Awareness Of Oneself – Alan Watts
“suppose we have a rope, and the one section of this rope is made of manila hemp, the next section is cotton, the next section is silk, the next section is nylon, and so on. now we tie a knot in this rope just an ordinary one
over knot you find by putting your finger in the knot you can move it all the way down the rope
now as this knot travels it’s first of all made of manila hemp it’s then made of cotton
it’s then made of silk it’s then made of nylon and so on but the knot keeps going on that’s
the integrity of pattern the continuing pattern which is what you are because you might you know
be for several years you might be a vegetarian and you might be a meat eater and so on and you
know your constitution changes all the time but people’s your friends still recognize you because
you’re still putting on the same show it’s the same pattern that is the recognizable individual
but we are trained in our language the very structure of the language we talk
deceives us into misunderstanding this because when we see a pattern
we ask what’s it made of”