Sunday, October 04, 2026
-----It's 9:09 am, I took some trash out, took a walk around the yard looking for future projects and am now nibbling on a chipotle-flavored tostada. Watcha doing?
-----Reading about Thaddeus Golas whose name I had put down in my commonplace book. I read his <i>The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment</i> decades ago(when I was in junior high). This little book, just 100 pages, is a cornerstone of 1970s counterculture. If I remember right, it has New Age thought(not always my thing), psyhedelic philosophy(uhmm) and accessible self-help(that I can get behind).
~~~~~Golas came from Paterson, New Jersey and his parents were Polish immigrants. He was born in the early 20s and died in 1997.
~~~~~Hardships: Father died when he was four, stepfather died when he was fourteen, YEARS without plumbing or electricity!
~~~~~Served our country: WWII in the 604th Engineer Camouflage Battalion. Briefly saw combat before the Battle of the Bulge(my father was at that very hard and cold battle).
~~~~~Studied at Columbia University under Jacques Barzan (earning his BA in '48).
~~~~~Publishing... worked at Ballantine, Redbook, Harper & Row. Before he moved to San Francisco, where the counterculture shaped his worldview (age he moved?).
~~~~~<i>The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment</i> was his major work and became an underground classic. Came out in 1972, self-published and later picked up by Bantam Books. Enlightenment is accessible....not just for gurus or ascetics. He felt you don't strive for spiritual growth you <i>relax into it</i>.... maybe I feel both. He felt that love and expanded conciousness are natural states, not achievements. "Seperation is an illusion;unity is the underlying reality."
~~~~~"Be, don't do." Joy comes from alignment, not effort. Umm, don't you have to make effort to align ... put yourself in the right places, choices, mindset, etc.?
~~~~~Okay, so I get it. He wasn't big on discipline. He felt that spiritual awakening was a shift in perception (not something done by adjusting morals or behavior).
~~~~~He later removed explicit LSD references from his work.
~~~~~conversational, not dogmatic (doesn't mean I agree with him)
~~~~~Optomistic .... inherent divinity, joy without struggle
~~~~~A lot of readers describe the book as a "trigger" for transcendental experiences.
~~~~~Other stuff published through Seed Center Books/Even Lazier Publishing ... <i>Love and Pain</i>, The Lazy Man's Life(autobiography), The Cosmic Airdrome(essays), audio recordings of The Lazy Man's Guide.
~~~~~Also lived in Hollywood and Redway.
~~~~~Somewhat reclusive?
~~~~~Published little after his main work (I really like that some times ... the effort put into one piece of expression). He still had a devoted readership, despite this.
~~~~~Themes that go with me: perception (his is choosing perception over performance) , awakening, stepping through doorways, seeing clearly after years of distortion, reclaiming your consciousness, refusing to carry what isn't yours, stepping into life vs. shrinking inside it
"I am writing what I will want to read some day when I am stuck in a weird place..."
Yes, I am rereading this book and will let you know how it goes. Nope, I don't subscribe to the drug use ... I just read all sorts of people.
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