Terence McKenna, brother Dennis McKenna, Self Transforming Machine Elves from Hyperspace
Influences
Food of The Gods, DMT, R. Gordon Wasson, Richard Schultes, Dennis McKenna, Aldous Huxley, Ralph Abraham, Rupert Sheldrake, Timothy Leary, O.T. Oss, O.N. Oeric, William Burroughs
Terence McKenna received a B.S. in Ecology and Conservation from the Tussman Experimental College, a short-lived outgrowth of UC Berkeley, in 1969. He spent the months after his graduation traveling through India and other Asian countries, alternately smuggling hashish and collecting butterflies for biological supply companies.
In 1971 Terence McKenna, his brother Dennis, and three others traveled to the Colombian Amazon in search of oo-koo-hé, a plant preparation containing DMT. At La Chorrera, at the urging of his brother, he allowed himself to be the subject of a psychedelic experiment which he claimed put him in contact with The Logos: an informative, hallucinatory voice nearly universal to the visionary experience. The revelations of this voice prompted him to undertake his investigations into the structure of the I Ching, which eventually led him to his Novelty Theory.
For most of the 1970s McKenna maintained a low profile, living in a nondescript suburban home, supporting his lifestyle with the royalties from the Magic Mushroom Growers Guide, and the cultivation and sale of psilocybin mushrooms. He said that he was frightened out of this line of work, and into public speaking by the harsh penalties the war on drugs exacted from his colleagues. He himself was once wanted by Interpol for drug trafficking.
McKenna was a contemporary and colleague of Ralph Abraham, Rupert Sheldrake, and Riane Eisler and participated in joint workshops and symposiums with them. He was a personal friend of Tom Robbins, and influenced the thought of numerous scientists, writers, artists, and entertainers.
He became a fixture of popular counterculture in his later years. Timothy Leary once introduced him as the real Tim Leary. He contributed to psychedelic and goa trance albums by The Shamen, Spacetime Continuum, Zuvuya and Shpongle, and his speeches were sampled by many others. He was a skilled orator, and admired by his fans for his eloquence. While some of his presentations included verbatim repetitions of the same catch phrases, his gift for extemporaneous speech allowed him to weave them into seamless performances that varied audience to audience. His responses to novel questions were often as sophisticated as his prepared material. In addition to psychedelic drugs, he spoke on the subjects of virtual reality (which he saw as a potential way to express artistically the experiences he had on heavy doses of psychedelics), 'techno-paganism,' artificial intelligence, evolution, extraterrestrials, ancestor-worship (or, as he put it, contacting 'dead people'), and aesthetic theory (art/visual experience as 'information,' hence the significance of hallucinatory visions experienced under the influence of psychedelics). He advised the taking of psychedelics in relatively-to-extremely large doses (claiming that those who had only sampled psychedelics in small doses had more than likely failed to access their full potential), particularly alone, in a dark room, without music or other forms of external stimulation. Philosophically and religiously, he expressed admiration for Marshall McLuhan, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Gnostic Christianity, and James Joyce (calling Finnegans Wake the best literary representation of the psychedelic experience). He remained suspicious of all forms of organized religion or guru-based forms of spiritual awakening. He thought of DMT as offering the peak of the psychedelic experience and spoke of the 'jeweled, self-dribbling basketballs' or 'self-transforming machine elves' that one encounters in that state. Although he avoided giving his allegiance to any one interpretation (part of his rejection of both monotheism and monogamy), he was open to the idea of psychedelics as being 'trans-dimensional travel, literally,' enabling an individual to encounter what could be aliens, ghosts/ancestors, or spirits of the earth.
McKenna also co-founded Botanical Dimensions with Kathleen Harrison (his colleague and wife of 17 years), a non-profit ethnobotanical preserve on the Island of Hawaii, where he lived for several years prior to his death. Before moving to Hawaii full time, McKenna split his time between Hawaii and a town called Occidental, located in the redwood studded hills of western Sonoma County, California (a town unique for its high concentration of visionaries and famous artists, including Tom Waits and Mickey Hart). He died of glioblastoma multiforme, a type of brain cancer. He was 53 years old. He is survived by his brother Dennis, his son Finn, and his daughter Klea.
God is not the Creator... God is the Energy out of which the entire Universe is made. Sentient Beings or Spirits are the Creator. God and these Spirits are each other's Mirror. They are One... but they have different Functions. Sentient Beings or Spirits are the Experimenters and the Universe is their Experiment. They fool around with God and God keeps them Happy. It's a very funny Universe.
I miss Terence's musings and can only wonder what he'd make of today: accelerated novelty as we descend through the flickering lights towards the glittering object, outside of history, entirely now, globally outrageous, a new home in the imagination, resting now by the water's edge, bathed in a halo of joy. How will the world end, with a whimper or with a bang, asked T.S. Eliot. "It is the business of the future to be dangerous. " -Alfred North Whitehead
*** Namaste! *** Thanx *** It's a big pleasure to hear you... your Being is a wonderful journey! *** Thanx for all the light and wisdom you give to the Planet! *** May the elements of night and day enlighten your path and sparkle brightful stars on your Being! *** Hari 3õ *** Mandana ***
haha, ur not gonna stop!! have a taste!....i added a mix of your mind;)it's the so good with so good:) it is something like the snowball effect. but the snow is as deep and packable as we can imagine. !! it's too good to stop! it is like our leg was asleep, but instead of feeling bad as the blood rushes in.. it feels uncomfortably good!!!ahh!! the more we relax into in and dont run away from it.. the better we can feel!!! say yes to something that may feel too good!, 4 u at the moment.. soon it will be the norm, waiting for you to let the volume push itself up.
ΩΩΩ≈≈≈mAY +he Pa+h yOu +RaVeI In 2•0•0•9 bE gArIaNdEd wI+h cOsmIc JewE*II*S••+hAnKyOu fOr cArIng + MaKiNg A dIfFeReNce cOsmIcAIIY•••yOu aRe aSsIs+iNg In +he pOSI+IvE tRaNsMu+a+iON oF cOnsCiOusNess≈≈≈ΩΩΩ
I must say Terence you presence rivals me... It shocks, pretrudes, and invades!
I experienced Sensory Deprivation this past weekend and it was such an awe-insping call to my ego. It basically crushed all my senses that my ego filtrates through everyday living. good stuff! I met the owner of the company known as "Crash" in Venice Beach... he is one rad cat... Im hoping to venture the tank in the next two weeks with a couple of new comrads, whom i spoke with about the phenomenal capabilities that the tank holds....!
</a
Online Now!
