We need a home in the psychological sense as much as we need one in the physical: to compensate for a vulnerability.
ALAIN DE BOTTONLiterature is the greatest reality simulator – a machine that puts you through infinitely more situations than you can ever directly witness.
More Alain de Botton Quotes
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Bad art might be defined as a series of bad choices about what to show and what to leave out.
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Paying tax should be framed as a glorious civic duty worthy of gratitude – not a punishment for making money.
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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.
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True love is a lack of desire to check one’s smartphone in another’s presence.
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True respectability stems not from the will of the majority but from proper reasoning.
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Forgiveness requires a sense that bad behaviour is a sign of suffering rather than malice.
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An argument in a couple: 2 people attempting to introduce each other to important truths – by panicked shouting.
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We each appear to hold within ourselves a range of divergent views as to our native qualities.. And amid such uncertainty, we typically turn to the wider world to settle the question of our significance.. we seem beholden to affections of others to endure ourselves.
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The pleasure we derive from journeys is perhaps dependent more on the mindset with which we travel than on the destination we travel to.
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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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Wealth is not an absolute. It is relative to desire. Every time we yearn for something we cannot afford, we grow poorer, whatever our resources. And every time we feel satisfied with what we have, we can be counted as rich, however little we may actually possess.
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It’s hard loving those who don’t much like themselves: “If you’re so great, why would you think I’m so great.
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It is perhaps when our lives are at their most problematic that we are likely to be most receptive to beautiful things.
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We should read other people’s books in order to learn what we feel; it is our own thoughts we should be developing, even if it is another writer’s thought that help us to do so.
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Journeys are the midwives of thought. Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than moving planes, ships or trains.
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