Motivational Quotes

Adversity

You don't develop courage by being happy in your relationships everyday. You develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity.

- Angelis, Barbara De

Best Quotes about Adversity

I didn't know I'd have to be torn down before I could be built up.

Adversity reveals genius, prosperity conceals it.

Horace

Adversity has the same effect on a man that severe training has on the pugilist -- it reduces him to his fighting weight.

Billings, Josh

The willow which bends to the tempest, often escapes better than the oak which resists it; and so in great calamities, it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner than those of a loftier character.

Scott, Sir Walter

It's a matter of ABC: When we encounter ADVERSITY, we react by thinking about it. Our thoughts rapidly congeal into BELIEFS. These beliefs may become so habitual we don't even realize we have them unless we stop to focus on them. And they don't just sit there idly; they have CONSEQUENCES. The beliefs are the direct cause of what we feel and what we do next. They can spell the difference between dejection and giving up, on the one hand, and well-being and constructive action on the other. The first step is to see the connection between adversity, belief, and consequence. The second step is to see how the ABCs operate every day in your own life.

Seligman, Martin E. P.

Suffering! We owe to it all that is good in us, all that gives value to life; we owe to it pity, we owe to it courage, we owe to it all the virtues.

France, Anatole

He that can heroically endure adversity will bear prosperity with equal greatest of the soul; for the mind that cannot be dejected by the former is not likely to be transported without the latter.

Fielding, Henry

People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles.

Dune, Frank Herbert

Some people bear three kinds of trouble -- the ones they've had, the ones they have, and the ones they expect to have.

Hale, Edward Everett

10.

We deem those happy who from the experience of life have learnt to bear its ills without being overcome by them.

Jung, Carl

11.

Misfortunes leave wounds which bleed drop by drop even in sleep; thus little by little they train man by force and dispose him to wisdom in spite of himself. Man must learn to think of himself as a limited and dependent being; and only suffering teaches

Weil, Simone

12.

Mishaps are like knives, that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or by the handle.

Lowell, James Russell

13.

Nothing bad ever happens without equal or growth

14.

Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.

Seneca

15.

Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.

Tagore, Rabindranath

16.

Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.

James, William

17.

Adversity causes some men to break, others to break records.

Ward, William A.

18.

Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.

Hill, Napoleon

19.

There will be no crown bearers in heaven who are not cross bearers on earth.

20.

Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward.

Ford, Henry

21.

The hardest struggle of all is to be something different from what the average man is.

Schwab, Charles M.

22.

Two frogs fell into a bowl of cream. One didn't panic, he relaxed and drowned. The other kicked and struggled so much that the cream turned to butter and he walked out.

23.

Constant success shows us but one side of the world; adversity brings out the reverse of the picture.

Colton, Charles Caleb

24.

If the career you have chosen has some unexpected inconvenience, console yourself by reflecting that no career is without them.

Johnson

25.

Things don't go wrong and break your heart so you can become bitter and give up. They happen to break you down and build you up so you can be all that you were intended to be.

Jones, Charles ''Tremendous''

26.

The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired.

Seneca

27.

That which causes us trials shall yield us triumph: and that which make our hearts ache shall fill us with gladness. The only true happiness is to learn, to advance, and to improve: which could not happen unless we had commence with error, ignorance, and imperfection. We must pass through the darkness, to reach the light.

Pike, Albert

28.

Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever remains to them?

Kennedy, Rose F.

29.

To endure is the first thing that a child ought to learn, and that which he will have the most need to know.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

30.

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are stronger at the broken places.

Hemingway, Ernest

31.

One may not reach the dawn save by the path of the night.

Gibran, Kahlil

32.

We see many who are struggling against adversity who are happy, and more although abounding in wealth, who are wretched.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

33.

It is odd but agitation or contest of any kind gives a rebound to my spirits and sets me up for a time.

Byron, Lord

34.

A certain amount of opposition is a great help to a man. Kites rise against, not with, the wind.

Neal, John

35.

I'm not afraid of storms, for I'm learning to sail my ship.

Alcott, Louisa May

36.

The path of least resistance is the path of the loser.

Weltman, Phil

37.

Many miles away there's a shadow on the door of a cottage on the Shore of a dark Scottish lake.

Sting

38.

Men often bear little grievances with less courage than they do large misfortunes.

Aesop

39.

People are like stained -- glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within

Ross, Elizabeth Kubler

40.

I have often been downcast, but never in despair; I regard our hiding as a dangerous adventure, romantic and interesting at the same time. In my diary I treat all the privations as amusing. I have made up my mind now to lead a different life from other girls and, later on, different from ordinary housewives. My start has been so very full of interest, and that is the sole reason why I have to laugh at the humorous side of the most dangerous moments.

Frank, Anne

41.

I had to pick myself up and get on with it, do it all over again, only even better this time.

Walton, Sam

42.

Painful as it may be, a significant emotional event can be the catalyst for choosing a direction that serves us--and those around us -- more effectively. Look for the learning.

Allenbaugh, Eric

43.

Be still my heart; thou hast known worse than this.

Homer

44.

Many who seem to be struggling with adversity are happy; many, amid great affluence, are utterly miserable.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

45.

It is easy enough to be pleasant, When life flows by like a song. But the man worth while is the one who can smile, when everything goes dead wrong. For the test of the heart is troubled, And it always comes with the years. And the smiles that is worth the praises of earth is the smile that shines through tears.

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler

46.

Life is truly known only to those who suffer, lose, endure adversity and stumble from defeat to defeat.

Kapuscinski, Ryszard

47.

The difference between stumbling blocks and stepping stones is how you use them

48.

The seaman tells stories of winds, the ploughman of bulls; the soldier details his wounds, the shepherd his sheep.

Propertius, Sextus

49.

Only entropy comes easy.

Mumford, Lewis