Quotes from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“The first step to building resilience is to take responsibility for who you are and for your life. If you’re not willing to do that, stop wasting your time reading this letter. The essence of responsibility is the acceptance of the consequences—good and bad—of your actions.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“One of the reasons you are suffering right now is precisely because the purpose of your struggle is unclear. What are you working toward? What are you fighting for? Who are you going to be?”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“I begin with humility, I act with humility, I end with humility. Humility leads to clarity. Humility leads to an open mind and a forgiving heart. With an open mind and a forgiving heart, I see every person as superior to me in some way; with every person as my teacher, I grow in wisdom. As I grow in wisdom, humility becomes ever more my guide. I begin with humility, I act with humility, I end with humility.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Practice builds habits. Our habits are our character. When it comes to virtue, practice “makes a very great difference—or rather, all the difference.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Start with this: not all pain matters. There are people whose attention is consistently drawn away from their purpose and toward their pain, like a moth to a light. Such people, who pay attention to every annoyance and obstacle in their way, are usually unsuccessful in their endeavors. In extreme cases they are mentally ill. A healthy person, a flourishing person, learns to move past a lot of annoyance and a good deal of pain.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“When we’re struggling, we don’t need a book in our hands. We need the right words in our minds. When things are tough, a mantra does more good than a manifesto.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“If you take responsibility for anything in your life, know that you’ll feel fear. That fear will manifest itself in many ways: fear of embarrassment, fear of failure, fear of hurt. Such fears are entirely natural and healthy, and you should recognize them as proof that you’ve chosen work worth doing. Every worthy challenge will inspire some fear.   A”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Smiling and breathing. These are simple things. Exercising and serving. These are simple things. Being grateful and gracious. These are simple things. Acting with humility. Acting with courage. These are simple things. Some people try to make this business of living too complicated,”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Courage overcomes, but does not replace, fear. Joy overcomes, but does not replace, pain.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“A veteran who comes home from war is returning from one of the most intense experiences a human being can have. Even if he was not under fire every day, he woke up every morning as part of a team. He started every day with a purpose, and a mission that mattered to those around him.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“What happens to us becomes part of us. Resilient people do not bounce back from hard experiences; they find healthy ways to integrate them into their lives. In time, people find that great calamity met with great spirit can create great strength.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“But the longer you hesitate, the hairier and scarier the fear becomes. The longer you hesitate, the more likely you are to turn around and crawl back under the covers. Screw that, Walker. It’s time to begin.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“We all need something to struggle against and to struggle for. The aim in life is not to avoid struggles, but to have the right ones; not to avoid worry, but to care about the right things; not to live without fear, but to confront worthy fears with force and”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“When real transformation does occur in someone’s life, it usually happens through evolution, not revolution. Every time we make a choice to confront our fear, our character evolves and we become more courageous. Every time we make a choice to move through pain to pursue a purpose larger than ourselves, our character evolves and we become wiser. Every time we make a choice to move through suffering, our character evolves and we become stronger.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“First, you can develop resilience. Anyone can do it. No one can do it for you. You and you alone have to do the work. Second, you can develop resilience. It’s possible to build virtues. It’s possible to change your character. It’s possible, therefore, to change the direction of your life. Third, you can develop resilience. Resilience cannot be purchased or given to you; you have to do the hard work of building excellence in your life.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Beware the person who seeks to lead and has not suffered, who claims responsibility on the grounds of a spotless record.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Never cease chiseling your own statue.   —PLOTINUS (205–270)   You”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Resilience is the virtue that enables people to move through hardship and become better. No one escapes pain, fear, and suffering. Yet from pain can come wisdom, from fear can come courage, from suffering can come strength—if we have the virtue of resilience.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“We all need resilience to live a fulfilling life. With resilience, you’ll be more prepared to take on challenges, to develop your talents, skills, and abilities so that you can live with more purpose and more joy. I hope something here can help you to become stronger. I look forward to walking with you on this path.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Millions of people, in all walks of life and in every endeavor, create distractions and excuses for themselves by focusing on tools rather than on character. They’d rather, as Socrates warned, focus on what they have than on what they are.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses . . . in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.   —MUHAMMAD ALI”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“What you will become is a result of what you are willing to endure. Are you willing to work hard? To think hard? I know that you are. You always have been.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“When we rob people of their pain—when we don’t allow them the possibility of failure—we also rob them of their happiness.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Those who are excellent at their work have learned to comfortably coexist with failure. The excellent fail more often than the mediocre. They begin more. They attempt more. They attack more. Mastery lives quietly atop a mountain of mistakes.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Eric Hoffer, studied the reasons why people voluntarily give away responsibility and join mass movements and mobs. One quote he collected came from a young German who explained that he joined the Nazi party to be “free from freedom.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Virtues that are not practiced die. Resilience that is not practiced weakens.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Accept that you are imperfect and always will be. Your quest is not to perfect yourself, but to better your imperfect self.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“And it’s often in those battles that we are most alive: it’s on the frontlines of our lives that we earn wisdom, create joy, forge friendships, discover happiness, find love, and do purposeful work. If you want to win any meaningful kind of victory, you’ll have to fight for it.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“Fortune will play her hand. And when she stands between us and flourishing, all we can do is live our best life.   One”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

