Motivational Quotes

Adversity

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

Best Quotes about Adversity

One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.

Chesterton, Gilbert K.

Cushion the painful effects of hard blows by keeping the enthusiasm going strong, even if doing so requires struggle.

Peale, Norman Vincent

No one would ever have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in a storm.

To accuse others for one's own misfortunes is a sign of want of education. To accuse oneself shows that one's education has begun. To accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one's education is complete.

Epictetus

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.

The finest steel has to go through the hottest fire.

Nixon, Richard M.

If your knees are knocking, kneel on them.

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.

We say, sorrow, disaster, calamity. God says,chastening and it sounds sweet to him though it is a discord to our ears. Don't faint when you are rebuked, and don't despise the chastening of the Lord. In your patience possess your souls.

Chambers, Oswald

10.

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

11.

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

Hemingway, Ernest

12.

In times of storm, the shallowness of the root structure is revealed.

13.

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

14.

Nothing splendid was ever created in cold blood. Heat is required to forge anything. Every great accomplishment is the story of a flaming heart.

Glasgow, Arnold H.

15.

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

16.

We all know that sponges grow in the ocean but I wander how much deeper the ocean would be if that wasn't the case.

17.

Dust is a protective coating for fine furniture.

Burata, Mario

18.

Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

Zwanzig, Carl

19.

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

20.

In every adversity there lies the seed of an equivalent advantage. In every defeat is a lesson showing you how to win the victory next time.

Collier, Robert

21.

Men stumble over pebbles, never over mountains

Cady, Emilie

22.

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

Tagore, Rabindranath

23.

Out of love and hatred, out of earnings and borrowings and leadings and losses; out of sickness and pain; out of wooing and worshipping; out of traveling and voting and watching and caring; out of disgrace and contempt, comes our tuition in the serene and beautiful laws.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

24.

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

25.

It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.

Benson, Taylor

26.

Prosperity is a great teacher; adversity is a greater. Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens it.

Hazlitt, William

27.

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

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

28.

As a rule, adversity reveals genius and prosperity hides it.

Horace

29.

Difficulty, my brethren, is the nurse of greatness --a harsh nurse, who roughly rocks her foster-children into strength and athletic proportion.

Bryant, William C.

30.

It is in the gift for employing all the vicissitudes of life to one's own advantage and to that of one's craft that a large part of genius consists.

Lichtenberg, Georg C.

31.

I bring to my life a certain amount of mess.

Coppola, Francis Ford

32.

Everything I did in my life that was worthwhile I caught hell for it.

Warren, Earl

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.

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

Bible

35.

It's easier to go down a hill than up it but the view is much better at the top.

Bennet, Arnold

36.

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

37.

Had there been no difficulties and no thorns in the way, then man would have been in his primitive state and no progress made in civilization and mental culture.

Joshee, Anandabai

38.

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

Colton, Charles Caleb

39.

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

40.

Sometimes your medicine bottle has on it, Shake well before using. That is what God has to do with some of His people. He has to shake them well before they are ever usable.

Havner, Vance

41.

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

Homer

42.

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

43.

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

44.

If you're on thin ice, you might as well dance.

45.

Forget the times of your distress, but never forget what they taught you.

Gesser

46.

Every hardship; every joy; every temptation is a challenge of the spirit; that the human soul may prove itself. The great chain of necessity wherewith we are bound has divine significance; and nothing happens which has not some service in working out the sublime destiny of the human soul.

Ford, Elias A.

47.

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

Chesterton, Gilbert K.

48.

We must free ourselves of the hope that the sea will ever rest. We must learn to sail in high winds.

Grant, Hanmer Parsons

49.

Prosperity tries the fortunate, adversity the great.

Pliny The Elder

50.

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.