Quotes About Hardship

The work was done by hundreds of undocumented Polish immigrants known as the "Polish brigade." The men toiled through spring and summer of 1980 with sledgehammers and blowtorches, but without hard hats, working twelve- to eighteen-hour days, seven days a week, often sleeping on Bonwit Teller's floors. They were paid less than $5 an hour, sometimes in vodka. Many went unpaid and were threatened with deportation if they complained.

A diamond is a piece of coal that stuck to the job.

There are times when life seems like a struggle where the only reward you get for hanging on is the chance to struggle some more.

Misfortune seemed to hang on him like day-before smoke.

But when you're extra scared or fatigued or discomfortable, some other bad thing is bound to happen. The past two days confirm this theory: a flat tire, a stickup, and a bad fall. The Morton Salt girl had it right. When it rains, it damn well pours.

Why does life carry some people on the crest of the wave while others drown beneath the water?

And I come here as a daughter, raised on the South Side of Chicago - by a father who was a blue-collar city worker and a mother who stayed at home with my brother and me.

Even cowards can endure hardship; only the brave can endure suspense.

Even cowards can endure hardship; only he brave can endure suspense

Which I have earned with the sweat of my brows.

Here's the devil-and-all to pay.

Every man was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth.

Someone who is motivated solely by the desire to become rich and famous might struggle hard to get ahead but will rarely have enough inducement to work beyond what is necessary, to venture beyond what is already known.

Easy Never Produces Excellence

We fought are tails of today

Blood diamonds, she thought. That's exactly what these are. She felt almost as superstitious as the Africans now, as if the pink diamonds themselves had somehow caused all this hardship and death.

Light's all very well, brothers, but it's not easy to live with.

Times being like they is and all. But I figure times been hard all my life. Now don't seem so much worse'n any other.

People who have it too easy in early life have a disadvantage for later on, because they get to thinking that everything is going to be easy. (quoted 2017-12-30 in the Toronto Daily Star)

My mom is always telling me it takes a long time to get to the top, but a short time to get to the bottom.

Wherever it left us, we were barely learning to live with it when here came Flannery O'Connor and Hank Williams to tell us that no one has ever been loved the way everybody wants to be loved, and that's hard. That's hard. --last stanza of How Step by Step We Have Come to Understand

Sunja-ya, a woman's life is endless work and suffering. There is suffering and then more suffering. It's better to expect it, you know. You're becoming a woman now, so you should be told this. For a woman, the man you marry will determine the quality of your life completely. A good man is a decent life, and a bad man is a cursed life—but no matter what, always expect suffering, and just keep working hard. No one will take care of a poor woman—just ourselves.

Life makes you pay...everybody pays something

no matter what, always expect suffering, and just keep working hard.