--- title: "Meaning & Key Takeaway of: We passionately long for there to be…" description: "\"“We passionately long for there to be another life in which we shall be similar to what we are here below. But we do not pause to reflect that, even wi..." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg" --- # We passionately long for there to be another life in which… ![“We passionately long for there to be another life in which we shall be similar to what we are here below. But we do not pause to reflect that, even without waiting for that other life, in this life, after a few years, we are unfaithful to what we once were, to what we wished to remain immortally…” quote by Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg) [Download](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg) [Open image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg) > ““We passionately long for there to be another life in which we shall be similar to what we are here below. But we do not pause to reflect that, even without waiting for that other life, in this life, after a few years, we are unfaithful to what we once were, to what we wished to remain immortally. Even without supposing that death is to alter us more completely than the changes that occur in the course of our lives, if in that other life we were to encounter the self that we have been, we should turn away from ourselves as from those people with whom we were once on friendly terms but whom we have not seen for years… We dream much of a paradise, or rather of a number of successive paradises, but each of them is, long before we die, a paradise lost, in which we should feel ourselves lost too.”” [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) ## About This Quote This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation. Human longing for an ideal future often blinds us to the present, where we betray our own aspirations and lose ourselves. **In simple terms:** We chase future perfection, neglecting present self‑integrity. Key Takeaway Cultivate present‑day authenticity. Themes nostalgia self‑reflection impermanence Mood melancholic contemplative Type philosophical literary When to use this quote - personal growth - relationship repair - mindfulness - spiritual seeking Key Concepts existentialism temporal longing Questions to Reflect On - What present values are you abandoning for imagined futures? - How can you honor your past self today? A Different Perspective Idealizing future can cause present neglect. ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ No ratings yet [Another life](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/another-life/) [Death](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/death/) [Life](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/life/) [Paradise Lost](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/paradise-lost/) ## Related quotes > [“We dream much of paradise, or rather of a number of successive paradises, but each of them is, long before we die, a paradise…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-dream-much-of-paradise-or-rather-of-a-number-of-successive/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [We passionately long that there may be another life in which we shall be similar to what we are here below. But we do…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-passionately-long-that-there-may-be-another-life-in-which-we-shall/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“The study of the self. 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Be my valentine.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/anonymous/ive-been-waiting-my-whole-life-for-you-be-my-valentine/) [Anonymous](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/anonymous/) > [If you hang around waiting for the right answer, you're going to be waiting all your life.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/tanya-plibersek/if-you-hang-around-waiting-for-the-right-answer-you-re-going-to-be/) Tanya Plibersek > [Dreaming is happiness. Waiting is life.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/victor-hugo/dreaming-is-happiness-waiting-is-life/) [Victor Hugo](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/victor-hugo/) > [“I have always, essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that person I always thought I was on the verge…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/shauna-niequist/i-have-always-essentially-been-waiting-waiting-to-become-something/) [Shauna Niequist](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/shauna-niequist/) > [When you follow your bliss a kind of track opens up, that's always been there, waiting for you. 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She made so little distinction between… ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/for-her-fran-oise-wealth-was-like-a-necessary-condition-without-which/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [Knowing does not always allow us to prevent, but at least the things that we know, we hold them, if not in our hands,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/knowing-does-not-always-allow-us-to-prevent-but-at-least-the-things/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [Death is in truth an illness from which we recover](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/death-is-in-truth-an-illness-from-which-we-recover/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [The bonds that unite another person to our self exist only in our mind.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/the-bonds-that-unite-another-person-to-our-self-exist-only-in-our-mind/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [...a writer's works, like the water in an artesian well, mount to a height which is in proportion to the depth to which suffering…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/a-writer-s-works-like-the-water-in-an-artesian-well-mount-to-a-height/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“Then from those profound slumbers we awake in a dawn, not knowing who we are, being nobody, newly born, ready for anything, the brain…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/then-from-those-profound-slumbers-we-awake-in-a-dawn-not-knowing-who/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“Art extracted from the most familiar reality does indeed exist and its domain is perhaps the largest of any.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/art-extracted-from-the-most-familiar-reality-does-indeed-exist-and/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [I find very reasonable the Celtic belief that the souls of our dearly departed are trapped in some inferior being, in an animal, aplant,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/i-find-very-reasonable-the-celtic-belief-that-the-souls-of-our-dearly/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“When you heard anyone in the middle of a talk which was being deliberately kept off the Affair announce furtively some piece of political…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/when-you-heard-anyone-in-the-middle-of-a-talk-which-was-being/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“We betroth ourselves by proxy, and then feel obliged to marry the intermediary.