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Living is the original art. As a young man I wanted to be a poet and I learned along the way that I already was a poet.

Mark Nepo

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Mark Nepo
Age: 73
Born: 1951
Born: February 23
Poet
Brooklyn
New York
Learned
Living
Art
Young
Originals
Wanted
Original
Way
Poet
Men
Along
Already

More quotes by Mark Nepo

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Truth is a seed hidden in the days until watered by what life brings us.
Mark Nepo
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What is not ex-pressed is de-pressed.
Mark Nepo
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The many ways to listen have been reaching into me for years. To enter deep listening, I've had to learn how to keep emptying and opening, how to keep beginning. I've had to lean into all I don't understand, accepting that I am changed by what I hear.
Mark Nepo
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The sun doesn't stop shining because some people are blind.
Mark Nepo
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There are many ways that we grow, but there are two major ways: We shed what no longer works, or we're broken open. If we're unwilling to shed, then we will be broken open. Through shedding, we are worn down, just as nature is eroded to its beauty. I think that through suffering, human beings are eroded to our beauty.
Mark Nepo
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I looked a hundred times and all I saw was dust. The sun broke through and flecks of gold filled the air.
Mark Nepo
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We tend to make the thing in the way the way.
Mark Nepo
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The real & lasting practice for each of us is to remove what obstructs us so we can be who we are.
Mark Nepo
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I've learned that loving your self requires a courage unlike any other. It requires us to believe in and stay loyal to something no one else can see that keeps us in the world - our own self worth.
Mark Nepo
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I would rather be fooled than not believe.
Mark Nepo
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Part of the blessing and challenge of being human is that we must discover our own true nature.
Mark Nepo
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Wakefulness is not a destination but a song the human heart keeps singing, the way birds keep singing at the first sign of light.
Mark Nepo
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When the sweet ache of being alive, lodged between who you are and who you will be, is awakened, befriend this moment. It will guide you. Its sweetness is what holds you. Its ache is what moves you on.
Mark Nepo
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If we devote ourselves to the life at hand, the rest will follow. For life, it seems, reveals itself through those willing to live. Anything else, no matter how beautiful, is just advertising.
Mark Nepo
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In truth, the more we lean into life, the more we authentically interact with the world, the brighter our flame.
Mark Nepo
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When we are forced to stop the noise around us and in us, we begin to hear everything that is not us, and this is the beginning of humility and the renewal of our soul's energy as only by listening to all that is larger than us can we discover and feel our place in the Universe.
Mark Nepo
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When we deny what comes through us, it defines us. When we honestly face what comes through us, then who we are grows.
Mark Nepo
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The journey is made easier when we can accept that the process of living is designed for what matters to come through us tenderly.
Mark Nepo
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The paradox is that we have this amazing capacity in our minds and hearts to learn and gain insights and then to build a kind of personal storehouse of knowledge. The underside is that those insights harden and fill the spaces in our hearts and minds. They become assumptions, conclusions and judgments.
Mark Nepo
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The mystery is that whoever shows up when we dare to give has exactly what we need hidden in their trouble.
Mark Nepo