Excerpt: Going through a hard time? Facing challenges? Read our 20 quotes on overcoming obstacles for help facing what it is you’re facing right now.
Click Here to jump right to our list of Quotes on Overcoming Obstacles!
Introduction: It could be better. But it could also be much worse.
Fact: We’re all going to face challenges in our lives.
Fiction: Challenges are a bad thing.
Fact: It is only in the process of overcoming challenges that we grow as people.
Fiction: Life would be so much better without challenges.
Fact: The most beautiful people in life are the ones who have overcome the greatest challenges.
Fiction: The most beautiful people in life are born that way.
One of the fundamental beliefs that can absolutely change your life is the belief that mindset changes everything and that you are in charge of your mind. As you read above (and as you already know), we all are going to face challenges in our lives. The question though, is how are you going to perceive those challenges and what are you going to do about them? You could be born feeling uglier or less privileged than most. You might be diagnosed with an incredibly challenging disease or disorder. You could be born without limbs…
…Does your life suck because it’s challenging and does sulking sound like the solution? Is comparing your life to everybody else who has it better (and then sulking) going to launch you to success? Are you going to focus on all of the reasons why your life is worse than everybody else’s or are you going to focus on what makes you unique and how you can share your gifts with the world?
Remember that while, yes, there are people out there who may have it better than you, there are also (and most certainly) people out there who have it worse than you. And I can’t tell you how many times I have been incredibly influenced by people that have it worse than me yet still share incredible gifts with the world that create such joy, happiness, and movement (you can check out a few of my favorite humans at the bottom of this post who, by the way, represent a mastery mindset over each challenge listed above).
As you read our twenty overcome obstacles quotes below, pay attention to any in particular that catch your attention or make you nod your head and focus on how you might be able to use that, “catch” to make moves forward in your life. Remember that while we’re all on different journeys, we’re all journeying towards a better life; a more full life; a more happy life. And when you can share your gifts of experience, insight, wisdom, and love – you can help others get there. And what could leave you feeling better about your life than constant growth and contribution? Wishing you all the best on your journey forward!
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The List: 20 Quotes on Overcoming Obstacles to Help You Face What You’re Facing
“Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.”
John Wooden
“Every difficulty in life presents us with an opportunity to turn inward and to invoke our own submerged inner resources. The trials we endure can and should introduce us to our strengths.”
Epictetus, The Art of Living
“Yet it is in this whole process of meeting and solving problems that life has its meaning. Problems are the cutting edge that distinguishes between success and failure. Problems call forth our courage and our wisdom; indeed, they create our courage and our wisdom. It is only because of problems that we grow mentally and spiritually. When we desire to encourage the growth of the human spirit, we challenge and encourage the human capacity to solve problems, just as in school we deliberately set problems for our children to solve. It is through the pain of confronting and resolving problems that we learn. As Benjamin Franklin said, ‘Those things that hurt, instruct.’ It is for this reason that wise people learn not to dread but actually to welcome problems and actually to welcome the pain of problems.”
Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled
“Circumstances don’t make a person, they reveal him or her.”
Richard Carlson, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
“Life is full of unforeseen detours. Circumstances happen which seem to completely cut across our plans. Learn to turn your detours into delights. Treat them as special excursions and learning tours. Don’t fight them or you will never learn their purpose. Enjoy the moments and pretty soon you will be back on track again, probably wiser and stronger because of your little detour.”
Steve Penny
“Everything that happens helps you grow, even if it’s hard to see right now. Circumstances will direct you, correct you, and perfect you over time. So whatever you do, hold on to hope. The tiniest thread will twist into an unbreakable cord. Let hope anchor you in the possibility that this is not the end of your story – that the change in the tides will eventually bring you to peaceful shores.”
Marc Chernoff
“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.”
Maya Angelou
“One of the finest beliefs I developed years ago that helped me to enjoy all of my life experience was the idea that there are no bad experiences, that no matter what I go through in life – whether it’s a challenging experience or a pleasurable one – every experience provides me something of value if I look for it.”
Tony Robbins, Awaken the Giant Within
“If you can find happiness inside you, then no matter what’s happening externally, you can access this source of happiness. You might lose your job, get sick, lose a loved one, have to go through a difficult medical procedure, go through a divorce … and you can still find this happiness. It’s there if you choose to use it. The external circumstances of your life matter, but they don’t take away your true source of happiness.”
Leo Babauta
“Life is an ever-flowing process and somewhere on the path some unpleasant things will pop up – it might leave a scar, but then life is flowing, and like running water, when it stops it grows stale. Go bravely on, my friend, because each experience teaches us a lesson. Keep blasting because life is such that sometimes it is nice and sometimes it is not.”
Bruce Lee, Striking Thoughts
“When we avoid the legitimate suffering that results from dealing with problems, we also avoid the growth that problems demand from us. It is for this reason that in chronic mental illness we stop growing, we become stuck. And without healing, the human spirit begins to shrivel.”
Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled
“True happiness comes not when we get rid of all of our problems, but when we change our relationship to them, when we see our problems as a potential source of awakening, opportunities to practice, and to learn.”
Richard Carlson, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
“No one can be responsible for where or how we each begin. No one has the freedom to do anything or everything, and all choices bring consequences. What we choose to do next, though, how to spend our resources or attention or effort, this is what defines us.”
Seth Godin
“Good thoughts and actions can never produce bad results; bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results. This is but saying that nothing can come from corn but corn, nothing from nettles but nettles. Men understand this law in the natural world, and work with it; but few understand it in the mental and moral world (though its operation there is just as simple and undeviating), and they, therefore, do not cooperate with it.”
James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
“When things get tough or uncomfortable, we tell ourselves: it’s OK to quit, it doesn’t matter, we’ll do it next time, we’re not disciplined enough, we suck at this, we can’t do it, it’s too hard, it would be nice to take a break, life is too short to struggle, we deserve a reward, just this once won’t matter, we’re going to fail, it’s better to fail quietly, we just don’t feel like it right now, let’s not think about this, hey a squirrel! So what can we do if our story is working against us? Change the damn story. Create a song to sing about yourself at the epic hero of your dreams. Sing this song daily, and be proud of it. Go after the dream, fight the forces of distraction and dullness and self-doubt, rise up to be your best self. You are the writer of your story, the composer of your song, and every moment is a chance to rewrite it, a new draft ready to be crafted into something better.”
Leo Babauta
Read Next: 61 Powerful Keep Moving Forward Quotes To Help You During Hard Times
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