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 BOTTONAs adults, we try to develop the character traits that would have rescued our parents.
More Alain de Botton Quotes
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The materialistic view of happiness of our age starkly revealed in our understanding of the word “luxury.
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As victims of hurt, we frequently don’t bring up what ails us, because so many wounds look absurd in the light of day.
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What I want to argue for is not that we should give up on our ideas of success, but that we should make sure that they are our own. We should focus in on our ideas and make sure that we own them, that we’re truly the authors of our own ambitions.
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Arguments are like eels: however logical, they may slip from the minds weak grasp unless fixed there by imagery and style.
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Being content is perhaps no less easy than playing the violin well: and requires no less practice.
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One’s doing well if age improves even slightly one’s capacity to hold on to that vital truism: “This too shall pass.
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The need for love hallucinates a prince or princess. The oasis complex is never a complete delusion: the man in the desert does see something on the horizon. It is just that the palms have withered, the well is dry, and the place is infected with locusts.
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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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There is a longing for a return to a time without the need for choices, free of the regret at the inevitable loss that all choice (however wonderful) has entailed.
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Insomnia is a glamorous term for thoughts you forgot to have in the day.
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Serious journalists often imagine society is adrift because people don’t know certain things.
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There may be significant things to learn about people by looking at what annoys them most.
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Good sex isn’t just fun, it keeps us sane and happy. Having sex with someone makes us feel wanted, alive and potent.
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There are selections so acute that they come to define a place, with the result that we can no longer travel through that landscape without being reminded of what a great artist noticed there.
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Differ though we might with Christianity’s view of what precisely our souls need, it is hard to discredit the provocative underlying thesis.
ALAIN DE BOTTON