Genuine healing occurs when we take ourselves mercifully into our own hearts and accept the totality of our lives. This healing of the soul or spirit, says Stephen Levine, is independent of bodily healing. We harden our hearts when we fail to forgive ourselves of our own pain. In this sense, one can only heal one's self; one can never truly be healed by another.

Conscious living and conscious dying require that we bring our pain into our hearts, rather than wall ourselves off from it. In this moving and personal two-part program, The late Stephen Levine illustrates this point by referring to several cases of dying individuals with whom he has worked. He also discusses the use of imagery in healing, maintaining that each individual should choose imagery consistent with their own sensibility. He leads a brief meditation exercise designed to bring the full scope of living into awareness.

Poet and meditation teacher, Stephen Levine was author of Healing into Life and Death, Who Dies?, Meetings on the Edge, A Gradual Awakening and Grist for the Mill (co-authored with Ram Dass).