It is in books, poems, paintings which often give us the confidence to take seriously feelings in ourselves that we might otherwise never have thought to acknowledge.
Alain De BottonRead
Our disrespect for thinking: someone sitting in a chair, gazing out of a window blankly, always described as 'doing nothing'.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that society undervalues contemplation and reflection, viewing them as inactivity.
Alain De Botton's quote critiques the common perception that simply sitting and thinking is unproductive or useless. He points out that this 'doing nothing' is often a necessary cognitive process that can foster creativity, insight, and deeper understanding, thereby revealing the importance of mental space and reflection in our busy lives.
Themes
ThinkingContemplationReflectionDoing NothingPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
In a seminar on the importance of mindfulness, this quote can highlight the value of taking time to think.
More from Alain De Botton
All quotes βTaking architecture seriously therefore makes some singular and strenuous demands upon us...It means conceding that we are inconveniently vulnerable to the colour of our wallpaper and that our sense of purpose may be derailed by an unfortunate bedspread
Alain De BottonRead
The more closely we analyze what we consider 'sexy,' the more clearly we will understand that eroticism is the feeling of excitement we experience at finding another human being who shares our values and our sense of the meaning of existence.
Alain De BottonRead
Good books put a finger on emotions that are deeply our own - but that we could never have described on our own.
Alain De BottonRead
The challenge of modern relationships: how to prove more interesting than the other's smartphone.
Alain De BottonRead
It is the most ambitious and driven among us who are the most sorely in need of having our reckless hopes dampened through immersive dousings in the darkness which religions have explored. This is a particular priority for secular Americans, perhaps the most anxious and disappointed people on earth, for their nation infuses them with the most extreme hopes about what they may be able to achieve in their working lives and relationships.
Alain De BottonRead
Similar quotes
Racism is a belief system. It was assembled over centuries from many component parts - bits of biblical scripture, the propaganda of the slave-owning lobby and the pseudo-science of academics working in universities in Europe and America.
David OlusogaRead
My joy is in your freedom, not your compliance. I do not want your worship, I do not need your obedience, and it is not necessary for you to serve me. Deity has no needs. "All that is" is exactly that: all that is. It therefore wants or lacks nothing, by definition.
Neale Donald WalschRead
Contemporary moral philosophy has found an original way of being boring, which is by not discussing moral issues at all.
Bernard WilliamsRead
Not much longer shall we have time for reading lessons of the past. An inexorable present calls us to the defense of a great future.
Henry R. LuceRead
After I am dead, I would rather have men ask why Cato has no monument than why he had one.
Cato The ElderRead
It is necessary that every man have at least somewhere to go. For there are times when one absolutely must go at least somewhere!
Fyodor DostoevskyRead