#002: Psilocybin & The Sands Of Time (SEN Interview, 1982) ~ Terence McKenna

Terence McKenna Psilocybin & The Sands Of Time (December, 1982) SEN Interview, Dolphin Tapes, Berkeley CA; Big Sur CA. ISBN: 0937727059. Presented: Esalen Institute, Big Sur CA. #002 The Paul Herbert Collection The second tape of Terence McKenna from the Paul Herbert Collection. These will be uploaded here in chronological order as they are aired on The Psychedelic Salon Podcast. These recordings have been digitized from Paul’s original cassettes by Lorenzo Hagerty, some are already featured on this channel and may differ in length and quality, these being professional recordings. Where possible images of the original cassette will be featured with these uploads and all videos will be in a new playlist, The Paul Herbert Collection. The Psychedelic Salon Podcast Terence quotes: “There is an element of risk [in using psychedelics]. I never tell people that there isn’t, but I think that the risk is worth it.“ “This [repression of psychedelic drugs] has, in my opinion, held back the Western development of understanding consciousness because quite simply, these states, I do not believe, are accessible by any means other than drugs.“ “The immediate future of man lies in the imagination and in seeking the dimension where the imagination can be expressed. The present cultural crisis on the surface of the planet is caused by the fact that this is not a fitting theater for the exercise of imagination. It wrecks the planet. The planet has its own Eco-systemic dynamics, which are not the dynamics of imagination.“ “A birth is a death. Everything you treasure, and believe in, and love, and relate to is destroyed for you when you leave the womb. And you are launched into another modality, a modality that perhaps you would not have chosen but that you cannot do anything about.“ “The drug may not be toxic, but you may be self-toxic, and you may discover this in the drug experience.“ “On these matters of specific fact, like is the mushroom an extraterrestrial and that sort of thing, I haven’t the faintest idea. The mushroom itself is such a mercurial, elusive, Zen sort of personality that I never believe a word it says. I simply entertain its notions and try and sort through them, and I found that to be the most enriching approach to it.“ “Could any symbol be any more appropriate of the ambiguity of human transformation? What mushroom is it that grows at the end of history? Is it Stropharia cubensis, or is it the creation of Edward Teller? This is an unresolved problem.“