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After 40 (old age for most of man’s history), one should strive to be more or less packed and ready to go were the end call to come.

Alain de Botton

One of the unexpectedly important things that art can do for us is to teach us how to suffer more successfully.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Important One Successful Suffer Teach Thing Unexpectedly
You normally have to be bashed about a bit by life to see the point of daffodils, sunsets and uneventful nice days.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Bash Daffodil Day Have Nice Normal Sunset
If we are inclined to forget how much there is in the world besides that which we anticipate, then works of art are perhaps a little to blame, for in them we find at work the same process of simplification or selection as in the imagination.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Anticipate Art Besides Forget Inclined Much Perhaps World
The problem is if you really believe in a society where those who merit to get to the top, get to the top, you’ll also, by implication … believe in a society where those who deserve to get to the bottom also get to the bottom and stay there.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Belief Implication Merit Problem Really Society Top
We are like an exquisite high-speed aircraft which for lack of a tiny part is left stranded beside the runway, rendered slower than a tractor or bicycle.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Aircraft Bicycle Exquisite Render Runway Speed Tractor
A notorious inability to express emotions makes human beings the only animals capable of suicide.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Animal Capable Emotion Express Human Inability Notorious Suicide Time
Serious journalists often imagine society is adrift because people don’t know certain things.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Adrift Certain Imaginem Society Journalist Serius Thing
An argument in a couple: 2 people attempting to introduce each other to important truths – by panicked shouting.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Argument Attempt Couple Important Introduce Truth
Our sadness won’t be of the searing kind but more like a blend of joy and melancholy: joy at the perfection we see before us, melancholy at an awareness of how seldom we are sufficiently blessed to encounter anything of its kind.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Before Blend Define Joy Melancholy Perfection Sadness Sear
Art cannot single-handedly create enthusiasm… it merely contributes to enthusiasm and guides us to be more conscious of feelings that we might previously have experienced only tentatively or hurriedly.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Conscious Contribute Create Enthusiasm Guide Merely More Single
Only by declaring a book completely finished can one start to see how much remains to be done on it.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Book Completely Declare Done Finish Car Remain Start
Most of us still caged within careers chosen for us by our not entirely worldly 18-22 year old selves.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Cage Career Chosen Entirely Most Old Selve Still
Socrates, on being insulted in the marketplace, asked by a passerby, “Don’t you worry about being called names?” retorted, “Why? Do you think I should resent it if an ass had kicked me?
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Ask Being Insult Marketplace Name Passerby Restore
It is in dialogue with pain that many beautiful things acquire their value. Acquaintance with grief turns out to be one of the more unusual prerequisites of architectural appreciation. We might, quite aside from all other requirements, need to be a little sad before buildings can properly touch us.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Acquaintance Acquire Beautiful Dialogue Grief Pain Thing Turn More Value
Insomnia is a glamorous term for thoughts you forgot to have in the day.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Dance Forgot Glamorous Insomnia Term Thought
Intimacy is the capacity to be rather weird with someone – and finding that that’s ok with them.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Capacity Find Intimacy Rather Someone

After 40 (old age for most of man’s history), one should strive to be more or less packed and ready to go were the end call to come.

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After 40 (old age for most of man’s history), one should strive to be more or less packed and ready to go were the end call to come.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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