"You are the center of the mandala. You are not marginalized in any way. And the message that the culture gives us is that we are marginal... We are constantly told we are not special. So then when you look for guidance, direction, mentorship, we always look towards institutions. 'Well, I'll go to the University, or I'll go to the army, or I'll do something - somebody will tell me, give me a larger purpose.' But it's really yourself that is the final arbiter, and if you keep yourself as the final arbiter, you will be less susceptible to infection by cultural illusion. Now the problem with this is that it makes you feel bad to not be infected by cultural illusion, because it's called alienation. The reason we feel alienated is because the society is infantile, trivial and stupid. So the cost of sanity in this society is a certain level of alienation. I grapple with this because I am a parent, and I think anybody who has children comes to this realization: What will it be - Alienated cynical intellectual or slackjawed halfwit consumer of the horse shit being handed down from on high. There is not much choice. And we all want our children to be 'well adjusted' - unfortunately there is nothing to be well adjusted to. So that's a real problem..."
This turned out to be excellent!! I really enjoyed it! Terence McKenna had a lot of really important things to say in the last half of this talk, and I recommend watching at least the last half of it. The first half was really good as well, but it was the last half that inspired me the most. Part two is pretty interesting as well.
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