Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough.

- Alain De Botton

There is no such thing as work-life balance. Everything worth fighting for unbalances your life.

- Alain De Botton

It is striking how much more seriously we are likely to be taken after we have been dead a few centuries.

- Alain De Botton

Do you love me enough that I may be weak with you? Everyone loves strength, but do you love me for my weakness? That is the real test.

- Alain De Botton

We don't really learn anything properly until there is a problem, until we are in pain, until something fails to go as we had hoped ... We suffer, th…

- Alain De Botton

Everyone wants a better life: very few of us want to be better people.

- Alain De Botton

At the heart of every frustration lies a basic structure: the collision of a wish with an unyielding reality.

- Alain De Botton

Maturity: the confidence to have no opinions on many things.

- Alain De Botton

I know a lot about writing, but I don't know much about how other industries work. I've tried to use my naivety to my advantage.

- Alain De Botton