Alain de Botton Quotes, Artist Quotes, Greatness Quotes

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.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Artist Quotes , Greatness Quotes

If cynicism and love lie at opposite ends of a spectrum, do we not sometimes fall in love in order to escape the debilitating cynicism to which we are prone? Is there not in every coup de foudre a certain willful exaggeration of the qualities of the beloved, an exaggeration which distracts us from our habitual pessimism and focuses our energies on someone in whom we can believe in a way we have never believed in ourselves?

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Falling In Love Quotes , Lying Quotes

As adults, we try to develop the character traits that would have rescued our parents.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Character Quotes , Parent Quotes

Choosing a spouse and a choosing career: the two great decisions for which society refuses to set up institutional guidance.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Careers Quotes , Two Quotes

A dominant impulse on encountering beauty is to wish to hold on to it, to possess it and give it weight in one’s life. There is an urge to say, ‘I was here, I saw this and it mattered to me.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Travel Quotes , Giving 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

Writing isn’t a career choice. It’s self-medication that over time precipitates the madness it was meant to ward off.

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

As an atheist, I think there are lots of things religions get up to which are of value to non-believers - and one of those things is trying to be a bit better than we normally manage to be.

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

People who go on to be writers are those who can forgive themselves the horror of the first draft.

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

I think people want to get married to end their emotional uncertainty. In a way, they want to end powerful feelings, or certainly the negative ones.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Powerful Quotes , Emotional Quotes

I'm also interested in the modern suggestion that you can have a combination of love and sex in a marriage - which no previous society has ever believed.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Sex Quotes , Suggestions Quotes

The media insists on taking what someone didn't mean to say as being far closer to the truth than what they did.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Mean Quotes

Endeavoring to purchase something we think beautiful may in fact be the most unimaginative way of dealing with the longing it excites in us, just as trying to sleep with someone may be the bluntest response to a feeling of love.

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

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, 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.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Love Quotes , Princess Quotes

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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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Happiness Quotes , Sex Quotes

He was marked out by his relentless ability to find fault with others' mediocrity - suggesting that a certain type of intelligence may be at heart nothing more or less than a superior capacity for dissatisfaction.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Heart Quotes , Mediocrity 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

We often lose our tempers not with those who are actually to blame; just with those who love us enough to forgive us our foul moods.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Forgiving Quotes , Blame Quotes

People who readily accept the need for a gym will resist that their personalities might need some work too.

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

It was no longer her absence that wounded me, but my growing indifference to it. Forgetting, however calming, was also a reminder of infidelity to what I had at one time held so dear.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Infidelity Quotes , Growing Quotes