Top 35 Stanislav Grof Quotes

Many of us who have experienced psychedelics feel very much that they are sacred tools. They open spiritual awareness.

As long as I had easy access to psychedelics at the government-sponsored research project, most of my energy went into psychedelic sessions.

At a time when unbridled greed, malignant aggression, and existence of weapons of mass destruction threatens the survival of humanity, we should seriously consider any avenue that offers some hope.

It is possible to see the intermediate state between lives as being in a way more important than incarnate existence.

There are people who can start having very powerful experiences without taking psychedelics. It can happen against their will. This is a universal phenomenon.

Each of us can manifest the properties of a field of consciousness that transcends space, time, and linear causality.

Many cultures have independently developed a belief system in reincarnation that includes return of the unit of consciousness to another physical lifetime on Earth.

When you read the psychedelic literature, there is a distinction between the so-called natural psychedelics and synthetic psychedelics that are artificially produced.

Coming to terms with the fear of death is conducive to healing, positive personality transformation, and consciousness evolution.

I believe it is essential for our planetary future to develop tools that can change the consciousness which has created the crisis that we are in.

Individuals approaching death often experience encounters with their dead relatives, who seem to welcome them to the next world. These deathbed visions are authentic and convincing; they are often followed by a state of euphoria and seem to ease the transition.

Traditional academic science describes human beings as highly developed animals and biological thinking machines. We appear to be Newtonian objects made of atoms, molecules, cells, tissues, and organs.

If consciousness can function independently of the body during one’s lifetime, it could be able to do the same after death.

The study of consciousness that can extend beyond the body is extremely important for the issue of survival, since it is this part of human personality that would be likely to survive death.

In some instances, the accuracy of past-life memories can be objectively verified, sometimes with remarkable detail.

The experiences associated with death were seen as visits to important dimensions of reality that deserved to be experienced, studied, and carefully mapped.

Walt Disney was my great hero.

Unlike scientism, science in the true sense of the word is open to unbiased investigation of any existing phenomena.

It is possible to spend one’s entire lifetime without ever experiencing the mystical realms or even without being aware of their existence.

The knowledge of the realm of death makes it possible for the shaman to move freely back and forth and mediate these journeys for other people.

An important consequence of freeing oneself from the fear of death is a radical opening to spirituality of a universal and non-denominational type.

Ancient eschatological texts are actually maps of the inner territories of the psyche that seem to transcend race and culture and originate in the collective unconscious.

In the kind of world we have today, transformation of humanity might well be our only real hope for survival.

I spent much of my later childhood and adolescence very, very involved and interested in art, and particularly in animated movies.

Research challenges the materialistic understanding of death, according to which biological death represents the final end of existence and of all conscious activity.

The materialistic paradigm of Western science has been a major obstacle for any objective evaluation of the data describing the events occurring at the time of death.

The beliefs concerning reincarnation have great ethical impact on human life and our relationship to the world.

I read Freud’s Introductory Lectures in Psychoanalysis in basically one sitting. I decided to enroll in medical school. It was almost like a conversion experience.

Dying people in pre-industrial cultures typically died in the context of an extended family, clan, or tribe.

A text of Tibetan Buddhism describes the time of death as a unique opportunity for spiritual liberation from the cycles of death and rebirth and a period that determines our next incarnation.

The psyche of the individual is commensurate with the totality of creative energy. This requires a most radical revision of Western psychology.

There is no fundamental difference between the preparation for death and the practice of dying, and spiritual practice leading to enlightenment.

Whether or not we believe in survival of consciousness after death, reincarnation, and karma, it has very serious implications for our behavior.

Freud said that we are born as a tabula rasa. This is a model that simply is too superficial and inadequate.

I have taken part in ceremonies with North American and Mexican shamans, as well as Brazilian ceremonies.