel, and hug and kiss      its spokes of agony,    Its tire of tears, its nave of nothingness. Discovering this the mind becomes whole: the split between I and me, man and the world, the ideal and the real, comes to an end. Paranoia, the mind beside itself, becomes metanoia, the mind with itself and so free from itself. Free from clutching at themselves the hands can handle; free from looking after themselves the eyes can see; free from trying to understand itself thought can think. In such feeling, seeing, and thinking life requires no future to complete itself nor explanation to justify itself. 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