The problem with the church and the synagogue is that they’re too talkative. You go to church on Sunday and they lecture God on what he’s supposed to do, as if he didn’t know. Then they lecture the people on what they should do, as if they could or would. And it’s incessant chatter. And I’m trying to persuade the church to cultivate mental silence.
Everybody knows—it’s a matter of public knowledge—that I’m a rascal: that I drink too much, that I sleep with too many women, that I—even people go so far as to say that I’m trying to commit suicide. Because Americans are terribly serious. They don’t understand certain things (that are understood in Europe and Asia) about the joyous life. They’re always wanting that everything you do is supposed to be “good for you.” Now, life is bad for you. Jung pointed out—he was joking—he said: life is a disease with a very bad prognosis. It lingers on for years and invariably ends with death. And, you know, everybody, mental health, everybody is after you for your best interests. And I’m sick of being pursued for my best interests.
If you’re going to survive elegantly, you must not feel a compulsion to survive.
“I” is like “eye:” it’s an aperture through which the universe is examining itself.
One doesn’t quite speak of achieving it, because you have to understand first that there is no separate “you” to achieve it.
What one does is mostly empty motions. When you understand that, however—look, this is the point that people need to understand: when you understand that, you can act creatively because you act with the whole energy of the universe behind you.