The longing for a destiny is no nowhere stronger than in our romantic life. All too often forced to share our bed with those who cannot fathom our soul, can we not be forgiven if we believe ourselves fated to stumble one day upon the man or woman of our dreams.
ALAIN DE BOTTONBecause the rhythm of conversation makes no allowance for dead periods, because the presence of others calls for continuous responses, we are left to regret the inanity of what we say, and the missed opportunity of what we do not.
More Alain de Botton Quotes
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What is fascinating about marriage is why anyone wants to get married.
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It’s as though either you accept [religious] doctrine and then you can have all the nice stuff, or you reject the doctrine and you’re living in some kind of spiritual wasteland under the guidance of CNN and Walmart.
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One of the better guarantors of ending up in a good relationship: an advanced capacity to be alone.
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At the heart of every frustration lies a basic structure: the collision of a wish with an unyielding reality.
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We envy only those whom we feel ourselves to be like; we envy only members of our reference group. There are few successes more unendurable than those of our close friends.
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Sweetness is the opposite of machismo, which is everywhere-and I really don’t get on with machismo. I’m interested in sensitivity, and weakness, and fear, and anxiety, because I think that, at the end of the day, behind our masks, that’s what we are.
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We study biology, physics, movements of glaciers… Where are the classes on envy, feeling wronged, despair, bitterness.
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There is no such thing as work-life balance. Everything worth fighting for unbalances your life.
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Most of our childhood is stored not in photos, but in certain biscuits, lights of day, smells, textures of carpet.
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A notorious inability to express emotions makes human beings the only animals capable of suicide.
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Memory is… similar to anticipation: an instrument of simplification and selection.
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You have to be quite heavily invested in someone to do them the honour of telling them you’re annoyed with them.
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We may seek a fortune for no greater reason than to secure the respect and attention of people who would otherwise look straight through us.
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The longing for destiny is nowhere stronger than in our romantic life.
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Out of the millions of people we live among, most of whom we habitually ignore and are ignored by in turn, there are always a few that hold hostage our capacity for happiness, whom we could recognize by their smell alone and whom we would rather die than be without.
ALAIN DE BOTTON