Some (lighter) winter break reading from Hagen (1977):

Vitality consists of this birth and death. This impermanence, this constant arising and fading away, are the very things that make our lives vibrant, wonderful and alive.

Yet we usually want to keep things from changing. We want to perserve things, to hold onto them. As we shall see, this desire to hold on, to somehow stop change in its tracks, is the greatest source of woe and horror and trouble in our lives. (p. 21)