Jerome Tan > Jerome's Quotes

“Listen! Here’s all you need to know to become enlightened: Sit down, shut up, and ask yourself what’s true until you know. That’s it. That’s the whole deal; a complete teaching of enlightenment, a complete practice. If you ever have any questions or problems—no matter what the question or problem is—the answer is always exactly the same: Sit down, shut up, and ask yourself what’s true until you know. In other words, go jump off a cliff. Don’t go near the cliff and contemplate jumping off. Don’t read a book about jumping off. Don’t study the art and science of jumping off. Don’t join a support group for jumping off. Don’t write poems about jumping off. Don’t kiss the ass of someone else who jumped off. Just jump.”
― Jed McKenna, Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing

“Don Juan advises Carlito to choose a path with heart. I am familiar with it for the same reason that so many spiritual seekers are familiar with it, because it has that ring of sagely goodness that makes it the one thing out of all of Castenada’s writings that gets widely remembered. Does that make it true or valuable? Obviously not, just another cliché. Just another piece of pretty misdirection. I am well aware that a great many of the world’s most popular spiritual doctrines advocate a heart-centered approach to spiritual development, but popularity among the soundly asleep may not be the best criterion by which to judge a method for waking up.”
― Jed McKenna, Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing