"The immediate future of man lies in the imagination and in seeking the dimension where the imagination can be expressed."
Read quote
4 likes
Quote collection
Terence McKenna quotes (page 21 of 36)
705 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Inside the boundaries of the old paradigm there's no hope, there's no way out of the box of capitalism, monogamy, consumer fetishism, egoism, money worship, no way out. No way. No way out!"
Read quote
4 likes
"I do not think that the government, under the guise of some phony, alarmist, pseudo-scientific rhetoric, should attempt to control the evolution of consciousness. After all, if these things truly are consciousness-expanding, it doesn't take too much intelligence to realize that it is the absence of consciousness that is causing our flirtation with extinction and planetary disaster."
Read quote
4 likes
"We now know enough to fantasize realistically about what the alien would be like, and I think that this then sets up polarities in the collective psyche that previously we have only seen at the level of the individual."
Read quote
4 likes
"A global society is coming into being, a global society that is made out of information that was not intended to be ours, but is ours, by the mistaken invention of computers and the printing press, information is power, and information has spilled by the clumsy hands of the dominator culture so that the information is everywhere, never before has the situation been so fluid, we might be able to finally have a crack at this"
Read quote
4 likes
"Man was not put on this planet to toil in the mud. Or the god who put us on this planet to toil in the mud is no god I want to have any part of. It's some kind of gnostic demon. It's some kind of cannibalistic demiurge that should be thoroughly renounced and rejected."
Read quote
4 likes
"We have to claim anarchy and realize that systems have a life of their own that is anti-humanist. There is definitely an anti-humanist tendency in all systems."
Read quote
4 likes
"I believe that what makes the psychedelic experience so central is that it is a connection into a larger modality of organization on the planet, which is a fancy way of saying it connects you up to the mind of Nature Herself."
Read quote
4 likes
"What is needed, is an awakening."
Read quote
4 likes
"The way I think of the psychedelics is, they are catalysts to the imagination."
Read quote
4 likes
"The world could be anything, you know, It could be a solid state matrix of some sort. It could be an illusion. It could be a dream. I mean it really could be a dream."
Read quote
4 likes
"The psychedelic sets you at the beginning of the path, and then people do all kinds of things with it."
Read quote
4 likes
"Experientially there is only one religion, and it is shamanism and shamanic ecstasy."
Read quote
4 likes
"We are living in a state of constant scientific revolution. There is not a single area that you can name that is now seen as it was seen a hundred years ago. Nothing is left of the world view of one hundred years ago."
Read quote
4 likes
"We have the tools, the intellect, the will to create a caring global culture. It isn't going to come without a recognition of the power of the psychedelic experience. The psychedelic experience is the birth right of every human being on the planet. It is as much a basic part of each and every one of us as our sexuality, our national identity, our consciousness of self. And any society which attempts to hold back or impede this dimension of self-expression, when the history of that society is written, it will be called barbarous."
Read quote
4 likes
"One of the things that people don't do enough of when they do psychedelic work is spend time in the library."
Read quote
4 likes
"I don't believe that shamanism without hallucinogens is authentic shamanism or comfortable shamanism."
Read quote
4 likes
"Think about this for a moment, we grow so inured to these religious forms, think about the notion of instituting at the center of your religion a rite where you eat your god is probably a memory of a relationship to some kind of a psychedelic experience of some sort."
Read quote
4 likes
"If you charge off with some political agenda that is not informed by clarity, you are going to end up with business as usual. The road to hell is paved with good intentions but it is not paved with clarity."
Read quote
4 likes
"Plants seem like an excellent model for the kind of future that we should be building."
Read quote
4 likes