A curious thought experiment. . . Nietzsche’s message to us was to live life in such a way that we would be willing to repeat the same life eternally
IRVIN D. YALOMAs we reach the crest of life and look at the path before us, we apprehend that the path no longer ascends but slopes downward toward decline and diminishment. From that point on, concerns about death are never far from mind.
More Irvin D. Yalom Quotes
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Love is not just a passion spark between two people; there is infinite difference between falling in love and standing in love.
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He had learned long ago that, in general, the easier it was for anxious patients to reach him, the less likely they were to call. (107)
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You know, I think everybody I’ve seen has come from some other therapy, and almost invariably it’s very much the same thing: the therapist is too disinterested, a little too aloof, a little too inactive. They’re not really interested in the person, he doesn’t relate to the person.
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…the more unlived your life, the greater your death anxiety.
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If one is to love oneself one must behave in ways that one can admire.
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Some sort of greater awareness of their own finiteness and what their time on earth really is, and what they really want to do with their lives, could help improve them.
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If I had to pick out a therapist in a movie that I’d like to go see as a personal therapist, it would be Robin Williams in Goodwill Hunting.
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None of my patients are really troubled by the idea that some part of what they say might be in a book in the future.
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Self-awareness is a supreme gift, a treasure as precious as life.
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I dream of a love that is more than two people craving to possess one another.
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In a study we did of bereavement, we found that rather impressive numbers of widows and widowers had not simply gone back to their pre-loss functioning, but grown.
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Just as you were about to step on it, I asked you “Do you want to cross the footbridge to me?” – Immediately you did not want to anymore; and when I asked you again you remained silent.
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This was due to a kind of increased existential awareness that resulted from this confrontation with the death of another. And I think it brought them in touch with their own death, so they began to experience a kind of preciousness to life that comes with an experience of its transiency.
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We take pleasure not only in the growth of our patient but also in the ripple effect—the salutary influence our patients have upon those whom they touch in life.
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The drive for power is not uncommonly motivated by this dynamic. One’s own fear and sense of limitation is avoided by enlarging oneself and one’s sphere of control.
IRVIN D. YALOM