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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.

Alain de Botton

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Alain de Botton
Age: 55
Born: 1969
Born: December 20
Journalist
Philosopher
Publisher
Writer
City of Zurich
Alain De Botton
Thinking
Train
Accept
Accepting
Extensively
Kids
Marrying
Need
Plane
Enough
Raising
Needs
Planes
Think
Instinct

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Responsible for wrapping the iron fist of authority in its velvet glove is Jane Axtell, head of the accountancy firm's Human Resources department.
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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.
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The lesson? To respond to the unexpected and hurtful behavior of others with something more than a wipe of the glasses, to see it as a chance to expand our understanding.
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Maturity: the confidence to have no opinions on many things.
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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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We are all more intelligent than we are capable, and awareness of the insanity of love has never saved anyone from the disease.
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We may seek a fortune for no greater reason than to secure the respect and attention of people who would otherwise look straight through us.
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Insomnia is a glamorous term for thoughts you forgot to have in the day.
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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 was foreign and Jewish, with a funny name, and was very small and hated sport, a real problem at an English prep school. So the way to get round it was to become the school joker, which I did quite effectively - I was always fooling around to make the people who would otherwise dump me in the loo laugh.
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Architects themselves tend to shy away from the word, preferring instead to talk about the manipulation of space.
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The secular world is full of holes. We have secularized badly.
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The arrogance that says analysing the relationship between reasons and causes is more important than writing a philosophy of shyness or sadness or friendship drives me nuts. I can't accept that.
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Socrates, on being insulted in the marketplace, asked by a passerby, Don't you worry about being called names? retorted, Why? Do you think I should resent it if an ass had kicked me?
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I know a lot about writing, but I don't know much about how other industries work. I've tried to use my naivety to my advantage.
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Happiness is impossible for longer than 15 minutes. We are the descendants of creatures who, above all else, worried.
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Our greatest furies spring from events which violate our sense of the ground of our existence.
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Why, then, if expensive things cannot bring us remarkable joy, are we so powerfully drawn to them?
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Out of the millions of people we live among, most of whom we habitually ignore and are ignored by in turn, there are always a few that hold hostage our capacity for happiness, whom we could recognize by their smell alone and whom we would rather die than be without.
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We used to build temples, and museums are about as close as secular society dares to go in facing up to the idea that a good building can change your life (and a bad one ruin it).
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