“sometimes deeper mental clarity
is preceded by great internal storms”
Yung Pueblo, Inward (Page 21)
Quotes about Struggle
“Life is not given to us that we might live idly without work. No, our life is a struggle and a journey. Good should struggle with evil; truth should struggle with falsehood; freedom should struggle with slavery; love should struggle with hatred. Life is movement, a walk along the way of life to the fulfillment of those ideas which illuminate us, both in our intellect and in our hearts, with divine light.”
Giuseppe Mazzini, A Calendar of Wisdom (Page 72)
“The people you admire, the ones who seem to be able to successfully handle and deal with adversity and difficulty, what do they have in common? Their sense of equilibrium, their orderly discipline. On the one-yard line, in the midst of criticism, after a heartbreaking tragedy, during a stressful period, they keep going. Not because they’re better than you. Not because they’re smarter than you. But because they have learned a little secret. You can take the bite out of any tough situation by bringing a calm mind to it.”
Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic (Page 386)
“To bear trials with a calm mind robs misfortune of its strength and burden.”
Seneca, Hercules Oetaeus, via The Daily Stoic (Page 386)
“So long as you’re struggling, quarreling, there can’t be despair. Despair is one of the supreme sins, because a despairing person ceases to struggle. That makes despair the ultimate defeat; it is death. It has a feeling of completeness to it, closely connected to smugness: the despairing person makes no attempt to move from the point he is at—no attempt to change himself or the world—and this completeness is a mark of dying. Dying is completion.”
Adin Steinsaltz, via Sunbeams (Page 142)
“You come from a long, unbroken line of ancestors who survived unimaginable adversity, difficulty, and struggle. It’s their genes and their blood that run through your body right now. Without them, you wouldn’t be here. You’re an heir to an impressive tradition—and as their viable offspring, you’re capable of what they are capable of. You’re meant for this. Bred for it.”
Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic (Page 170)
“It had done me good to be somewhat parched by the heat and drenched by the rain of life.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, via Sunbeams (Page 109)
“Even with the support of others, it’s hard to struggle through hardship without sufficient motivation of your own.”
Chris Guillebeau, The Happiness of Pursuit (Page 175)
“I may wish to be free from torture, but if the time comes for me to endure it, I’ll wish to bear it courageously with bravery and honor. Wouldn’t I prefer not to fall into war? But if war does befall me, I’ll wish to carry nobly the wounds, starvation, and other necessities of war. Neither am I so crazy as to desire illness, but if I must suffer illness, I’ll wish to do nothing rash or dishonorable. The point is not to wish for these adversities, but for the virtue to make adversities bearable.”
Seneca, Moral Letters, via The Daily Stoic (Page 90)
10 Stephen Grosz Quotes From The Examined Life on Pain, Change, and Loss
Excerpt: Stephen Grosz has been a psychoanalyst for 25+ years. These quotes from The Examined Life give you access to 50,000+ hours of his distilled insight.
Read More »10 Stephen Grosz Quotes From The Examined Life on Pain, Change, and Loss
“Part of the reason we fight against the things that happen is that we’re so focused on our plan that we forget that there might be a bigger plan we don’t know about. Is it not the case that plenty of times something we thought was a disaster turned out to be, with the passage of time, a lucky break? We also forget that we’re not the only people who matter and that our loss might be someone else’s gain.”
Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic (Page 83)
