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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.

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
Experience
Even
Think
Thinking
Numb
Direct

More quotes by Stephen Levine

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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.
Stephen Levine
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The mind creates the abyss. The heart crosses over it. Love is the bridge.
Stephen Levine
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Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. There is nothing to do but be.
Stephen Levine
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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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Letting the last breath come. Letting the last breath go. Dissolving, dissolving into vast space, the light body released from its heavier form. A sense of connectedness with all that is, all sense of separation dissolved in the vastness of being. Each breath melting into space as though it were the last.
Stephen Levine
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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.
Stephen Levine
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We've all been should upon enough.
Stephen Levine
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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.
Stephen Levine
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Oxygen plays a pivotal role in the proper functioning of the immune system. We can look at oxygen deficiency as the single greatest cause of all diseases.
Stephen Levine
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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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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.
Stephen Levine
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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
Stephen Levine
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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.
Stephen Levine
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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.
Stephen Levine
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That which is impermanent attracts compassion. That which is not provides wisdom. (116)
Stephen Levine
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Relate to the fear, not just from it. (50)
Stephen Levine
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Understanding is the ultimate seduction of the mind. Go to the truth beyond the mind.
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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Our addiction to always being right is a great block to the truth. It keeps us from the kind of openness that comes from confidence in our natural wisdom.
Stephen Levine