A Quote by Alain de Botton

Asking someone to be with us turns out to be an impossibly demanding and therefore pretty mean thing to suggest to anyone we would really want the best for.

Alain de Botton

Quote Topics

Anyone Asking Best Demanding Mean Out Pretty Really Someone Suggest Therefore Thing Turns Us Want Would

Quote Author

Alain de Botton
English - Writer
Born: December 20, 1969

I wonder why anyone would hesitate to be generous with their writing. I mean, if you really want to make a living, go to Wall Street and trade oil futures ... We're writers. We're doing something that is inherently a generous act. We're exposing ourselves to the muse and to the things that frighten us. Why do that if you're not willing to be generous? And paradoxically, almost ironically, it turns out that the more generous you are, the more money you make. But that's secondary. For me, the privilege of being generous is why I get to do this.

Seth Godin

So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect, so we never dare to ask the universe for it.

Jim Carrey

People are always asking me what my lyrics mean. Does it mean this, does it mean that, that's all anybody wants to know. F**k them, darling. I say what any decent poet would say if you dared ask him to analyze his work: If you see it, dear, then it's there. ... I think my melodies are superior to my lyrics. ... I was never too keen on the British music press. They've called us a supermarket hype, and they used to suggest that we didn't write our own songs.

Freddie Mercury

Let's take Pravda in the 1980s. I mean you could have read things in Pravda saying that it was a stupid error to invade Afghanistan: "it was a dumb thing to do, we have to get out, it's costing us too much." I mean that U.S. analog of that would be "extreme liberalism," and it has been pretty well studied.

Noam Chomsky

What does it mean for a painter to paint in the manner of So-and-So or to actually imitate someone else? What's wrong with that? On the contrary, it's a good idea. You should constantly try to paint like someone else. But the thing is, you can't! You would like to. You try. But it turns out to be a botch... And it's at the very moment you make a botch of it that you're yourself.

Pablo Picasso

Anyone who wants to promote a car or a football tournament turns to opera. There's a much greater public connection than the image of plush corporate boxes would suggest.

Rory Bremner

I still encourage anyone who feels at all compelled to write to do so. I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. That thing you had to force yourself to do - the actual act of writing - turns out to be the best part. It's like discovering that while you thought you needed the tea ceremony for the caffeine, what you really needed was the tea ceremony. The act of writing turns out to be its own reward.

Anne Lamott

I think the role of the artist today is about being provocative. I don't mean shocking, but you have to provoke people into action. As an artist, you ask people for their time. It's the most precious thing anyone has. I'm asking audiences to come to my work and spend some time with it. What I'm really doing, of course, is asking people to take time for themselves.

Mira Calix

I’ve never watched an entire episode of "American Idol." It’s too mean. Why would anyone want to go on a show to be ripped apart? I don’t want to be tough with my singers, but I do want to tell them on "The Voice" that if you really want this, you’ll be kicked when you’re down. You have to be willing to roll with those punches. You have to really want it.

Christina Aguilera

Sometimes you realize that the thing an actor is asking for isn't exactly the thing they want. Maybe they're asking for more dialogue, or maybe they want a deep intellectual exploration of their role. But probably what they really need is encouragement.

Karyn Kusama

Just Because something ends dosent mean that it's a bad thing or that someones bound to get hurt,ot that it never shold have happend in the first place or whatever. But If each step brings us to the next how can we grow if we avoid everything that can hurt us?? We pretty much have no choice but to get out there and hope for the best and who knows we may even learn a thing or two on the way

Alyson Noel

My advice to you is not to undertake the spiritual path. It is too difficult, too long, and is too demanding. I suggest you ask for your money back, and go home. This is not a picnic. It is really going to ask everything of you. So, it is best not to begin. However, if you do begin, it is best to finish.

Chogyam Trungpa

It comforts me to think that if we are created beings, the thing that created us would have to be greater than us, so much greater, in fact, that we would not be able to understand it. It would have to be greater than the facts of our reality, and so it would seem to us, looking out from within our reality that it would contradict reason. But reason itself would suggest it would have to be greater than reality, or it would not be reasonable.

Donald Miller

When you're asking someone for assistance, make it as easy as possible for them to say "no" to you. You don't want someone helping you who doesn't really want to.

Raymond Arroyo

When you're asking someone for assistance, make it as easy as possible for them to say 'no' to you. You don't want someone helping you who doesn't really want to.

Raymond Arroyo

The trouble with paternalists is that they want to make impossibly profound changes, and they choose impossibly superficial means for doing so.