“We can then recognize that we invented religions to serve two central needs which continue to this day and which secular society… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
At the beginning of human history, as we struggled to light fires and to chisel fallen trees into rudimentary canoes, who could… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“The overreactor is responsible, as the psychological term puts it, for the 'transference' of an emotion from the past on to someone… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“Even if our loved ones have assured us that they'll be busy at work, even if they told us they hated us… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“Even if our loved ones have assured us that they will be busy at work, even if they told us they hated… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“How quickly all the advantages of technological civilisation are wiped out by a domestic squabble. At the beginning of human history, as… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
Perhaps because the origins of a certain kind of love lie in an impulse to escape ourselves and out weaknesses by an… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“To be mature is, we're told, to move beyond possessiveness. Jealousy is for babies. The mature person knows that no one owns anyone.” — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“He feared that by leaving her he would ruin her life - so he stayed, and did just that.” — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
“The Anxiety of Sunday afternoon: your unlived lives and infinite possibility pressing upon the constraints of reality.” — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
Those who divorce aren't necessarily the most unhappy, just those neatly able to believe their misery is caused by one other person. — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“We could not be fulfilled if we weren't inauthentic some of the time—inauthentic, that is, in relation to such things as our passing desires… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“Insofar as we appreciate order, it is when we perceive it as being accompanied by complexity, when we feel that a variety of elements… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
I like the values associated with a medical family - common sense, being practical but also thoughtful. — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“Anyone who urgently needs us deserves, in the true book of love, to be our friend.” — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“We can then recognize that we invented religions to serve two central needs which continue to this day and which secular society has not… — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
“Half the ingratitude and complacency in the world down to how slowly and imperceptibly most good and bad things unfold.” — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
It is perhaps when our lives are at their most problematic that we are likely to be most receptive to beautiful things. — Alain de Botton Copy Share Image
