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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.

Irvin D. Yalom

Indeed, the evidence supporting the efficacy of group therapy, and the prevailing sentiment of the mental health profession, are sufficiently strong that it would be difficult to defend the adequacy of the inpatient unit that attempted to operate without a small group program.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Attempt Difficult Evidence Grow Health Impatient Indeed Operate Profession Small
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
One doesn’t do existential therapy as a freestanding separate theory; rather it informs your approach to such issues as death, which many therapists tend to shy away from.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Approach Death Existence Frestand Issue Ratherminform Separate Theory Therapy
If we climb high enough, we will reach a height from which tragedy ceases to look tragic.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Cease Climb Enough Height Loo Reach Tragedy Tragic We
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
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
Pandora’s box, but to re-enter life in a richer, more compassionate manner.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Box Compassionate Enter Life Maner More Pandora Re Richer
There is some evidence, for example, that those who enter the death-related professions (soldiers, doctors, priests, and morticians) may in part be motivated by a need to obtain control over death anxiety.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Anxiety Death Doctor Enter Evidence Example Ned Priest Professional Soldier
Love is not just a passion spark between two people; there is infinite difference between falling in love and standing in love.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Between Difference Fall Infinite Love Passion People Spark Stand
Were not teaching our students the importance of relationships with other people: how you work with them, what the relational pathology consists of, how you examine your own conscience, how you examine the inner world, how you examine your dreams.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Important Pathology People Relationship Student Teach Work
Hidden in disguise, leaking out in a variety of symptoms. It is the wellspring of many of our worries, stresses, and conflicts.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Conflict Disguise Hidden Leak Many Out Stresses Variety Wellspring Worry
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
And if you do the latter, you’re not so worried about the everyday trivialities of life, for example, petty concerns about secrecy or privacy.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Concern Day Every Example Latter Life Pretty Privacy Security Trivialities Worry
I think we ripple on into others, just like a stone puts its ripples into a brook. That, for me, too, is a source of comfort. It kind of, in a sense, negates the sense of total oblivion.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Brook Comfort Obvious Other Put Ripple Sense Source Stone Think
The creative members of an orthodoxy, any orthodoxy, ultimately outgrow their disciplines.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Creative Discipline Member Orthodoxy Outgrow Ultimate
I think my quarry is illusion. I war against magic. I believe that, though illusion often cheers and comforts, it ultimately and invariably weakens and constricts the spirit.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Against Believe Cheer Comfort Illusion Magic Quarry Think Though
You will search the world over and not find a nonsuperstitious community. As long as there is ignorance, there will be adherence to superstition. Dispelling ignorance is the only solution. That is why I teach.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Community Nonsuperstious Over Search World
Never take away anything if you have nothing better to offer
IRVIN D. YALOM

Anything Away Better never Nothing Offer Take
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. YALOM

Country Curious Experiment Life Live Message People Person Repeat Same Such Through Way Willing
If people in their 20s had more death awareness, would that in fact temper their ambition or drive?
IRVIN D. YALOM

Ambition Awareness Death Drive Fact More People Temper Twenty
When we have forgotten ourselves and become absorbed in someone (or something) outside ourselves
IRVIN D. YALOM

Absorbed Become Forgotten Ourselves Outside Someone Something
Death anxiety is the mother of all religions, which, in one way or another, attempt to temper the anguish of our finitude.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Anguish Another Anxiety Death Finitude Mother Religion Temper Way
Life is a miserable thing. I have decided to spend my life thinking about it.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Decide Life Miserable Spend Think
Death cures psychoneurosis. In a sense all these neurotic concerns–fear of rejection, interpersonal concerns–seem to melt away, and people get another perspective on their lives. The important things are really important, and the trivia of life is trivialized.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Away Concern Cure Dear Death Interpersonal Meet Neurotic Psychoneurious Rejection Seem Sense
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.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Country Emest Game never People Person Real Said Therapist Think
This is what makes us human. But it comes with a costly price: the wound of mortality. Our existence is forever shadowed by the knowledge that we will grow, blossom, and, inevitably, diminish and die.
IRVIN D. YALOM

Blossom Costly Diminish Existence Forever Knowledge Price Shadow Some Wound

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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