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Though the physicality of death destroys us, the idea of death may save us.

Irvin D. Yalom

I must stop him from being one of those who call themselves good because they have no claws.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Being Call Claws Must No Stop Themselves
Life is a spark between two identical voids, the darkness before birth and the one after death.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Before Birth Darkness Death Identical Life Spark Void
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Goodwill Movie Out People Peron Person Pick Sea Therapist
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

Control Drive Enlarge Fear Limitation Motivate Oneself Own Power S[Here
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Couch Experience Like Long Need Personal Side Therapist
Mirroring, softly, barely audibly, just under the membrane of consciousness.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Barely Consciousness Just Membrance Mirror Softly Under
One reason patients are reluctant to work in a therapy group is they fear that things will go too far, that the powerful therapist or the collective group might coerce them to lose control–to say or think or feel things that will be catastrophic.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Far Fear Group Once Patient Powerful Reason Reluctant Therapist Therapy Thing Too Work
I thought a lot about how someone very old is the last living individual to have known some person or cluster of people.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Cluster Individual Known Last Live Old People Person Some Someone Thought
Mature love is loving, not being loved.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Being Love Loved Loving Mature
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Dignity Else Emerence Everything Government Highest More Protection Religion Revelation
Rather, love is a way of being, a “giving to,” not a ‘falling for”; a mode of relating at large, not an act limited to a single person.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Being Fall Give Large Limited Love Mode Person Rather Relate Single Way
The creative members of an orthodoxy, any orthodoxy, ultimately outgrow their disciplines.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Creative Discipline Member Orthodoxy Outgrow Ultimate
If you want to choose the pleasure of growth, prepare yourself for some pain.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Choose Growth Pain Pleasure Prepare Some Want
Life as a therapist is a life of service in which we daily transcend our personal wishes and turn our gaze toward the needs and growth of the other.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Gaze Growth Life Need Personal Service Therapist Towards Transcend Wish
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Defense Despite Most Staunch Venerable
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Awareness Began Brought Come Confrontation Death Due Existential Experience Increase Preciousness Think

Though the physicality of death destroys us, the idea of death may save us.

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Though the physicality of death destroys us, the idea of death may save us.

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