Hector And The Search For Happiness Quotes

Knowing and feeling are two different things, and feeling is what counts.

Sometimes happiness is not knowing the whole story.

The basic mistake people make is to think that happiness is the goal!

Making comparisons can spoil your happiness.

Happiness often comes when least expected.

Many people see happiness only in their future.

Lesson no. 5: Sometimes happiness is not knowing the whole story

Nobody wants to live with a person who'll never be happy.

Lesson no. 17: Happiness is caring about the happiness of those you love.

Many people think that happiness comes from having more power or more money.

Happiness is feeling useful to others.

Women are very complicated, even if you are a psychiatrist.

Lesson no. 20: Happiness is a certain way of seeing things.

I'm old enough to ask myself that question, but not so old that I don't care what the answer is.

But, in reality, being unhappy might also teach him something about happiness.

Be vary wary of people who declare that they're going to create heaven on earth, they almost invariably create hell.

nature or nurture' said the professor. 'Whichever way the parents are to blame

He had fallen in love with her emotions, and that was a very profound feeling indeed.

True wisdom would be the ability to live without this scenery, to be the same person even at the bottom of a well. But that, it has to be said, is not so easy.

The only shadow on my happiness is when I tell myself sometimes that as it's all going well, it can't last, that one day things won't be so good.

It's one thing thinking something and another thing knowing it.

Edouard said that he didn't take Hector for a fool, but he could see that Hector had fallen in love, which was worse than being a fool.

And since he was seeing more and more people who were unhappy for no apparent reason, he was becoming more and more tired, and even a little happy himself. He began to wonder whether he was in the right profession, whether he was happy with his life, whether he wasn't missing out on something. And then he felt very afraid because he wondered whether these unhappy people were contagious.

Happiness. We're tearing our hair out to try to find a definition of it, for heaven's sake. Is it joy? People will tell you that it isn't, that joy is a fleeting emotion, a moment of happiness, which is always welcome, mind you. And then what about pleasure, huh? Oh, yes, that's easy, everybody knows what that is, but there again it doesn't last. But is happiness not the sum total of lots of small joys and pleasures, huh?

He had realised that it was Clara he loved, and that he loved her in many different ways. (Because there are even more ways of loving than there are ways of being happy, but it would take another book to explain them all.)

Nostalgia is not what it used to be.

Or rather, he was sad because that morning he'd understood that he'd understood nothing, because while he still understood nothing he wasn't sad at all, but now that he'd understood that he'd understood nothing he felt sad, if you follow.

happiness is a different thing altogether. If you try to achieve it, you have every chance of failing. And besides, how would you ever know that you’d achieved it? Of course one can’t blame people, especially unhappy people, for wanting to be happier and setting themselves goals in order to try to escape from their unhappiness.

Happiness. We're tearing our hair out to try to find a definition of it, for heaven's sake. Is it joy? People will tell you that it isn't, that joy is a fleeting emotion, a moment of happiness, which is always welcome, mind you. And then what about pleasure, huh? Oh, yes, that's easy, everybody knows what that is, but there again it doesn't last.

Because they know that people will be kinder to a child who smiles.

There’s no point in looking before crossing the road if you don’t look in the right direction.

Instead of searching for beauty in perfection, we should look for it in things that are flawed, incomplete.

People who are afraid of death are afraid of lif

He didn't necessarily think that it was okay, but when a psychiatrist says 'okay', it just means 'I understand what you're saying.

Adeline was really rather charming, she always had a man in her life, but it never worked out: either they were nice but she didn't find them very exciting; or they were exciting but she didn't find them particularly nice, or they were neither nice nor exciting and she wondered why she was with them at all. She found a way of making the exciting men nicer and that was by leaving them. But then, they weren't exciting anymore either.

And since he was seeing more and more people who were unhappy for no apparent reason, he was becoming more and more tired, and even a little unhappy himself. He began to wonder if he was in the right profession, whether he was happy with life, whether he wasn't missing out on something. And then he felt very afraid because he wondered whether these unhappy people were contagious.

Some people, very many actually, both men and women, complained of having enjoyed a very loving relationship with someone, but of no longer feeling the same way despite still being very fond of that person, with whom they generally lived.

Lesson no. 12: It’s harder to be happy in a country run by bad people.

Did the squirrel realize how lucky he was to be there? Or on the contrary did he spend his life wondering whether he might not be better off somewhere else, or feeling that he didn't have the life he deserved? In the end, it depended on the comparisons the squirrel was able to make

(Be very wary of people who declare that they’re going to create heaven on earth, they almost invariably create hell.)

Exciting happiness is joy, celebration, travelling, being in bed with a woman you desire.

He looked at Hector's list and told him that, thanks to a lot of studies and calculations, they'd shown that if you compared yourself to others and didn't find yourself wanting, if you had no money or health problems, if you had friends, a close-knit family, a job you liked, if you were religious and practised your religion, if you felt useful, if you went for a little stroll from time to time, and all of this in a country that was run by not very bad people, where you were taken care of when things went wrong, your chances of bring happy were greatly increased.

