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Steven and I went on to talk about forgiveness ("It's the answer to every problem anyone has," he says), transformation ("You can only change yourself, but when you do, isn't it funny how everybody around you changes, too?"), and regret ("I don't want to hurt another human being"), and then he asked if I wanted to go outside. We drove off in his vintage Ford Phaeton, passing through the tiny town of Sunapee on our way to the woods where, as a boy, he spent hours wandering and exploring.

Oprah: So we're going into the woods. I love the woods.
Steven: I love the woods even more than the ocean. I think it's about where you're brought up. As a 9-year-old kid, I thought this place was fairy central. I thought the children of the woods had to have lived in here.

Oprah: And you felt like you were a child of the woods. I'm from the woods, too. I used to have a house in Florida looking out at the ocean, and I remember standing there one day saying, "God, I really need trees." I don't feel grounded without them. How do you feel coming into the woods—does it feel like coming home?
Steven: This is where I found my spirituality when I was a kid.

Oprah: What do you mean by spirituality? When I use the word, people are thrown by it.
Steven: In the silence I heard something. At first I was scared by it. It was so quiet, and I was so alone.

Oprah: Alone in the woods.
Steven: But it wasn't a noise. It was the stillness. Listen.

Oprah: The stillness.
Steven: There it is. There's the magic. I just put together, you know, the beauty of Mother Nature and music and somewhere in that, I felt a presence of God.

Oprah: I think God's not just in the music—I think God is the music. Wait, I'm going to do a Steven look. [Purses lips and nods.] I think God is the music.

Steven: Ooh, that's good. I've seen whales calving in the waters off Maui, and I've watched my children being born. But music is the most beautiful thing of all.

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