“Too many people spend their entire existence ignorant of the core values that drive them. They focus on what the world around them tells them to value, and they build a career, a family, and a life on these values. Then they wonder why they aren’t fulfilled.”
— G. Scott Graham, MDMA and Grief
“Effective Logistics Make Paddleboarding with Dogs Smoother: Successfully managing paddleboards, leashes, and dogs requires careful planning to prevent chaos.”
— G. Scott Graham, SUP with your Pup: A Guide to Paddleboarding with your Dog
tags: dog-training, paddleboarding, sup
“Over time, Mettā builds a bridge between parts of yourself that grief scattered.
It says: You are not broken for still hurting.
You are not selfish for loving again.
You are not alone.”
— G. Scott Graham, Come As You Are: Five Years Later
tags: grief-quotes, metta
“Engagement is not merely an enhancement to the psychedelic experience—it is the key to its transformative potential. The difference between a journey that fades into memory and one that catalyzes profound change lies in the willingness to fully participate.”
— G. Scott Graham, Engagement: The Missing Component in Psychedelic Therapy
“If you believe your practice only “counts” when you’re sitting with your eyes closed, you’re missing 90% of the path.
Your cushion is your lab.
Your life is the field.
That’s where real practice happens.”
— G. Scott Graham, Now what? After Your Vipassana Course Is Over
tags: vipassana, vipassana-meditation
“Engagement means being fully present and actively involved in the experience. This does not mean attempting to steer the journey in a specific direction or resisting difficult emotions. Instead, it is about cultivating a dynamic relationship with the experience—allowing it to unfold while remaining connected and responsive.”
— G. Scott Graham, Engagement: The Missing Component in Psychedelic Therapy
“You are not bound by the past; you are building what comes next. And at the heart of it all is the mind.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Maṅgala Sutta
tags: 38-blessings, buddhist-quotes, life-design, mangala-sutta, maṅgala-sutta
“The fourth precept, traditionally phrased as ‘To refrain from false speech,’ can be transformed into a positive and empowering ideal: I cultivate truthful, kind, and meaningful speech.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
tags: atthasīla, buddhist-ethics, eight-precepts, eightfold-ethical-conduct, uposatha-vows
“Psychological flexibility is the ability to remain present and open to experiences, even when they are challenging, unfamiliar, or emotionally intense. It is the capacity to embrace each moment as it unfolds rather than reacting with resistance, avoidance, or an attempt to impose control.”
— G. Scott Graham, Engagement: The Missing Component in Psychedelic Therapy
“Yathā bhūta asks:
Can you witness your experience without flinching?
Can you see what’s actually here—not what you were taught to see?
This is not passive acceptance. This is radical clarity.
And with it comes freedom—not from grief, but from the tyranny of pretending it’s something else.”
— G. Scott Graham, Come As You Are: Five Years Later
tags: as-it-is, grief, yathā-bhūta
“Here is the truth — I am just like the thousands of grieving people out there. I don’t have a disorder. I am just vocal and unapologetically public about it… People want you to grieve quietly, neatly, and in a way that doesn’t disturb the status quo.”
— G. Scott Graham, Come As You Are: Three Years Later
tags: grief-and-loss
“Your breath, the only thing you need for ānāpāna, is always with you.”
— G. Scott Graham, Psychedelic Preparation Workbook: Sixty Days to Engagement
tags: psychedelic-preparation
“The precepts are not just lists of things to avoid. They are not about deprivation. They are about aligning yourself with a way of being that minimizes harm, maximizes wisdom, and brings peace to yourself and those around you.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
tags: buddhism
“Psychedelics hold immense potential for healing, insight, and transformation—but they are not magic pills that work on their own. They offer an opportunity, an opening, a possibility. But whether that opportunity leads to lasting change depends on how we engage with it.”
— G. Scott Graham, Engagement: The Missing Component in Psychedelic Therapy
“It’s not about moving on. It was about staying connected. It was about staying committed. It was about honoring everything we worked for in our 31 years together. Changing my last name was a natural evolution of that focus.”
