“A person who thinks all the time has nothing to think about except thoughts. So, he loses touch with reality and lives in a world of illusions.

By thoughts I mean, specifically, chatter in the skull—perpetual and compulsive repetition of words, of reckoning, and of calculating.

I’m not saying that thinking is bad; like everything else, it’s useful in moderation, a good servant but a bad master.

And all so-called civilized peoples have increasingly become crazy and self destructive because through excessive thinking they have lost touch with reality. That’s to say we confuse signs, words, numbers, symbols, and ideas with the real world.

Most of us would have rather money than tangible wealth. And a great occasion is somehow spoiled for us unless photographed.”

—Alan Watts