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Our suffering is caused by holding on to how things might have been, should have been, could have been.

Stephen Levine

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Stephen Levine
Age: 78 †
Born: 1937
Born: July 17
Died: 2016
Died: January 17
Poet
Screenwriter
the United States of America
Stephan Levine
Might
Things
Caused
Holding
Suffering

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Healing is bringing mercy and Awareness into that which we have held in judgment and fear.
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When we see all women as the divine mother and all men as the divine father, everyone you meet is sacred.
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Relate to the fear, not just from it. (50)
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Gratitude is the state of mind of thankfulness. As it is cultivated, we experience an increase in our sympathetic joy, our happiness at another's happiness. Just as in the cultivation of compassion, we may feel the pain of others, so we may begin to feel their joy as well. And it doesn't stop there.
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If sequestered pain made a sound, the atmosphere would be humming all the time.
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Death is just a change in lifestyles.
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We are so numb we don't even know what a direct experience is. We have an experience, then we think about it and we think the thinking about it is the experience.
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Buddha left a road map, Jesus left a road map, Krishna left a road map, Rand McNally left a road map. But you still have to travel the road yourself
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Forgiveness is mental floss! Build the capacity to forgive slowly - start with little unkind acts, otherwise you'll sabotage yourself. When we forgive, we forgive the actor, not the action.
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Sometimes pain and illness are not meant to be removed. You can't second-guess God. Rather than praying for it to go away, it's often wiser to pray that you learn as much from it as you possibly can.
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Understanding is the ultimate seduction of the mind. Go to the truth beyond the mind.
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That which is impermanent attracts compassion. That which is not provides wisdom. (116)
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Much thought has at its root a dissatisfaction with what is. Wanting is the urge for the next moment to contain what this moment does not. When there is wanting in the mind, that moment feels incomplete. Wanting is seeing elsewhere. Completeness is being right here.
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The mind creates the abyss. The heart crosses over it. Love is the bridge.
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In Chinese, the word for heart and mind is the same -- Hsin. For when the heart is open and the mind is clear they are of one substance, of one essence.
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Letting go of our suffering is the hardest work we will ever do. It is also the most fruitful. To heal means to meet ourselves in a new way -- in the newness of each moment where all is possible and nothing is limited to the old.
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Safety is the most unsafe spiritual path you can take. Safety keeps you numb and dead. People are caught by surprise when it is time to die. They have allowed themselves to live so little.
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It doesn't matter how long you forget, only how soon you remember!
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You can call it wisdom, or sanity, or health, or enlightenment. I use the word God as a short-cut. I am comfortable with the word God because I don't have the foggiest idea of what it means.
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[D]etachment means letting go and nonattachment means simply letting be. (95)
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