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-betroth-ourselves-by-proxy-and-then-feel-obliged-to-marry-the/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“But the old lady on the contrary, far from justifying her daughter’s fears, felt every time someone of her own age “disappeared” that she…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/but-the-old-lady-on-the-contrary-far-from-justifying-her-daughter-s/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [Often it is just lack of imagination that keeps a man from suffering very much.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/often-it-is-just-lack-of-imagination-that-keeps-a-man-from-suffering/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“When we are nice to others, we generally lose all claim to their respect.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/when-we-are-nice-to-others-we-generally-lose-all-claim-to-their/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) > [“Nobility is often no more than the inner aspect which our egotistical feelings assume when we have not yet named and classified them.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/nobility-is-often-no-more-than-the-inner-aspect-which-our-egotistical/) [Marcel Proust](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) [Explore all 1,113 Marcel Proust quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/) ## More Another life quotes > [“Small memories of another life flutter through my head like moths — all grey images and tearstains”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/a-r-kahler/small-memories-of-another-life-flutter-through-my-head-like-moths-all/) A.R. Kahler > [When you chopped logs with the ax and they split open they smelled beautiful, like Christmas. But when you split someone's head open it…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kate-atkinson/when-you-chopped-logs-with-the-ax-and-they-split-open-they-smelled/) [Kate Atkinson](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kate-atkinson/) > [“I love the dark hours of my being. My mind deepens into them. There I can find, as in old letters, the days of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/rainer-maria-rilke/i-love-the-dark-hours-of-my-being-my-mind-deepens-into-them-there-i/) [Rainer Maria Rilke](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/rainer-maria-rilke/) > [In another life, I would be your girl. Capable of making promises. 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And that is the gospel truth.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/sebastian-barry/and-whatever-my-life-had-been-up-to-that-day-it-was-another-life/) [Sebastian Barry](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/sebastian-barry/) > [Literature duplicates the experience of living in a way that nothing else can, drawing you so fully into another life that you temporarily forget…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/barbara-kingsolver/literature-duplicates-the-experience-of-living-in-a-way-that-nothing/) [Barbara Kingsolver](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/barbara-kingsolver/) > [Whatever you have received more than others-in health, in talents, in ability, in success, in a pleasant childhood, in harmonious conditions of home life-all…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/albert-schweitzer/whatever-you-have-received-more-than-others-in-health-in-talents-in/) [Albert Schweitzer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/albert-schweitzer/) > [“Let me give you a bit of advice.' the girl said bitterly, 'from one working girl to another; life isn't easy, no matter where…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/sarah-j-maas/let-me-give-you-a-bit-of-advice-the-girl-said-bitterly-from-one/) [Sarah J. Maas](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/sarah-j-maas/) > [“The vibrations he felt in his sleep had nothing to do with his soul easing out of his body as he dreamily thought; they…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author-poet-aberjhani/the-vibrations-he-felt-in-his-sleep-had-nothing-to-do-with-his-soul/) Author-Poet Aberjhani > [I wasn't born with a tie or with Mark Shields stapled to my left hip. I have another life.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/david-brooks/i-wasn-t-born-with-a-tie-or-with-mark-shields-stapled-to-my-left-hip/) [David Brooks](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/david-brooks/) > [For many observers, a child who has known nothing but war, a child for whom the Kalashnikov is the only way to make a…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/ishmael-beah/for-many-observers-a-child-who-has-known-nothing-but-war-a-child-for/) [Ishmael Beah](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/ishmael-beah/) > [I mean, is there a chance for me? 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Even without supposing that death is to alter us more completely than the changes that occur in the course of our lives, if in that other life we were to encounter the self that we have been, we should turn away from ourselves as from those people with whom we were once on friendly terms but whom we have not seen for years… We dream much of a paradise, or rather of a number of successive paradises, but each of them is, long before we die, a paradise lost, in which we should feel ourselves lost too.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Marcel Proust" }, "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-another-life-in-which-we-shall/", "about": { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Another life" }, "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-another-life-in-which-we-shall/#quotation", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a0e/marcel-proust-114_another-life_we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-ano_2075021.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“We passionately long for there to be another life in which we shall be similar to what we are here below…” — Marcel Proust", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } }, { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://sms4smile.com/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Quotes", "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Marcel Proust", "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/marcel-proust/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "“We passionately long for there to...", "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-another-life-in-which-we-shall/" } ], "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/marcel-proust/we-passionately-long-for-there-to-be-another-life-in-which-we-shall/#breadcrumb" }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website", "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/", "publisher": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } }, { "@type": "Organization", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization", "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/themes/sq/assets/icons/icon-512.png", "width": 512, "height": 512 } } ] } ```