Alchemy and Kabbalah are later developments in my thinking. I think the primary interest has been the relationship of magic and mystery to logic and understanding. Those are the primary driving forces of my life. I have this ability, for some reason, to be able to hold both the Magical MysteryTour we're on in conjunction with the logical rigor of understanding theoretical physics, which makes me kind of a rare bird, because usually you're one or the other.

What I thought was unreal now, for me, seems in some ways to be more real than what I think to be real, which seems now to be unreal

A lot of things occurred to me with shamans in Peru.There were a number of different kinds of experiences that you learn from doing ritual and taking ayahuasca [a common tropical forest hallucinogen] is the key to understanding the native consciousness and perception of the world with the Peruvian shamans that you wouldn't get unless you had been with them, but every shamanic tradition, including the Native American tradition of medicine and cleansing ritual, like the Sun Dance or the sweat lodge.

Consciousness is the creative element in the universe. Without it, nothing would appear.

Most people who've never experienced non-ordinary states of consciousness and only hear them described tend to try to describe them in terms of the logical, rational way of looking at things, the so-called scientific explanation, which often leaves a lot lacking and doesn't really fulfill understanding the experience at all.

You had to be able to lift yourself outside of the time stream - and that essentially became what is called the yoga of time travel.

When I speak or when I offer ideas and explain how the universe seems to work from the point of view that I've understood, it seems to give people a lift - an unshackling or freeing.