Motivational Quotes

Adversity

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

Best Quotes about Adversity

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

Kapuscinski, Ryszard

Adversity is the state in which man mostly easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially free of admirers then.

Johnson, Samuel

If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.

Casey, M Kathleen

You'll never find a better sparring partner than adversity.

Schmidt, Walt

The reward of suffering is experience.

Aeschylus

A wounded deer leaps the highest.

Dickinson, Emily

The battle of life is, in most cases, fought uphill; and to win it without a struggle were perhaps to win it without honor. If there were no difficulties there would be no success; if there were nothing to struggle for, there would be nothing to be achieved.

Smiles, Samuel

Adversity is a great teacher, but this teacher makes us pay dearly for its instruction; and often the profit we derive, is not worth the price we paid.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

10.

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

11.

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

12.

There is no better than adversity. Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss, contains its own seed, its own lesson on how to improve your performance the next time.

Mandino, Og

13.

Life has meaning only in the struggle. Triumph or defeat is in the hands of the Gods. So let us celebrate the struggle!

Swahili Warrior Song

14.

They sicken at the calm that know the storm.

Parker, Dorothy

15.

There could be no honor in a sure success, but much might be wrested from a sure defeat.

Lawrence, Thomas E.

16.

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

17.

Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. [Isaiah 48:10]

Bible

18.

No man is more unhappy than the one who is never in adversity; the greatest affliction of life is never to be afflicted.

19.

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

20.

No untroubled day has ever dawned for me.

Seneca

21.

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.

22.

If your knees are knocking, kneel on them.

23.

Here is the rule to remember in the future, When anything tempts you to be bitter: not, This is a misfortune but To bear this worthily is good fortune.

Aurelius, Marcus

24.

Tribulation will not hurt you, unless as it too often does; it hardens you and makes you sour, narrow and skeptical.

Chapin, Edwin Hubbel

25.

Anytime you suffer a setback or disappointment, put your head down and plow ahead.

Brown, Les

26.

Every burden is a blessing.

Schuller, Robert H.

27.

Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?

Keats, John

28.

The actual tragedies of life bear no relation to one's preconceived ideas. In the event, one is always bewildered by their simplicity, their grandeur of design, and by that element of the bizarre which seems inherent in them.

Cocteau, Jean

29.

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

Billings, Josh

30.

As iron put into the fire loseth its rust and becometh clearly red-hot, so he that wholly turneth himself unto God puts off all slothfulness, and is transformed into a new man.

Kempis, Thomas

31.

The finest steel has to go through the hottest fire.

Nixon, Richard M.

32.

I bring to my life a certain amount of mess.

Coppola, Francis Ford

33.

Just because Fate doesn?t deal you the right cards, it doesn?t mean you should give up. It just means you have to play the cards you get to their maximum potential.

Brown, Les

34.

Never bear more than one kind of trouble at a time. Some people bear three kinds; all they have had, all they have now, and all they expect to have.

Hale, Edward Everett

35.

When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.

Ash, Mary Kay

36.

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

Kennedy, Rose F.

37.

I would never have amounted to anything were it not for adversity. I was forced to come up the hard way.

Penney, J. C. (James Cash)

38.

God left the world unfinished for man to work his skill upon. He left the electricity still in the cloud, the oil still in the earth. How often we look upon God as our last and feeblest resource! We go to Him because we have nowhere else to go. And then we learn that the storms of life have driven us, not upon the rocks, but into the desired haven.

Macdonald, George

39.

The greatest difficulties lie where we are not looking for them.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

40.

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

41.

Adversity draws men together and produces beauty and harmony in life's relationships, just as the cold of winter produces ice-flowers on the window-panes, which vanish with the warmth.

Kierkegaard, S°ren

42.

If you want to win anything -- a race, your self, your life -- you have to go a little berserk.

Sheehan, George

43.

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

Hemingway, Ernest

44.

Failure is success if we learn from it.

Forbes, Malcolm S.

45.

I love those who can smile in trouble, who can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but they whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves their conduct, will pursue their principles unto death.

Paine, Thomas

46.

He who knows no hardships will know no hardihood. He who faces no calamity will need no courage. Mysterious though it is, the characteristics in human nature which we love best grow in a soil with a strong mixture of troubles.

Fosdick, Harry Emerson

47.

Part of the happiness of life consists not in fighting battles, but in avoiding them. A masterly retreat is in itself a victory.

Peale, Norman Vincent

48.

There are three modes of bearing the ills of life, by indifference, by philosophy, and by religion.

Colton, Charles Caleb

49.

I have become my own version of an optimist. If I can't make it through one door, I'll go through another door -- or I'll make a door. Something terrific will come no matter how dark the present.

Tagore, Rabindranath

50.

Do not free the camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel.

Chesterton, Gilbert K.