Quotes About Resilience

I live in a world where two truths coexist: where both hell and hope lie in the palm of my hand

No one can pull anyone back from anywhere. You save yourself or you remain unsaved.

I had surprised myself this year by jumping in to reshape my life before life stepped in to reshape it for me.

Never give up the search to have back what was lost too soon.

In fact, most things that threaten to last forever often become quite annoying.

Death is the last enemy: once we've got past that I think everything will be alright.

And for an insane moment she thought, this is no different from normality, just women existing and surviving, this is what happens to women who don't fit into a world created by men.

In nature, nothing is perfect and everything is perfect. Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways, and they're still beautiful.

My mother was very strong. Once, she picked up a coconut and smashed it against my father's head. It taught me about women defending themselves and not collapsing in a heap.

I can be almost terminally grief-stricken because things are so dire, but at the same time, there's a real lightheartedness about just the recoverability of life, of how things change, how they're not the same, ever again.

Hard times require furious dancing. Each of us is proof.

Be nobody's darling; Be an outcast. Take the contradictions Of your life And wrap around You like a shawl, To parry stones To keep you warm.

All my life I had to fight. I had to fight my daddy. I had to fight my brothers. I had to fight my cousins and my uncles. A girl child ain't safe in a family of men. But I never thought I'd have to fight in my own house. She let out her breath. I loves Harpo, she say. God knows I do. But I'll kill him dead before I let him beat me.

In nature, nothing is perfect. Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways and they're still beautiful.

I don't understand it," I continued. "These things, they just keep happening, and I know it has to mean something. It has to. I want my suffering to mean something. I want this pain to matter.

Even the notion of "quality of life" as a measurable standard is based on assumptions that a "good" healthy life is one without disability, pain, and suffering. I live with all three intimately, and I feel more vital than ever at this point in time because of my experiences and relationships. Vulnerable "high-risk" people are some of the strongest, most interdependent, and most resilient people around.

If you are reading this, you are still alive, and, therefore, the story is not over. Something else could happen.

I lived with my mom in a really small apartment. My bedroom was like in the living room. That's why I still love to sleep on couches now.

That though passageway came with a surprising revelation. When life forces you to face yourself, what awaits in the mirror is a gift: vulnerability. Your heart is pierced. You're broken open. You're hyper-aware of what you're feeling.

There's too much darkness in the world. Everywhere you turn someone is trying' to tear someone down in some way. Everywhere you go, there's a feeling of inadequacy, or a feeling that you're not good enough. I want to bring a certain light to the world.

I now see so clearly what escaped me then: It's not that the ground underneath me was suddenly shifting; it's that it is never still. That's part of the work of my journey—getting comfortable with life's groundlessness.

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, day and night, to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight Ã¢â'¬Â¦ It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.

Dear Lord, can you take it away... This pain in my heart that follows me day by day, and at night it stalks me like the shadows on my wall.

Elaine Brown's book A Taste of Power. Elaine rose up from an impoverished childhood in North Philly to become the first and only female leader of the Black Panther Party, the '60s political organization formed to challenge police brutality, fight systemic racism, and empower black communities.