“At the root of resilience is the willingness to take responsibility for results.”
― quote from Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life

Popular quotes

“Life is long, and sometimes cruel. Sometimes victims are needed. Someone has to take on that role. And human bodies are fragile, easily damaged. Cut them, and they bleed.”
― Haruki Murakami, quote from Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

“A mismatched outfit, a slightly defective denture, an exquisite mediocrity of the soul-those are the details that make a woman real, alive. The women you see on posters or in fashion magazines-the ones all the women try to imitate nowadays-how can they be attractive? They have no reality of their own; they're just the sum of a set of abstract rules. They aren't born of human bodies; they hatch ready-made from the computers." ~The Book of Laughter and Forgetting”
― Milan Kundera, quote from The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

“A vida inteira ele viveu perambulando, mandado embora de um lugar, assim que a "gente fina" comprava toda a maconha ou haxixe que quisesse, assim que houvesse perdido na roda da fortuna todas as moedas que queria. A vida inteira ele se ouviu sendo chamado de cigano sujo. A "gente fina" cria raízes; ele não tem nenhuma. Esse sujeito, Halleck, viu tendas de lona serem incendiadas por brincadeira, nos anos 30 e 40, e talvez houvesse bebês e velhos incendiados em algumas daquelas tendas. Ele viu suas filhas ou as filhas dos amigos serem atacadas, talvez violentadas, porque toda aquela "gente fina" sabe que ciganos trepam como coelhos e que um pouco mais não fará diferença — mas mesmo que faça, quem se importa? Ele talvez tenha visto seus filhos ou os filhos dos amigos serem surrados até quase a morte... e por quê? Porque os pais dos garotos que os surraram perderam algum dinheiro nos jogos de azar. É sempre a mesma coisa: você chega na cidade, a "gente fina" fica com o que quer e depois o manda embora. Às vezes, essa "gente fina" o condena a uma semana de trabalho na fazenda local de ervilhas ou um mês entre os trabalhadores da estrada local, como medida de ensinamento. E então, Halleck, para o cúmulo das coisas, vem o estalo final do chicote. O importante advogado de três queixos e bochechas de buldogue atropela e mata sua esposa na rua. Ela tem 70, 75 anos, é meio cega, talvez apenas se aventure no meio da rua depressa demais por querer voltar para sua gente antes de se mijar nas roupas — e ossos velhos quebram fácil, ossos velhos são como vidro, e você fica por ali, pensando que desta vez, apenas desta vez, haverá um pouco de justiça... um instante de justiça, como indenização por toda uma vida de miséria e...”
― Richard Bachman, quote from Thinner

“I want you to understand that what is black to one person is white to another. And nothing in this world is so perfect that it is pure white, or so bad it is pure black. Everything concerning human beings comes in shades of gray, Carrie.”
― V.C. Andrews, quote from Petals on the Wind

“I don't have sleeves to carry handkerchiefs in,' said Damen. 'I wouldn't mind being given a knife.' 'Or a fork?' said Laurent.”
― C.S. Pacat, quote from Captive Prince

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BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

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