The pain is there; when you close one door on it, it knocks to come in somewhere else.
IRVIN D. YALOMIf 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.
More Irvin D. Yalom Quotes
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Religion has everything on its side: revelation, prophecies, government protection, the highest dignity and eminence. . . and more than this, the invaluable prerogative of being allowed to imprint its doctrines on the mind at a tender age of childhood, whereby they become almost innate ideas.
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I must stop him from being one of those who call themselves good because they have no claws.
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The more unlived your life, the greater your death anxiety.
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When that person dies, the whole cluster dies,too, vanishes from the living memory. I wonder who that person will be for me. Whose death will make me truly dead?
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I don’t let any personal views about religion cause me to want to take away something that’s offering the patient comfort.
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Despite the staunchest, most venerable defenses, we can never completely subdue death anxiety: it is always there, lurking in some hidden ravine of the mind.
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Though the physicality of death destroys us, the idea of death may save us.
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The death anxiety of many people is fueled … by disappointment at never having fulfilled their potential.
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Some piece of ourselves, not necessarily our consciousness, but some piece of ourselves gets passed on and on and on.
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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
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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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What? ‘Borderline patients play games’? That what you said? Ernest, you’ll never be a real therapist if you think like that. That’s exactly what I meant earlier when I talked about the dangers of diagnosis.
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Therapists need to have a long experience in personal therapy to see what it’s like to be on the other side of the couch and see what they find helpful or not helpful. And if possible, get into therapy at different stages of their life with different kinds of therapists just to sample a bit.
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To love means to be actively concerned for the life and the growth of another.
IRVIN D. YALOM