Quotes on Unhappiness

So long as one is happy one can endure any discipline: it was unhappiness that broke down the habits of work.

.. But do you understand, I cry to him, do you understand that along with happiness, in the exact same way, in perfectly equal proportion, man also needs unhappiness

the tragedy of an attachment is that if its object is not attained it causes unhappiness. But if it is attained, it does not cause happiness – it merely causes a flash of pleasure followed by weariness, and it is always accompanied, of course, by the anxiety that you may lose the object of your attachment.

Sooner or later in life everyone discovers that perfect happiness is unrealizable, but there are few who pause to consider the antithesis: that perfect unhappiness is equally unattainable. The obstacles preventing the realization of both these extreme states are of the same nature: they derive from our human condition which is opposed to everything infinite.

The cause of most of man's unhappiness is sacrificing what he wants most for what he wants now.

They've got no idea what happiness is, they don't know that without this love there is no happiness or unhappiness for us--there is no life.

Happiness is always a by-product. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. But it is not something that can be demanded from life, and if you are not happy you had better stop worrying about it and see what treasures you can pluck from your own brand of unhappiness.