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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.

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
Learn
Possibly
Pain
Illness
Often
Pray
Away
Meant
Sometimes
Praying
Much
Guess
Second
Removed
Rather
Wiser

More quotes by Stephen Levine

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[D]etachment means letting go and nonattachment means simply letting be. (95)
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Grief can have a quality of profound healing because we are forced to a depth of feeling that is usually below the threshold of awareness.
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Relate to the fear, not just from it. (50)
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It doesn't matter how long you forget, only how soon you remember!
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That which is impermanent attracts compassion. That which is not provides wisdom. (116)
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Wanting things to be otherwise is the very essence of suffering. We almost never directly experience what pain is because our reaction to it is so immediate that most of what we call pain is actually our experience of resistance to that phenomenon. And the resistance is usually a good deal more painful than the original sensation.
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If sequestered pain made a sound, the atmosphere would be humming all the time.
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Our suffering is caused by holding on to how things might have been, should have been, could have been.
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Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. There is nothing to do but be.
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Go to the truth beyond the mind. Love is the bridge.
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How soon will we accept this opportunity to be fully alive before we die? (88)
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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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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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Whatever prepares you for death enhances life.
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If you can find the God inside yourself, you can find the God inside everybody.
Stephen Levine
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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.
Stephen Levine
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Quoting son, Noah Levine: Once you see what the heart really needs, it doesn’t matter if you’re going to live or die, the work is always the same. (25)
Stephen Levine
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Your distance from your partner is the distance from your heart. The things that make relationships difficult are some of the most precious aspects to us.
Stephen Levine
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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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I have never lived a life so much larger than death. (93)
Stephen Levine