#contentment

I am sensible of the velocity of the moments, and entering that part of my head alert to the motion of the world I am aware that life was never perfect, never absolute. This bestows contentment, even a fearlessness. ↗

— Harold Brodkey

#alert #am #aware #bestows #contentment

A youthful mind is seldom totally free from ambition; to curb that, is the first step to contentment, since to diminish expectation is to increase enjoyment. ↗

— Frances Burney

#contentment #curb #diminish #enjoyment #expectation

Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. ↗

— Mark Twain

#contentment #friends #friendship #life #friendship

Contentment is, after all, simply refined indolence. ↗

— Thomas Chandler Haliburton

#contentment #indolence #refined #simply

It isn't what you have or who you are or where you are or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about it. ↗

— Dale Carnegie

#contentment #happiness #inspirational #life #attitude

In contentment and joy are found the height and perfection of all love towards our neighbor. ↗

— William Ames

#found #height #joy #love #neighbor

From labour health, from health contentment spring; contentment opes the source of every joy. ↗

— James Beattie

#every #health #joy #labour #source

Charles' conversation was as flat as a street pavement, on which everybody's ideas trudged past, in their workday dress, provoking no emotion, no laughter, no dreams. At Rouen, he said, he had never had any desire to go and see a Paris company at the theatre. He couldn't swim, or fence, or fire a pistol, and was unable to explain a riding term she came across in a novel one day. Wheras a man, surely, should know about everything; excel in a multitude of activities, introduce you to passion in all its force, to life in all its grace, initiate you in all mysteries! But this one had nothing to teach; knew nothing, wanted nothing. He thought she was unhappy; and she hated him for that placid immobility, that stolid serenity of his, for that very happiness which she herself brought him. ↗

— Gustave Flaubert

#contentment #static #dreams

One often learns more from ten days of agony than from ten years of contentment. ↗

— Harold Coffin

#contentment #days #learns #more #often

The search for contentment is, therefore, not merely a self-preserving and self-benefiting act, but also a generous gift to the world. You cease being an obstacle, not only to yourself but to anyone else. Only then are you free to serve and enjoy other people. ↗

— Elizabeth Gilbert

#happiness #life #life