Life is filled with circuses. You will fail. You will likely fail often. It will be painful. It will be discouraging. At times it will test you to your very core.
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Despair lames most people, but it wakes others fully up.
Dark pictures and gloomy forebodings are worse than useless.
The Negro boy has obstacles, discouragements, and temptations to battle with that are little known to those not situated as he is.
At times I would rise up, a flash of energetic freedom would dart through my soul, accompanied with a faint beam of hope, that flickered for a moment, and then vanished.
We have more will than wallet; but will is what we need.
To admit that this picture has its shades is but to say that it is still the condition of men upon earth.
At first I hoped that the cloud would pass away of itself; but it did not.
Overlooking partial and temporary evils as inseparable from the practical operation of all human institutions, and looking only to the general result, every patriot has reason to be satisfied.
A hopeless feeling descends on one and is hard to fight off.
Noble disappointment, noble self-denial, are not to be admired, not even to be pardoned, if they bring bitterness.
Little by little, through patience and long-suffering, thou shalt conquer by the help of God, rather than by violence and thine own strength of will.
If you want to change the world get over being a sugar cookie and keep moving forward.
Sometimes no matter how well you prepare or how well you perform you still end up as a sugar cookie. It’s just the way life is sometimes.
Our attempts should be not to extinguish nature, but to repress it; not to stand unmoved at distress, but endeavour to turn every disaster to our own advantage. Our greatest glory is, not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
Wrongly attributed
The single most-shared sentence ever credited to Confucius, and it is an Irish novelist's. Goldsmith wrote it for the Public Ledger in 1760 and collected it in 1762, in a series of letters supposedly by a Chinese visitor. Letter VII opens with a headnote in Goldsmith's own hand: the Editor thinks proper to acquaint the reader that the greatest part of the following letter seems to him to be little more than a rhapsody of sentences borrowed from Confucius, the Chinese philosopher. Two paragraphs later the narrator says he holds the volume of Confucius in his hand. That framing is precisely how the line became Confucius's, and later Mandela's. Note also the comma after glory, which the popular version drops, and that Goldsmith wrote the same sentence again in Letter XXII with a different opening.
Believe that life is done testing you and will start giving you more than it took away from you. The wait might have been long but it's about to be over now.
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If things didn't go as planned, it doesn't mean you failed. If everything doesn't work out, that doesn't make life less meaningful. Great people also make mistakes. They just learn from it and never quit. Some of your darkest chapters will lead you to the most sparkling chapters.
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Life is beautiful. There are a few hiccups on the road but you have always been a warrior. You demonstrated courage in all the tough times. You can do it again. The spectacular view at the end of trials will be worth all your efforts. Unexpected blessings await.
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Your struggles are making way for rewards. Something awesome is lined up for you. Believe that the best blessings you can receive will show up. Time is not running out. The future holds more gifts than the grief held in the past. You aren't too late for your dreams.
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Results! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results! I know several thousand things that won't work.
Attribution contested
The famous form -- I have not failed, I have just found ten thousand ways that won't work -- has no source in Edison. The earliest record of the remark is this one, in the authorised 1910 biography, and it is a colleague's recollection of a conversation, not Edison writing. Note what changes in the retelling: several thousand becomes ten thousand, and a man cheerfully counting negative results becomes a man defending himself against failure.
Better late than never.