Going through a difficult life period?
We hope to provide you with some inspiration and comfort today. Drawing from ancient Stoic wisdom and modern psychology, the quotes in this article remind you that resilience is about moving through difficult times with intention.
In other words: instead of just reacting emotionally or shutting down, you can consciously choose how to respond. It’s about staying grounded, choosing your thoughts and actions carefully, and not losing yourself in the chaos.
Keep reading to discover a series of resilience quotes and four important steps you can take to cope with adversity.
1. Be Kind to Yourself
In difficult times, the way you speak to yourself matters deeply.
When life feels uncertain, overwhelming, or painful, self-talk can either add to your suffering or become a source of calm.
Harsh, self-critical thoughts like, “I should be handling this better” can deepen feelings of helplessness, draining your energy. On the other hand, compassionate self-talk such as, “This is really hard, and it’s okay to feel this way” won't make the pain disappear, but it makes it easier to carry.
Related Resilience Quotes
“This is a moment of suffering. Suffering is part of life. May I be kind to myself in this moment. May I give myself the compassion I need.” – Kristin Neff
“Sometimes there is just very little in life we can control. But one thing we can always control is how we treat ourselves. And that one thing can change everything.” – Leanna Tankersley
“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” – Buddha
“Embrace your suffering tenderly.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
2. Acknowledge Suffering as an Integral Part of Life
Pain, loss, and uncertainty are chapters in everyone’s story. Therefore, resilience is a vital part of what it means to live a full, meaningful life.
By acknowledging suffering as natural, you stop wasting energy on resisting or blaming and start focusing on how to respond to it.
These quotes explore resilience as a foundational life skill, one that helps us process suffering, discover meaning in pain, and embrace the uncertainty of existence with courage.
Related Resilience Quotes
“A good half of the art of living is resilience.” – Alain de Botton
“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death, human life cannot be complete.” – Viktor Frankl
“It’s often the desire for uncertainty that causes us to suffer more than the uncertainty itself.” – Mark Manson
Related Journal Prompts
- What does focusing on what you can control look like right now?
- How has your suffering shaped the person you are today?
- How do you want to respond to suffering (yours or others’) in a way that aligns with your values?
3. Adopt a Resilient Mindset
Building resilience often requires a shift in mindset: from resisting pain to working with it; from seeing challenges as curses to viewing them as opportunities for growth.
When you shift your thinking from “Why is this happening to me?/Why did this happen to me?” to “How can I/did I grow from this?”, everything changes.
These quotes speak to the attitudes that help you develop inner strength, so that you can endure and grow, no matter what life throws your way.
Related Resilience Quotes
"You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength." – Marcus Aurelius
“Pain is neither intolerable and everlasting, if you bear in mind that it has its limits, and if you add nothing to it in imagination.” – Marcus Aurelius
“Painful feelings are, by their very nature, temporary. They will weaken over time as long as we don’t prolong or amplify them through resistance or avoidance. The only way to eventually free ourselves from debilitating pain, therefore, is to be with it as it is. The only way out is through.” – Kristin Neff
“Remember this principle when something threatens to cause you pain: the thing itself was no misfortune at all; to endure it and prevail is good fortune.” – Marcus Aurelius
“Rather than wandering around in problem-solving mode all day, thinking mainly of what you want to fix about yourself or your life, you can pause for a few moments throughout the day to marvel at what’s not broken.” – Kristin Neff
“The greater the difficulty, the more glory in surmounting it.” – Epictetus
Key Insights
Here are three key insights from these quotes:
- Perception shapes reality. Choose interpretations that serve your growth. Focus your attention on what you can control and let go of what you can’t.
- Pain is manageable when kept in perspective. Prolonged suffering often comes from exaggeration in our minds. Stay grounded and focus on the present.
- Adversity is an opportunity. Enduring challenges with strength can be a source of pride. Throughout every struggle, there’s also something to be grateful for. Focus on the good, however small it may seem.
4. Know That Hardship Builds Character
Suffering, though painful, has the potential to deepen your character. Stoics like Seneca and Epictetus emphasised that hardships don’t just test us – they train us. If you lean in rather than run, you may discover you’re far more resilient than you thought.
Related Resilience Quotes
“A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.” – Seneca
“Every difficulty in life presents us with an opportunity to turn inward and to invoke our own inner resources. The trails we endure can and should introduce us to our strengths. Prudent people look beyond the incident itself and seek to form the habit of putting it to good use.” – Epictetus
“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” – Khalil Gibran
“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of those depths.” – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Summary
Becoming more resilient is about shifting how you relate to challenges, stress, and uncertainty. It doesn’t mean ignoring pain – it means learning to accept it and move through it with intention. Focus on:
- Being kind to yourself
- Acknowledging suffering as an integral part of life
- Cultivating a resilient mindset
- Knowing that hardship builds character
The pain you're feeling now, the uncertainty you're navigating, the strength you're being forced to summon — all of it is part of a process that’s refining you.
Just as pressure forms diamonds, hardship can bring forth your strongest, wisest self.
We don’t grow in comfort; we grow in challenge. And while it may not feel like it now, every difficulty you endure is planting seeds of resilience that can serve you for the rest of your life.
Keep going, keep growing.
You’ve got this!
Helpful Tools
We all face stress and challenges. But the difference between staying stuck and bouncing back often comes down to one powerful skill: becoming more mindful of your thinking patterns.
Your thoughts shape your reality. When you learn to notice unhelpful thought loops and prevent them from spiralling, you build resilience from the inside out.
The Mental Wellbeing Toolkit is designed to help you do exactly that – it's "like 10 therapy sessions in one."
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