Newspapers are being read all around. The point is not, of course, to glean new information, but rather to coax the mind out of its sleep-induced introspective temper.
ALAIN DE BOTTONYou normally have to be bashed about a bit by life to see the point of daffodils, sunsets and uneventful nice days.
More Alain de Botton Quotes
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In the oasis complex, the thirsty man images he sees water, palm trees, and shade not because he has evidence for the belief, but because he has a need for it. Desperate needs bring about a hallucination of their solution: thirst hallucinates water.
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We read the weird tales in newspapers to crowd out the even weirder stuff inside us.
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Maturity: knowing where you’re crazy, trying to warn others of the fact and striving to keep yourself under control.
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To be shown love is to feel ourselves the object of concern: our presence is noted, our name is registered, our views are listened to, our failings are treated with indulgence and our needs are ministered to. And under such care, we flourish.
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The inability to live in the present lies in the fear of leaving the sheltered position of anticipation or memory, and so of admitting that this is the only life that one is ever likely (heavenly intervention aside) to live.
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The moment we cry in a film is not when things are sad but when they turn out to be more beautiful than we expected them to be.
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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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We need a home in the psychological sense as much as we need one in the physical: to compensate for a vulnerability.
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What we seek, at the deepest level, is inwardly to resemble, rather than physically to possess, the objects and places that touch us through their beauty.
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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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If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest – in all its ardour and paradoxes – than our travels.
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Curiosity takes ignorance seriously – and is confident enough to admit when it’s in the dark. It is aware of not knowing. And then it sets out to do something about it.
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So many complaints boil down to the belly ache of the fragile, mortal, ignored ego in a vast and indifferent universe.
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Art holds out the promise of inner wholeness.
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The longing for destiny is nowhere stronger than in our romantic life.
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