— G. Scott Graham, Come As You Are: Meditation & Grief
tags: grief
“A well-fitted dog life jacket provides buoyancy, reduces fatigue, and makes it easier to assist a struggling dog.”
— G. Scott Graham, SUP with your Pup: A Guide to Paddleboarding with your Dog
tags: dog-training, paddleboarding, sup
“Practice is not a measurement of your worth. It’s a commitment to stay aligned with truth.
That’s why we don’t chase perfection. We chase presence.”
— G. Scott Graham, Now what? After Your Vipassana Course Is Over
tags: vipassana, vipassana-meditation
“The measure of the precepts’ efficacy is not in how rigidly you adhere to them, but in how they change you. Is your mind less reactive? Do you feel more at ease, more stable, more content? Do you find yourself moving through the world with greater clarity and less fear? Because that is the silent power of ethical living—it sends a message to those around you: ‘You have nothing to fear from me.’”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
tags: buddhism, buddhist
“The third precept, traditionally stated as ‘To refrain from sexual activity,’ can be reframed into a more expansive and positive ideal: I honor relationships with integrity, mindfulness, and care.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
tags: atthasīla, buddhist-ethics, eight-precepts, eightfold-ethical-conduct, uposatha-vows
“Before you can teach your dog paddleboarding, you need to master your own paddleboarding skills.”
— G. Scott Graham, SUP with your Pup: A Guide to Paddleboarding with your Dog
tags: dog-training, paddleboarding, sup
“The precepts are not chains—they are keys. Keys that unlock a life of greater freedom, greater clarity, and greater peace.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
“We aren’t stupid. We are grieving. Of the many themes that have emerged over the past seventeen months, this one has been the most consistent. Coming up again and again.”
— G. Scott Graham, Come As You Are: Meditation & Grief
tags: grief-quotes
“Sitting daily sounds simple. But in real life — with real demands, distractions, and inner resistance — it’s hard. Not because the technique is flawed, but because we were never trained to build a life around it.”
— G. Scott Graham, Now what? After Your Vipassana Course Is Over
tags: vipassana, vipassana-meditation
“MDMA alone is not a solution for grief.
I know I have said this already. But it is so important that I must revisit it, lest someone think that I am wounded in some way and MDMA is going to cure me somehow.”
— G. Scott Graham, MDMA and Grief
tags: grief-and-loss-quotes
“While most people could tell you the general financial mix of their investment portfolio, while most people could tell you how to connect to the Bluetooth stereo in their car, while most people could tell you how to disable the security system of their home, those same people could not tell you their governing values and how those values interplay with each other.”
— G. Scott Graham, MDMA and Grief
tags: values
“Most businesses don’t fail because of one catastrophic mistake.
They fail because something important went unnoticed for too long.”
— G. Scott Graham, Early Warning Signals
tags: business
“That is the delicate balance we must walk. We hold ourselves accountable, but we do not punish ourselves. We strive, but we do not cling to perfection. We live with awareness, knowing that every choice, every vow, every small effort in the direction of wisdom and compassion matters.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
“Don’t make a mental mistake during your therapeutic psychedelic experience. Develop your equanimity / psychological flexibility and use a Race Day Strategy.”
— G. Scott Graham, Psychedelic Preparation Workbook: Sixty Days to Engagement
tags: psychedelic-preparation
“By thoughtfully designing our lives, we make progress on the path sustainable and self-reinforcing… making it easier to live in alignment with the Mangala Sutta with less struggle and more ease.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Maṅgala Sutta
tags: 38-blessings, buddhist-quotes, life-design, mangala-sutta, maṅgala-sutta
“The precepts do not limit us, they liberate us. They clear away the noise, the excess, the distractions, leaving us with something far more valuable: a life fully lived.”
— G. Scott Graham, Living the Eight Precepts
tags: buddhist-wisdom