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Faith & Spirit Quote by Trey Anastasio

"Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul, you've got to run like an antelope out of control!"

About this Quote

"Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul" is Trey Anastasio doing what he does best: turning a jam-band surge into a philosophy you can shout while sprinting toward the unknown. The line mashes machinery and mysticism, a hot-wired metaphor that treats the self like a vehicle with hidden settings. You can coast in default mode, or you can slam the lever into something louder, riskier, more alive. It’s not subtle, and that’s the point. Phish lyrics often function less like diary entries and more like ignition switches.

Then comes the brilliant swerve: "run like an antelope out of control". The image is pure kinetic comedy and pure panic at once. Antelopes are grace, speed, instinct; "out of control" suggests the moment adrenaline outruns planning. Anastasio isn’t romanticizing chaos so much as glamorizing surrender to momentum-the kind that happens in a live set when the band stops steering and starts chasing the music.

Context matters: "Run Like an Antelope" is a concert engine, built for lift-off. These words don’t just describe a feeling; they instruct a crowd how to enter it together. The subtext is a quiet rejection of managed living: your "soul" has a high gear, but you won’t find it by optimizing your calendar. You find it by committing to motion before you’re fully ready, letting intensity be its own proof.

Quote Details

TopicMotivational
Source
Later attribution: Pattaya Hash (Avram Mednick, 2010) modern compilationISBN: 9781450277532 · ID: 1hU6wRPc14QC
Text match: 95.50%   Provider: Google Books
Evidence:
... Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul . You've got to run like an antelope : out of control . - Trey Anastasio , Tom Marshall , and Steve Pollak , 1983 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks to Richard Dumas and family for hosting us.
Other candidates (1)
Run Like an Antelope (Phish, 1990) primary60.0%
Song: "Run Like an Antelope" by Phish
Cite

Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Anastasio, Trey. (2026, April 1). Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul, you've got to run like an antelope out of control! FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/set-the-gearshift-for-the-high-gear-of-your-soul-72548/

Chicago Style
Anastasio, Trey. "Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul, you've got to run like an antelope out of control!" FixQuotes. April 1, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/set-the-gearshift-for-the-high-gear-of-your-soul-72548/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Set the gearshift for the high gear of your soul, you've got to run like an antelope out of control!" FixQuotes, 1 Apr. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/set-the-gearshift-for-the-high-gear-of-your-soul-72548/. Accessed 4 Apr. 2026.

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High gear of your soul - Trey Anastasio
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About the Author

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Trey Anastasio (born September 30, 1964) is a Musician from USA.

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