Alain de Botton Quotes, Hands Quotes, Telephones Quotes

The telephone becomes an instrument of torture in the demonic hands of a beloved who doesn't call.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Hands Quotes , Telephones Quotes

Being funny should be an incidental byproduct of trying to get to something truthful, not a destination in itself.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Trying Quotes , Truthful Quotes

I know a lot about writing, but I don't know much about how other industries work. I've tried to use my naivety to my advantage.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Writing Quotes , Use Quotes

Most of our childhood is stored not in photos, but in certain biscuits, lights of day, smells, textures of carpet.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Light Quotes , Smell Quotes

I was uncomfortable writing fiction. My love was the personal essay rather than the novel.

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There is always the option of being emotionally lazy, that is, of quoting.

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Kant and Hegel are interesting thinkers. But I am happy to insist that they are also terrible writers.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Interesting Quotes , Hegel Quotes

Forgiveness requires a sense that bad behaviour is a sign of suffering rather than malice.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Suffering Quotes , Behaviour Quotes

One wants never to give up this crystalline perspective. One wants to keep counterpositioning home with what one knows of alternative realities, as they exist in Tunis or Hyderabad. One wants never to forget that nothing here is normal, that the streets are different in Wisebaden, and Louyang, that this is just one of many possible worlds.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Giving Up Quotes , Home Quotes

Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Years Quotes , Lasts Quotes

It would be foolish to describe the logistics hub as merely ugly, for it has the horrifying, soulless, immaculate beauty characteristic of many of the workplaces of the modern world.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Would Be Quotes , World Quotes

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.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Sleep Quotes , Mind Quotes

Never, ever become a writer. It's a nightmare.

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It's perhaps easier now than ever before to make a good living; it's perhaps harder than ever before to stay calm, to be free of career anxiety.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Motivation Quotes , Inspiration Quotes

The fear of saying something stupid (which stupid people never have) has censored far more good ideas than bad ones.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Stupid Quotes , Ideas Quotes

For all his understanding of worldly concerns, when it came to fathoming the deeper meaning of his own furious activity, Sir Bob displayed the sort of laziness for which he himself had no patience in others. He appeared to have only a passing interest in the overall purpose of his financial accumulation.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Understanding Quotes , Laziness Quotes

If one felt successful, there'd be so little incentive to be successful.

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One kind of good book should leave you asking: how did the author know that about me?

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We don't really learn anything properly until there is a problem, until we are in pain, until something fails to go as we had hoped ... We suffer, therefore we think.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Pain Quotes , Thinking Quotes

Social media has lots of benefits, but compared to Christianity, it tends to group people by interests. Religion puts you with people who have nothing in common except that you're human.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Media Quotes , People Quotes