Leonardo da Vinci Quotes

Something about John Cleese was always very unsettled, I felt. There was always something else he wanted to do. He seemed constantly driven by this sense that there was a nirvana somewhere; some unique place where mind, body and soul would be utterly satisfied.

Angst is not the human condition, it’s the purgatory between what we have and what we want but can’t get.

This life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed with a desire to change his bed.

I wasn't unhappy, but I was a little like: 'Is this it? Really?' I was thirsty.

I have been offered a lot for my work, but never everything.

It's a blessing and a curse, 'cause I'm never satisfied, so I continually want to outdo myself. But still, I'm never happy.

The present is never a happy state to any human being.

We have produced a world of contented bodies and discontented minds.

The highly ambitious person, in spite of all his successes, always remains dissatisfied, in the same way as a greedy baby is never satisfied.

Whether we eat, sleep, work, play, whatever we do life contains dissatisfaction, pain. If we enjoy pleasure, we are afraid to lose it; we strive for more and more pleasure or try to contain it. If we suffer pain we want to escape it. We experience dissatisfaction all the time. All activities contain dissatisfaction or pain, continuously.

Do we not see all humans unaware Of what they want, and always searching everywhere, And changing place, as if to drop the load they bear?

The mass of men live lives of quiet exasperation.

This life is a hospital where every patient is possessed with the desire to change beds; one man would like to suffer in front of the stove, and another believes that he would recover his health beside the window.

I do want more. I am not content with being happy. I was not made for it. It is not my destiny. My destiny is the opposite.

As long as I have a want, I have a reason for living. Satisfaction is death.

There is no greater disaster than discontent.

You sensed that you should be following a different path, a more ambitious one, you felt that you were destined for other things but you had no idea how to achieve them and in your misery you began to hate everything around you.

Suffering is getting what you do not want while wanting what you do not get.

Distraction is the only thing that consoles us for our miseries. Yet it is itself the greatest of our miseries.

That her relationship with him was like being content in a house but always sitting by the window and looking out

I love the majesty of human suffering.

What was wrong with me? I had a decent life. I was healthy. I wasn't starving or maimed by a land mine or orphaned. Yet somehow, it wasn't enough. I had a hole in me, and everything I took for granted slipped through it like sand. I felt like I had swallowed yeast, like whatever evil was festering inside me had doubled in size.

We are never content with our lot.

Affliction is a pill, which, being wrapt up in patience and quiet submission, may be easily swallowed; but discontent chews the pill, and so embitters the soul.

If you look around the world and I can tell you right now that the majority of the planet is focused on certainty and significance. And those two absolutely guarantee unhappiness. Because if you're driven by significance, it doesn't matter what you achieve, it's never enough.