Alain de Botton Quotes, Atheist Quotes, Thinking 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.

6 years ago

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

Every fall into love involves the triumph of hope over self-knowledge. We fall in love hoping we won't find in another what we know is in ourselves, all the cowardice, weakness, laziness, dishonesty, compromise, and stupidity. We throw a cordon of love around the chosen one and decide that everything within it will somehow be free of our faults. We locate inside another a perfection that eludes us within ourselves, and through our union with the beloved hope to maintain (against the evidence of all self-knowledge) a precarious faith in our species.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Falling In Love Quotes , Elude Us Quotes

Let death find us as we are building up our matchstick protests against its waves.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Building Up Quotes , Wave Quotes

The difference between hope and despair is a different way of telling stories from the same facts.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Differences Quotes , Despair Quotes

The very act of drawing an object, however badly, swiftly takes the drawer from a woolly sense of what the object looks like to a precise awareness of its component parts and particularities.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Drawing Quotes , Looks Quotes

Don't despair: despair suggests you are in total control and know what is coming. You don't - surrender to events with hope.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Despair Quotes , Events Quotes

We keep a special place in our hearts for people who refuse to be impressed by us.

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

One of the better guarantors of ending up in a good relationship: an advanced capacity to be alone.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Good Relationship Quotes

It's clear to me that there is no good reason for many philosophy books to sound as complicated as they do.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Philosophy Quotes , Book Quotes

Religions are so subtle, so complicated, so intelligent in many ways that they're not fit to be abandoned to the religious alone; they're for all of us.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , God Quotes , Religious Quotes

When you look at the Moon, you think, ‘I’m really small. What are my problems?’ It sets things into perspective. We should all look at the Moon a bit more often.

6 years ago

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

Status anxiety definitely exists at a political level. Many Iraqis were annoyed with the US essentially for reasons of status: for not showing them respect, for humiliating them.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Annoyed Quotes , Anxiety 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

True respectability stems not from the will of the majority but from proper reasoning.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Majority Quotes , Stem Quotes

A lump rises in our throat at the sight of beauty from an implicit knowledge that the happiness it hints at is the exception.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Sight Quotes , Hints 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.

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

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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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , May Quotes , Littles Quotes

In Britain, because I live here, I can also run into problems of envy and competition. But all this is just in a day's work for a writer. You can't put stuff out there without someone calling you a complete fool. Oh, well.

6 years ago

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

Happiness may be difficult to obtain. The obstacles are not primarily financial.

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , May Quotes , Obstacles Quotes

The pre-scientific age, whatever its deficiencies, had at least offered its members the peace of mind that follows from knowing all man-made achievements to be nothing next to the grandeur of the universe. We, more blessed in our gadgetry but less humble in our outlook, have been left... having no more compelling repository of veneration than our brilliant, precise, blinkered and morally troubling fellow human beings.

6 years ago

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Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Blessed Quotes , Humble Quotes