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Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Terror of Death

Book by Irvin D. Yalom · 18 quotes · Anxiety, Death, Greater

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Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Terror of Death Quotes

“Self-awareness is a supreme gift, a treasure as precious as life. 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.”

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“It's not easy to live every moment wholly aware of death. It's like trying to stare the sun in the face: you can stand only so much of it. Because we cannot live frozen in fear, we generate methods to soften death's terror. We project ourselves into the future through our children; we grow rich, famous, ever larger; we develop compulsive protective rituals; or we embrace an impregnable belief in an ultimate rescuer.”

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“Try this thought experiment. Stare directly at the sun; take an unblinkered view at your place in existence; attempt to live without the protective railings many religions offer—that is, some form of continuation, immortality, or reincarnation, all of which deny death’s finality.”

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“Cada item de sua casa abrigava memórias das quais ela era então a única detentora. Ela me contou que todos os instrumentos seriam distribuídos a estrangeiros que jamais saberiam suas histórias ou os apreciariam como ela. E, um dia,sua própria morte apagaria, por fim, todas as ricas memórias incrustadas na espineta, no violoncelo, nas flautas, nos flautins e em muitos outros instrumentos. Seu passado sucumbiria juntamente com ela. (...) Agora ela sabia realmente que também era transitória, apenas de passagem pela casa, assim como todos os moradores anteriores. E a casa também era transitória e iria desaparecer algum dia para dar lugar a outra no mesmo terreno. O processo de abrir mão de seus bens e de se mudar foi uma experiência reveladora para Alice, que sempre havia se abrigado na ilusão confortável e acalentadora de uma vida ricamente mobiliada e atapetada. Agora ela aprendia que o luxo das posses materiais a havia protegido da esterilidade da existência.”

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