QuoteProject
My own business always bores me to death; I prefer other people's.
Oscar Wilde
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote reflects on the nature of human curiosity and the tendency to find interest in others' lives rather than our own.

In this quote, Oscar Wilde humorously expresses boredom with his own life and a preference for the excitement found in the lives of others. This highlights a common human tendency to be more fascinated by external experiences and situations than by our own, suggesting an inherent curiosity about the choices, actions, and dramas of others.

Themes

BoredomCuriosityHuman NatureLifeInterest

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in a discussion about social media and how people get drawn to others' lives online.

More from Oscar Wilde

Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
Oscar WildeRead
London is too full of fogs and serious people. Whether the fogs produce the serious people, or whether the serious people produce the fogs, I don't know.
Oscar WildeRead
When one has never heard a man's name in the course of one's life, it speaks volumes for him; he must be quite respectable.
Oscar WildeRead
Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.
Oscar WildeRead
A truth ceases to be true when more than one person believes in it.
Oscar WildeRead
His morality is all sympathy, just what morality should be
Oscar WildeRead

Similar quotes

In ancient times, those who followed the Way did not try to give people knowledge thereof, but kept them ignorant.
LaoziRead
There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says 'Morning, boys. How's the water?' And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes 'What the hell is water?'
David Foster WallaceRead
Going from PayPal, I thought: 'Well, what are some of the other problems that are likely to most affect the future of humanity?' Not from the perspective, 'What's the best way to make money?'
Elon MuskRead
No. You can't work your way into heaven. Anytime you try and justify yourself with works, you disqualify yourself with works. What I do here, every day, for the rest of my life, is only my way of saying, 'Lord, regardless of what eternity holds for me, let me give something back to you. I know it doesn't even no scorecard. But let me make something of my life before I go.. and then, Lord, I'm at your mercy.
Mitch AlbomRead
Has the world ever been changed by anything save the thought and its magic vehicle the Word?
Thomas MannRead
Truth is one, the sages speak of it by many names.
Joseph CampbellRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.