Alain de Botton Quotes - Page 7

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• There is a devilishly direct relationship between the significance of an idea and how nervous we become at the prospect of having to think about it.

  Alain de Botton

  Thinking, Ideas, Nervous

  Alain de Botton (2012). “Religion for Atheists: A non-believer's guide to the uses of religion”, p.188, Penguin UK

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• That said, deciding to avoid other people does not necessarily equate with having no desire whatsoever for company; it may simply reflect a dissatisfaction with what—or who—is available. Cynics are, in the end, only idealists with awkwardly high standards. In Chamfort's words, 'It is sometimes said of a man who lives alone that he does not like society. This is like saying of a man that he does not like going for walks because he is not fond of walking at night in the forêt de Bondy.

  Alain de Botton

  Night, Men, People

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• Most of us stand poised at the edge of brilliance, haunted by the knowledge of our proximity, yet still demonstrably on the wrong side of the line, our dealings with reality undermined by a range of minor yet critical psychological flaws (a little too much optimism, an unprocessed rebelliousness, a fatal impatience or sentimentality). We are like an exquisite high-speed aircraft which for lack of a tiny part is left stranded beside the runway, rendered slower than a tractor or bicycle.

  Alain de Botton

  Reality, Optimism, Lines

  "The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work". Book by Alain de Botton, 2008.

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• We study biology, physics, movements of glaciers... Where are the classes on envy, feeling wronged, despair, bitterness.

  Alain de Botton

  Class, Envy, Feelings

  Twitter post from Jan 05, 2013

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• The degree of sympathy we feel regarding another's fiasco is directly proportional to how easy or difficult it is for us to imagine ourselves, under like circumstances, making a similar mistake.

  Alain de Botton

  Mistake, Degrees, Imagine

  Alain De Botton (2008). “Status Anxiety”, p.149, Vintage

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• Someone who has thought rationally and deeply about how the body works is likely to arrive at better ideas about how to be healthy than someone who has followed a hunch. Medicine presupposes a hierarchy between the confusion the layperson will be in about what is wrong with him, and the more accurate knowledge available to doctors reasoning logically. At the heart of Epicureanism is the thought that we are as bad at answering the question "What will make me happy?" as "What will make me healthy?" Our souls do not spell out their troubles.

  Alain de Botton

  Heart, Medicine, Doctors

  "The Consolations of Philosophy". Book by Alain de Botton, 2000.

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• The blunt large questions become connected to smaller, apparently esoteric ones.

  Alain de Botton

  Esoteric, Blunt, Connected

  Alain de Botton (2003). “The Art of Travel”, p.67, Penguin UK

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• Pegging your contentment to the overall state of the world rather than of your own life: the basis of morality, or a sort of madness?

  Alain de Botton

  Contentment, World, Morality

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• What is a snob? A snob is anybody who takes a small part of you and uses that to come to a complete vision of who you are. That is snobbery.

  Alain de Botton

  Vision, Use, Snob

  "What's A Kinder Way To Frame Success?". Interview with Guy Raz, www.npr.org. November 1, 2013.

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• He did not mean to depress us, rather to free us from expectations which inspire bitterness. It is consoling, when love has let us down, to hear that happiness was never part of the plan.

  Alain de Botton

  Depressing, Mean, Expectations

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• Politics is so difficult, it's generally only people who aren't quite up to the task who feel convinced they are.

  Alain de Botton

  People, Tasks, Difficult

  Twitter post from Jan 04, 2013

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• You have to be quite heavily invested in someone to do them the honour of telling them you're annoyed with them.

  Alain de Botton

  Annoyed, Honour

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• In reality, the likelihood of reaching the pinnacle of capitalist society today is only marginally better than were the chances of being accepted into the French nobility four centuries ago, though at least an aristocratic age was franker, and therefore kinder, about the odds. It did not relentlessly play up the possibilities open to all, and so, in turn, did not cruelly equate an ordinary life with a failed one.

  Alain de Botton

  Reality, Odds, Play

  "The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work". Book by Alain de Botton, 2008.

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• Unnatural to expect that learning to be happy should be any easier than, say, learning to play the violin or require any less practice.

  Alain de Botton

  Practice, Play, Violin

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• Our capacity to draw happiness from aesthetic objects or material goods in fact seems critically dependent on our first satisfying a more important range of emotional or psychological needs, among them the need for understanding, for love, expression and respect.

  Alain de Botton

  Happiness, Emotional, Expression

  "On anticipation". www.theguardian.com. May 21, 2002.

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• William James once made an acute point about the relationship between happiness and expectation. He argued that satisfaction with ourselves does not require us to succeed in every endeavour. We are not always humiliated by failing; we are humiliated only if we first invest our pride and sense of worth in a given achievement and then do not reach it.

  Alain de Botton

  Pride, Expectations, Achievement

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• The finest proof of our loyalty toward one another was our monstrous disloyalties towards everyone else.

  Alain de Botton

  Loyalty, Finest, Proof

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• I feel that the great challenge of our time is the communication of ideas.

  Alain de Botton

  Communication, Ideas, Challenges

  "The School of Life: An Interview With Alain de Botton". Interview with Mark Matousek, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 12, 2016.

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• I passionately believe that's it's not just what you say that counts, it's also how you say it - that the success of your argument critically depends on your manner of presenting it.

  Alain de Botton

  Believe, Argument, Presenting

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• A successful work will draw out the features capable of exciting a sense of beauty and interest in the spectator.

  Alain de Botton

  Successful, Exciting, Interest

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• Insomnia is a glamorous term for thoughts you forgot to have in the day.

  Alain de Botton

  Pain, Insomnia, Injury

  Twitter post from Sep 18, 2012

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• Perhaps the easiest people to fall in love with are those about whom we know nothing. Romances are never as pure as those we imagine during long train journeys, as we secretly contemplate a beautiful person who is gazing out of the window – a perfect love story interrupted only when the beloved looks back into the carriage and starts up a dull conversation about the excessive price of the on-board sandwiches with a neighbour or blows her nose aggressively into a handkerchief.

  Alain de Botton

  Beautiful, Falling In Love, Journey

  Alain de Botton (2015). “On Love: A Novel”, p.40, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• 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.

  Alain de Botton

  Motivation, Inspiration, Moon

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• In the works of Lucretius, we find two reasons why we shouldn't worry about death. If you have had a successful life, Lucretius tell us, there's no reason to mind its end. And, if you haven't had a good time, "Why do you seek to add more years, which would also pass but ill?"

  Alain de Botton

  Successful, Years, Two

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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.

  Alain de Botton

  Eels, Style, Mind

  "The Consolations of Philosophy". Book by Alain de Botton, Chapter III, Consolation For Frustration, 2000.

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