Why are we here? What is experience? How do we describe Our Place in Things? How do we interpret our Reality? How do we interpret other people's Realites? What does it mean to be ALIVE? What are our basic Assumptions about Our Existence?
These are all very difficult but also very worthy questions to ask ourselves.
So much of our Awareness depends on exactly how much we 'Truly Understand'. Thankfully, we have access to generations of Individuals who have already put down in Writing what they believed to be the Answers to these Important Questions.
It is up to Us to pick up where they have left off. The Thread of Knowledge is Ours to Pull...
From his translating the Ideas of the far East into the language of the near West, to his helping hand at offering Christianity to open up to its own esoteric descriptions, Alan Watts has helped expand my consciousness in ways that both thrill and disturb. Books like Beyond Theology, Become What You Are, and The Book have helped to transform the way I interpret Our World.
From books on Buddism, Toaism, Christianity, and the underlying Perrenial Philosophy of all Religions, to amazing audio and video recordings of him Jovially Waxing Poetic on Existence and the Strangeness of Being Alive, Mr. Watts has a contageous excitement for his Subjects, and offers so much for us to Think about. It would be a shame for us not to Listen at least once.
His book No Boundaries was the seed that eventually would grow into a my passion for Increasing my Knowledge. It made me Realize that I knew (and know) practically nothing about what it means to be truly Aware, In, Of, and As this Universe.
The book Up From Eden, inspired me to look even deeper into Our Collective History in hopes of shedding more light on what it means to be a 'modern' Human.
His ability to sythesize seemingly disjointed perspectives into one cohesive whole is an invaluable gift to the rest of us.
And best of all, his source quotes can lead us in countless directions, pursuing additional words from the Authors that Speak to us the Clearest.
While it could be argued that Mr. Campbell wasn't actually a philosopher, I would recommend a second glance to help clear up this misconception. By comparing and contrasting the world's major mythologies and religions, Mr. Campbell has diffinitively shown us that, more often than not, they all are describing the Exact Same Mountain, they're just looking up at It from a slightly different point of view.
Knowing this simple Truth, that the esoteric similarities of all Religions, trump any exoteric differences, can help release us from our out-dated holy-war propensities, and Unite Us in our newly married Perspectives of Peace, Togetherness, and Understanding.
Power of Myth,The Inner Reaches of Outer Space, and Transformations of Myth Through Time are all Inpirational Works.
A man with the ability to see through practically everything. An intellect of dizzying capacity capable of turning almost anything you think you know about "Reality" completely upside-down.
After having watched and enjoying the documentary Zizek, I began looking into Slavoj Zizek's Writings.
I started with The Plague of Fantasies, one book of a trilogy of books called The Essential Zizek. While it can be extremely difficult to follow without a lot of previous study, his perspectives can really startle you in both their unique simplicity and their Profoundness.
I don't recommend Mr. Zizek as the best starting point. I think he makes for a better philosophical dessert than a beginning appetizer.