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There may be significant things to learn about people by looking at what annoys them most.

Alain de Botton

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Alain de Botton
Age: 54
Born: 1969
Born: December 20
Journalist
Philosopher
Publisher
Writer
City of Zurich
Alain De Botton
Learn
May
Things
People
Annoys
Annoying
Significant
Looking

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After 40 (old age for most of man's history), one should strive to be more or less packed and ready to go were the end call to come.
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Do you love me enough that I may be weak with you? Everyone loves strength, but do you love me for my weakness? That is the real test.
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Despite the best efforts of critics and the hopes of authors, our tastes in books are probably as inherent & unbudgeable as those in food.
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I assemble my ideas in pieces on a computer file, then gradually find a place for them on a piece of scaffolding I erect.
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The best cure for one's bad tendencies is to see them in action in another person.
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Reputation matters so much only because people so seldom think for themselves.
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We wanted to test each other's capacity for survival: only if we had tried in vain to destroy one another would we know we were safe.
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Bitterness: anger that forgot where it came from.
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Let death find us as we are building up our matchstick protests against its waves.
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How do the stems connect to the roots?' 'Where is the mist coming from?' 'Why does one tree seem darker than another?' These questions are implicitly asked and answered in the process of sketching.
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Much of the really serious trouble in the world gets going with a sense of humiliation.
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Not being understood may be taken as a sign that there is much in one to understand.
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There is always the option of being emotionally lazy, that is, of quoting.
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If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest - in all its ardour and paradoxes - than our travels.
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We accept the need to train extensively to fly a plane but think instinct should be enough for marrying and raising kids.
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In the gap between who we wish one day to be and who we are at present, must come pain, anxiety, envy and humiliation.
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The inability to live in the present lies in the fear of leaving the sheltered position of anticipation or memory, and so of admitting that this is the only life that one is ever likely (heavenly intervention aside) to live.
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The challenge for a human now is to be more interesting to another than his or her smartphone.
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A simple problem of arithmetic: there are far more ambitions than there are grand destinies available.
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Most victories are, in the best way, acts of revenge.
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