Terence McKenna Quotes

The evolutionary impulse is towards disidentification from thinking and the arising of awareness or presence, but the gravitational pull of the old consciousness, or rather unconsciousness, is still quite heavy. It's been around for thousands of years.

What it takes to reach this place I'm speaking about is to be in spirit. You shift who you are away from what you have, what you do, what your reputation is, what people think of you, and all of that ego-based thinking. You shift into the understanding that who you are is a piece of God - who you are is a piece of the source - and when you stay connected to that in your thoughts you inspire others to do the same.

I can remember years ago sitting on my bed and suddenly thinking, "I am God."

After 32 years as a priest , I think its fair to say that most institutional churches are very limited in addressing higher levels of spiritual consciousness.

I think one of the most rewarding experiences in life is to see people come to Christ and make lifestyle changes. When that happens, you definitely see God behind it. This year we've seen eight students make first-time decisions for Christ and when I see that, it's a great feeling. I'm really thankful that God is changing somebody, or sometimes he's changing me.

I think if people raise their consciousness and find a purpose, everybody will be helped.

I think Easterners have to be dragged kicking and screaming to their mind about God, and I think Westerners have to be dragged kicking and screaming to their heart center about God.

Awake. Love. Think. Speak. Be walking trees. Be talking beasts. Be divine waters.

Each person's life is like a mandala - a vast, limitless circle. We stand in the center of our own circle, and everything we see, hear and think forms the mandala of our life ... everything that shows up in your mandala is a vehicle for your awakening.

What we usually call human evolution is the awakening of the divine nature within us.

The 'kingdom of God' is not something one waits for; it has no yesterday or tomorrow, it does not come 'in a thousand years' it is an experience within a heart; it is everywhere, it is nowhere.

Repentance may begin instantly, but reformation often requires a sphere of years.

The holy child is waiting to be born in every instant, not just once a year.

As an evolutionary biologist, I have learned over the years that most people do not want to see themselves as lumbering robots programmed to ensure the survival of their genes. I don't think they will want to see themselves as digital computers either. To be told by someone with impeccable scientific credentials that they are nothing of the kind can only be pleasing.

The thinking mind is a useful and powerful tool, but it is also very limiting when it takes over your life completely, when you don't realize that it is only a small aspect of the consciousness that you are.

Those questions - when you think about a thought, when you're believing a thought or concept and you question it - you realize that it changes things. Every cell in your body is awake with inquiry.

Sometimes when we awaken from the bad dream of disowning ourselves, we think that the sojourn to self-discovery is a new one. But it is an ancient quest.

What I believe is that we have this extraordinary spirit inside ourselves, which for me is our Buddha nature. I believe we are in the process of opening and getting closer and closer to our Buddha nature and stripping away all that is covering it. I don't think I'm going to end up meeting this one being up there or out there.

I think the years I have spent in prison have been the most formative and important in my life because of the discipline, the sensations, but chiefly the opportunity to think clearly, to try to understand things.

The thing is that the ego cannot cure itself of its own malady of egoism; it's already infected by the disease itself. And that is why it is necessary to go to a guru who knows God and by absorbing his consciousness into yourself, you discover that you aren't this ego. You cross that abyss and you find that you are infinite.

I want the Pope to have the Christ consciousness. I don't want to just talk about Christ.

If you accept that a relationship is here to make you conscious instead of happy, then the relationship will offer you salvation, and you will be aligning yourself with the higher consciousness that wants to be born into this world.

Human beings are on a journey of awareness, which has momentarily been interrupted by extraneous forces.

Sannyas is celebration of life, and sin is natural: natural in the sense that you are unconscious - what else can you do? In unconsciousness, sin is bound to happen. Sin simply means that you don't know what you are doing, you are unaware, so whatsoever you do goes wrong. But to recognize that "I am a sinner" is the beginning of a great pilgrimage. To recognize that "I am a sinner" is the beginning of real virtue. To see that "I am ignorant" is the first glimpse of wisdom.