Everything is transient

It’s not that it’s impossible to be stimulated in the great urban core – rather it is possible to be inspired anywhere. At root, inspiration is the discovery of the greater meaning of something that seems, initially, unimpressive.

a general theory of how taste is shaped.

What if our real problem is not that we haven’t had time to travel enough – but that we don’t know how to make the most of what is already to hand?

The more we understand what reading is for us, the more we can enjoy intimate relationships with just a few important works. Our libraries can be simple. Instead of always broaching new material, we can spend time rereading, paying attention to the reinforcement of what we already know but tend so often to forget.

we keep wanting more money because we haven’t yet identified a passion that matters enough to us that it replaces money-making in our minds.

A walk is the smallest sort of journey we can ever undertake. It stands in relation to a typical holiday as a bonsai tree does to a forest. But even if it is only an eight-minute interlude around the block or a few moments in a nearby park, a walk is already a journey in which many of the grander themes of travel are present.

‘what most people think’ isn’t and should never be a reasonable guide to our own lives.

we pretend – far more regularly than we should – to be more sophisticated, stylish and in the know than we actually are.