Quote

Art cannot single-handedly create enthusiasm... it merely contributes to enthusiasm and guides us to be more conscious of feelings that we might previously have experienced only tentatively or hurriedly.

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
Merely
Hurriedly
Conscious
Tentatively
Single
Handedly
Create
Contributes
Feelings
Previously
Art
Experienced
Cannot
Guides
Might
Enthusiasm

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Distress at losing an object can be as much a frustration at the intellectual mystery of the disappearance as about the loss itself.
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So many complaints boil down to the belly ache of the fragile, mortal, ignored ego in a vast and indifferent universe.
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The fear of saying something stupid (which stupid people never have) has censored far more good ideas than bad ones.
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The longing for a destiny is no nowhere stronger than in our romantic life. All too often forced to share our bed with those who cannot fathom our soul, can we not be forgiven if we believe ourselves fated to stumble one day upon the man or woman of our dreams.
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Our greatest furies spring from events which violate our sense of the ground of our existence.
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The longing for destiny is nowhere stronger than in our romantic life.
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What we find exotic abroad may be what we hunger for in vain at home.
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It is by finding out what something is not that one comes closest to understanding what it is.
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It seems that most of us could benefit from a brush with a near-fatal disaster to help us recognise the important things that we are too defeated or embittered to recognise from day to day.
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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.
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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.
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There are people who say, 'Oh this guy is quite thick.' I think the reason is that, increasingly, I don't mind being simple in terms of literary expression. Others say, 'No, no, no. He went to Cambridge. He got a good degree. He must be Einstein.'
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We need objects to remind us of the commitments we've made. That carpet from Morocco reminds us of the impulsive, freedom-loving side of ourselves we're in danger of losing touch with. Beautiful furniture gives us something to live up to. All designed objects are propaganda for a way of life.
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There is real danger of a disconnect between what's on your business card and who you are deep inside, and it's not a disconnect that the world is ready to be patient with.
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Never too late to learn some embarrassingly basic, stupidly obvious things about oneself.
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To be shown love is to feel ourselves the object of concern: our presence is noted, our name is registered, our views are listened to, our failings are treated with indulgence and our needs are ministered to. And under such care, we flourish.
Alain de Botton
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To look at the paper is to raise a seashell to one's ear and to be overwhelmed by the roar of humanity.
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Philosophy had supplied Socrates with convictions in which he had been able to have rational, as opposed to hysterical, confidence when faced with disapproval.
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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.
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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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