black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

A danger of travel is that we see things at the wrong time, before we have had a chance to build up the necessary receptivity and when new information is therefore as useless and fugitive as necklace beads without a connecting chain.

Alain de Botton

There may be significant things to learn about people by looking at what annoys them most.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Annoy Learn Look Most People Significant Thing
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
Yet often, they know but just don’t care. So the task of serious journalism isn’t just to lay out truths. It is to make vital truths compelling to a big audience.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Audience Big Compell Truth Vital
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
The arrogance that says analysing the relationship between reasons and causes is more important than writing a philosophy of shyness or sadness or friendship drives me nuts. I can’t accept that.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Analyse Arrogance Cause Important More Philosophy Reason Relationship Say Write
Those who divorce aren’t necessarily the most unhappy, just those neatly able to believe their misery is caused by one other person.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Belive Cause Divorce Most Neat Necessary Other Unhappy
Getting to the top has an unfortunate tendency to persuade people that the system is OK after all.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

After All Get OK People System Tendency Top Unfortunate
It is not just nature that defies us. Human life is as overwhelming… If we spend time in it [the vast spaces of nature], they may help us to accept more graciously the great, unfathomable events that molest our lives and will inevitably return us to dust.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Defies Human Life Nature Overwhelms Space Spend Time
At the heart of every frustration lies a basic structure: the collision of a wish with an unyielding reality.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Basic Collision Every Frustration Heart Structure
Perhaps it is true that we do not really exist until there is someone there to see us existing, we cannot properly speak until there is someone who can understand what we are saying in essence, we are not wholly alive until we are loved.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Essence Exist Existing Love Perhaps Properly Someone Speak Until
The challenge for a human now is to be more interesting to another than his or her smartphone.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Challenge Human Interest More Now Smartphone
Don’t despair: despair suggests you are in total control and know what is coming. You don’t – surrender to events with hope.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Come Control Despair Hope Suggest Surrender Total
The greatest works of art speak to us without knowing us.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Greatest Speak Without Know Work
In the gap between who we wish one day to be and who we are at present, must come pain, anxiety, envy and humiliation.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Anxiety Between Day Gap Humiliation One Present Wish
The difference between hope and despair is a different way of telling stories from the same facts.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Badly Between Despair Difference Different Story Tell Way
There is a devilishly direct relationship between the significance of an idea and how nervous we become at the prospect of having to think about it.
ALAIN DE BOTTON

Devilishly Direct Idea Nervous Prospect Relationship Significance Think

A danger of travel is that we see things at the wrong time, before we have had a chance to build up the necessary receptivity and when new information is therefore as useless and fugitive as necklace beads without a connecting chain.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

A danger of travel is that we see things at the wrong time, before we have had a chance to build up the necessary receptivity and when new information is therefore as useless and fugitive as necklace beads without a connecting chain.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Alain de Botton Quotes