You can't measure the mutual affection of two human beings by the number of words they exchange.
Interpretation
True affection between people goes beyond mere words and cannot be quantified by conversation alone.
This quote by Milan Kundera emphasizes that the depth of emotional connection and affection between individuals transcends the superficiality of verbal communication. It highlights the idea that genuine feelings and relationships are not solely determined by how much we talk to each other, but rather by the quality and mutual understanding that exists beneath the words spoken.
In practice
In a discussion about the importance of non-verbal communication in relationships.
Which doesn't mean, of course, that I'd stopped loving her, that I'd forgotten her, or that her image had paled; on the contrary; in the form of a quiet nostalgia she remained constantly within me; I longed for her as one longs for something definitively lost.
Facts mean little compared to attitudes. To contradict rumor or sentiment is as futile as arguing against a believer's faith in the Immaculate Conception. You have simply become a victim of faith, Comrade Assistant.
While people are fairly young and the musical composition of their lives is still in its opening bars, they can go about writing it together and sharing motifs (the way Tomas and Sabina exchanged the motif of the bowler hat), but if they meet when they are older, like Franz and Sabina, their musical compositions are more or less complete, and every motif, every object, every word means something different to each of them.
Mankind's true moral test, its fundamental test (which lies deeply buried from view), consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals. And in this respect mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.
To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring - it was peace.
Sensuality is the total mobilization of the senses: an individual observes his partner intently, straining to catch every sound.
A mirror reflects a man's face, but what he is really like is shown by the_x000D_ kind of friends he chooses.
I guess this is what marriage is, or was, or could be. You drop the mask. You allow the fatigue in. You lean across and kiss the years because they're the things that matter.
Look to be treated by others as you have treated others.
Empathy is a necessary step for truth and reconciliation.
Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all? Millions of people in this world, all of them yearning, looking to others to satisfy them, yet isolating themselves. Why? Was the earth put here just to nourish human loneliness?
I'm trying to get people to see that we are our brother's keeper. Red, white, black, brown or yellow, rich or poor, we all have the blues.
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