in retrospect

He had spent seven years of life with Tereza, and now he realized that those years were more attractive in retrospect than they were when he was living them.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Milan Kundera

a desire limited to one woman

Making love with a woman and sleeping with a woman are two separate passions, not merely different but opposite. Love does not make itself felt in the desire for copulation (a desire that extends to an infinite number of women) but in the desire for shared sleep (a desire limited to one woman).

The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Milan Kundera

the pain one feels with someone

For there is nothing heavier than compassion. Not even one's own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels with someone, for someone, a pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echoes.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Milan Kundera