To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring—it was peace.

About Milan Kundera

Milan Kundera (UK: KU(U)N-dər-ə; Czech: [ˈmɪlan ˈkundɛra] ; 1 April 1929 – 11 July 2023) was a Czech and French novelist. Kundera went into exile in France in 1975, acquiring citizenship in 1981. His Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979, but he was granted Czech citizenship in 2019.

More quotations from Milan Kundera

Young is the one that plunges in the future and never looks back.

—Milan Kundera

When the heart speaks, the mind finds it indecent to object.

—Milan Kundera

All the basic situations in life occur only once.

—Milan Kundera

change situations once

The sound of laughter is like the vaulted dome of a temple of happiness.

—Milan Kundera

laughter happiness

Mysticism and exaggeration go together. A mystic must not fear ridicule if he is to push all the way to the limits of humility or the limits of delight.

—Milan Kundera

fear humility delight mysticism exaggeration

More quotations tagged with “nothing”

There is a well-worn adage that those who set out upon a great enterprise would do well to count the cost. I am not sure that this is always true. I think that some of the very greatest enterprises in this world have been carried out successfully simply because the people who undertook them did not count the cost; and I am much of the opinion that… the most instructive consideration for us is the cost of doing nothing.

—Thomas Henry Huxley

nothing cost consideration

There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.

—Peter Drucker

doing nothing efficiency process

There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly.

—R. Buckminster Fuller

nothing

We stood there, looking at each other, saying nothing. But it was the kind of nothing that meant everything.

—Jenny Han in It’s Not Summer Without You

silence communication nothing

Enlightenment is not an attainment; it is a realization. When you wake up, everything changes and nothing changes. If a blind man realizes that he can see, has the world changed?

—Dan Millman

perception change realization nothing the world enlightenment

History

1 Jan 2016 Added
26 Oct 2026 Wording changed

Previous wording

To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, where doing nothing was not boring — it was peace.