Francois Lelord

“He who spends too long regretting his ruined crop will be neglect to plant next year's harvest.”

“And, like poor Phaedra, we fall in love not with who we want to fall in love with, but with one who moves us, and sometimes it is the last person we should fall in love with. Our involuntary choice is not always the right one, and sometimes it is actually the worst one, hence our suffering. And then, of course, there is the completely different situation of the loving people where, over the years, the love they once felt for each other fades and they can't go on. They feel their love dying, but are unable to bring it back to life.”

“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.”

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

“Happiness often comes when least expected.”

“Making comparisons can spoil your happiness.”

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

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

“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.”

“We fall in love or stay in love with people who are unsuitable or who no longer love us and, conversely, we feel no love towards people who would be very suitable. Love is involuntary, that's the problem. Our personal histories prepare us to be attracted to people who unconsciously evoke emotions from our childhood or adolescence.”

“It is love that transports us, that fills us with joy! Love turns life into one long adventure, every encounter is a dazzling experience - well, not always, of course, but in actual fact, it is our less successful love affairs that enable us to appreciate the others. I think love protects us from one of the biggest problems facing the modern world: boredom.”

“People fall in love more easily when they are already troubled by another emotion because we know that any intense emotional state greatly increases the risk of falling in love.”

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

“You must be careful when you ask people whether they’re happy; it’s a question that can upset them a great deal.”

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

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

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

“Many people see happiness only in their future.”

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

“Sometimes happiness is not knowing the whole story.”

“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) *”