Read
Previously, I said this book read like a transcript from the School of Life YouTube videos. I was wrong. I need to correct this statement: this book reads like a transcript from the School of Life TikTok videos. Disclaimer: I actually no longer subscribed to the former, and never watch any of the latter.
Reading 63%
It was believed that when an earlier version of human society had failed to worship him appropriately, the god had flown into a rage and unleashed a titanic storm that had annihilated everyone on earth. To avoid such a catastrophe ever recurring, every year a young man—selected for his supposed likeness to Tezcatlipoca—would be sacrificed to the god and his remains eaten by priests and royalty. The testy deity would then be induced to send benign rains to end the dry season and implored to resist his more apocalyptic instincts.
It must have been fun to look like a god in the Aztec Empire. Did people back then curse each other by saying, "You look so much like a god; I hope you get eaten by the great people one day"?
Reading 57%
The American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson once remarked, "In every work of genius, we recognize our own rejected thoughts." In other words, geniuses don’t have thoughts that are in the end so very different from our own; they have simply had the confidence to take them more seriously.
Reading 19%
People who commit suicide aren’t those for whom a few things have gone very wrong; they are people who have encountered some otherwise survivable reversals against a background of fierce self-hatred. It is the self-hatred that will end up killing them, not the apparent subjects of their panic and sorrow.
人們並非僅因一兩件不幸的事才選擇自殺；他們是在沉重的自我憎恨的陰影下，面對著那些本可克服的困境。致命的是對自我的厭惡，而非表面上的恐懼和憂傷。
Reading 18%
Community
Every time we share a piece of our pained inner self with a like-minded friend, we defend ourselves against despair and self-hatred. This should matter to us far more than whether we have found one special romantic partner. What we need is a network of non-judgmental souls who have known enough of their own suffering to be ready to show us compassion and tenderness when we stumble.
AA meeting that is.
Reading 18%
After two months, I am still only at 18%. It's probably the second book by de Botton that I don't like. It reads like scripts from The School of Life YouTube channel: seemingly deep yet shallow, brief but not to the point.
Reading 7%
We now spare little time thinking of how relative our emotional language might be, just as we seldom reflect on the arbitrariness of speaking English or French rather than Sentinelese or Pirahã. We overlook that there are people for whom love is mohabbat (Hindi) or who bid each other goodnight with hyvää yötä (Finnish) or wǎn'ān (Cantonese).
That's Mandarin, Alain. In Cantonese, it should be "maan5 on1."
Reading 3%
Our societies sometimes struggle with the question of what art might be for. Here the answer feels simple: Art is a weapon against despair. It is a tool with which to alleviate a sense of crushing isolation and uniqueness. It provides common ground where the sadness in me can, with dignity and intelligence, meet the sadness in you.
To Read
Every time Alain de Botton releases a book, he gives a presentation: Alain de Botton on A THERAPEUTIC JOURNEY