Basically, having a gift for happiness was a bit like being good at maths or games: it depended partly on the development of the brain after you were born, ad even before, but also on how your parents or other adults had brought you up when you were small. And of course on your own efforts and subsequent encounters. 'Nature or nurture,' said the professor. 'Whichever way, the parents are to blame!

They were both going to the big country where there were more psychiatrists than anywhere else in the world. We could just as well say more swimming pools, more Nobel prizewinners, more strategic bombers, more apple pies, more computers, more natural parks, more libraries, more cheerleaders, more serial killers, more newspapers, more raccoons, many of many more things, because it was the country of More. No doubt because the people who lived there had left their own countries precisely because they wanted more, especially more freedom.” (Hector and the Search for Happiness) *

The old monk said, ‘The basic mistake people make is to think that happiness is the goal!’ And

And besides, you can feel useful to others without necessarily expecting gratitude and still be happy.

because those are the two things you want to do most when you love somebody: to save them (sometimes from themselves) and to be near them always.

He was simply someone in search of a new life’s purpose; as soon as he found it, his life took on deeper meaning.

Because there are times when getting up to mischief isn’t mischievous and other times when it is and you shouldn’t do it.

But the reasons why Hector was unhappy were quite complex. He didn't really want to think about it, perhaps because those reasons weren't so easy to accept. It even made him feel a little afraid. He knew this fear too well, it was what stopped his patients from being able to really think about their problems, and it was his job to help them overcome this fear and understand what was happening to them.

...it's a mistake to think that happiness is the goal. I'm not sure I understand." "I was referring to the goals which you in your civilization are so good at setting yourselves, and which incidentally allow you to achieve many interesting things. But happiness is a different thing altogether. If you try to achieve it, you have every chance of failing. And besides, how would you ever know that you achieved it? Of course one can't blame people, especially unhappy people, for wanting to be happier and setting themselves goals in order to try to escape from their unhappiness.

1 pamoka: Geras būdas apkartinti savo laimę - lyginti. 2 pamoka: Laimė dažnai aplanko netikėtai. 3 pamoka: Daug žmonių tikisi būti laimingi tik ateityje. 4 pamoka: Daug žmonių mano, kad laimė - būti turtingesniam ir svarbesniam. 5 pamoka: Kartais laimė yra ko nors nesuprasti. 6 pamoka: Laimė - tai smagus pasivaikščiojimas gražiuose neregėtuose kalnuose. 7 pamoka: Klaidinga manyti, kad laimė yra tikslas. 8 pamoka: Laimė - būti su mylimais žmonėm. 9 pamoka: Laimė - kai tavo šeimai nieko netrūksta. 10 pamoka: Laimė - turėti mėgstamą užsiėmimą. 11 pamoka: Laimė - turėti namą ir sodą. 12 pamoka: Laimė sunkiausiai pasiekiama šalyse, kurias valdo negeri žmonės. 13 pamoka: Laimė - kai tavęs reikia kitiems. 14 pamoka: Laimė - kad tave mylėtų tokį, koks esi iš tikrųjų. 15 pamoka: Laimė - jaustis kupinam gyvenimo džiaugsmo. 16 pamoka: Laimė - tai švęsti. 17 pamoka: Laimė - tai galvoti apie laimę tų, kuriuos myli. 18 pamoka: Laimė - tai galimybė mylėti kelias moteris tuo pačiu metu. 19 pamoka: Saulė ir jūra - tai visiems prieinama laimė. 20 pamoka: Laimė priklauso nuo to, kaip mes suvokiame pasaulį. 21 pamoka: Baisus laimės nuodas - noras su kuo nors varžytis. 22 pamoka: Moterys dėmesingesnės kitų laimei nei vyrai. 23 pamoka: Laimė - tai rūpintis kitų laime. *Būti dėmesingam kitiems. *Neskubėti, kai grožiesi pasauliu.

We should concern ourselves not so much with the pursuit of happiness but with the happiness of pursuit

Our ikigai is different for all of us, but one thing we have in common is that we are all searching for meaning. When we spend our days feeling connected to what is meaningful to us, we live more fully; when we lose the connection, we feel despair. Modern life estranges us more and more from our true nature, making it very easy for us to lead lives lacking in meaning. Powerful forces and incentives (money, power, attention, success) distract us on a daily basis; don’t let them take over your life.

What do Japanese artisans, engineers, Zen philosophy, and cuisine have in common? Simplicity and attention to detail. It is not a lazy simplicity but a sophisticated one that searches out new frontiers, always taking the object, the body and mind, or the cuisine to the next level, according to one’s ikigai.

He knew his love for her was more a desire to save her, to be her superhero, and it was partly a desire to do what people who are in love do, and partly a desire to feel young again with her, because Ying Li was very young, and she looked even younger.

we say 'more psychiatrists than anywhere else in the world' but we could just as well say more swimming pools, more Nobel prizewinners, more strategic bombers, more apple pies, more computers, more natural parks, more libraries, more cheerleaders, more serial killers, more newspapers, more racoons, more of many more things, because it was the country of More, and had been for a long time. No doubt because the people who lived there had left their own countries precisely because they wanted more, especially more freedom. (The only people who hadn't got more freedom were the natives who already lived there, but, as previously mentioned, that was in the days when people who came from countries like Hector's tended to think that everything belonged to them.)