If you live long enough, you'll see that every victory turns into a defeat.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
Ah, if only there were two of me, she thought, one who spoke and the other who listened, one who lived and one who watched, how I would love myself! I would envy no one.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects the desire for introspection and self-acceptance, highlighting the conflict between one's inner and outer selves.
In this quote, Simone De Beauvoir expresses a longing for a dual existence where one part of herself engages with the world while the other observes and understands her experiences. This highlights the complexities of self-perception and suggests that true self-love and acceptance might come from having a deeper awareness of one's own thoughts and feelings, enabling one to appreciate oneself without envy of others.
Themes
Self-LoveIntrospectionSelf-AcceptanceEnvySelf-Awareness
In practice
Example use cases
During a self-help seminar discussing the importance of self-acceptance.
More from Simone De Beauvoir
All quotes →Two separate beings, in different circumstances, face to face in freedom and seeking justification of their existence through one another, will always live an adventure full of risk and promise." (p. 248)
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To catch a husband is an art; to hold him is a job.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
Sex pleasure in woman is a kind of magic spell; it demands complete abandon; if words or movements oppose the magic of caresses, the spell is broken.
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As long as there have been men and they have lived, they have all felt this tragic ambiguity of their condition, but as long as there have been philosophers and they have thought, most of them have tried to mask it.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
Few tasks are more like the torture of Sisyphus than housework, with its endless repetition: the clean becomes soiled, the soiled is made clean, over and over, day after day. The housewife wears herself out marking time: she makes nothing, simply perpetuates the present … Eating, sleeping, cleaning – the years no longer rise up towards heaven, they lie spread out ahead, grey and identical. The battle against dust and dirt is never won.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
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