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Writer's pictureAlistair Appleton

the translation of nirvana: phew!

Alan Watts’ smoke-kippered and throaty laugh:

& the perfect translation of nirvana – which means ‘blowing out’ at Sanskrit root – is not extinction or any such disappearing metaphors, it is the cartoon sigh of relief: ‘Phew!’. It’s that huge, laughing, blinking sense of RELIEF. There’s nothing to do, nothing to correct. No original sin. No future to slog towards. No past to lug around like a sack of rocks.

Phew!

I love Watts.

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