Top 200 Suffering Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.”

— Pema Chödrön

52. “Silver is purified in fire and so are we. It is in the most trying times that our real character is shaped and revealed.”

— Helen Keller

53. “To forget a Holocaust is to kill twice.”

— Elie Wiesel

54. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever in the next. Amen.”

— Reinhold Niebuhr

55. “The most disrespected person in America is the black woman. The most unprotected person in America is the black woman. The most neglected person in America is the black woman.”

— Malcolm X

56. “Poverty is the worst form of violence.”

— Mahatma Gandhi

57. “God is a concept by which we measure our pain.”

— John Lennon

58. “What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears.”

— Seneca the Younger

59. “If it is true that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, isn’t it also true a society is only as healthy as its sickest citizen and only as wealthy as its most deprived?”

— Maya Angelou

60. “Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worst kind of suffering.”

— Paulo Coelho

61. “In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.”

— Viktor E. Frankl

62. “Through effort you will cross any raging flood, through energy you will pass any sorrow.”

— Buddha

63. “Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it.”

— J.K. Rowling

64. “It’s pain that changes our lives.”

— Steve Martin

65. “Despair is suffering without meaning.”

— Viktor E. Frankl

66. “Of course I’ll hurt you. Of course you’ll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.”

— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

67. “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things.”

— Arthur Schopenhauer

68. “Only two things can reveal life’s great secrets: suffering and love.”

— Paulo Coelho

69. “There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.”

— Howard Zinn

70. “Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but – I hope – into a better shape.”

— Charles Dickens

71. “For what then matters is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential at its best, which is to transform a personal tragedy into a triumph, to turn one’s predicament into a human achievement.”

— Viktor E. Frankl

72. “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

73. “Pain that is not transformed is transmitted.”

— Richard Rohr

74. “It’s not enough to be compassionate. You must act.”

— Dalai Lama XIV

75. “Within the spiritual journey you understand that suffering becomes something that has been given to you to show you where your mind is still stuck. It’s a vehicle to help you go to work. That’s why it’s called grace.”

— Ram Dass

76. “Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.”

— William Shakespeare

77. “There are moments when troubles enter our lives and we can do nothing to avoid them. But they are there for a reason. Only when we have overcome them will we understand why they were there.”

— Paulo Coelho

78. “The deepest level of worship is praising God despite pain, trusting Him during a trial, surrendering while suffering, and loving Him when He seems distant.”

— Rick Warren

79. “I call him religious who understands the suffering of others.”

— Mahatma Gandhi

80. “If there is meaning in life at all, then there must be meaning in suffering.”

— Viktor E. Frankl

81. “The cure for pain is in the pain.”

— Rumi

82. “According to Buddhist psychology most of our troubles stem from attachment to things that we mistakenly see as permanent.”

— Dalai Lama XIV

83. “I will hurt you for this. I don’t know how yet, but give me time. A day will come when you think yourself safe and happy, and suddenly your joy will turn to ashes in your mouth, and you’ll know the debt is paid.”

— George R.R. Martin

84. “He who thinks he is the doer is also the sufferer.”

— Ramana Maharshi

85. “No pain, no palm; no thorns, no throne; no gall, no glory; no cross, no crown.”

— William Penn

86. “When you're struggling with something, look at all the people around you and realize that every single person you see is struggling with something, and to them, it's just as hard as what you're going through.”

— Nicholas Sparks

87. “As long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality persist in our world, none of us can truly rest.”

— Nelson Mandela

88. “Scars speak more loudly than the sword that caused them.”

— Paulo Coelho

89. “There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.”

— Mahatma Gandhi

90. “I ask not for a lighter burden, but for broader shoulders.”

— Jewish Proverb

91. “You can't avoid pain, but you can choose to overcome it.”

— Paulo Coelho

92. “A sacrifice to be real must cost, must hurt, and must empty ourselves. Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in his love than in your weakness.”

— Mother Teresa

93. “Great faith is the product of great fights. Great testimonies are the outcome of great tests. Great triumphs can only come out of great trials.”

— Smith Wigglesworth

94. “Radical Acceptance is the willingness to experience ourselves and our lives as they are.”

— Tara Brach

95. “When God places a burden upon you, He places His arms underneath you.”

— Charles H. Spurgeon

96. “The more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt. The one who does most to avoid suffering is, in the end, the one who suffers most.”

— Thomas Merton

97. “There is no joy for the one who does not bear sadness, there is no sweetness for the one who does not have patience, there is no delight for the one who does not suffer, and there is no relaxation for the one who does not endure fatigue.”

— Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya

98. “If through a broken heart God can bring His purposes to pass in the world, then thank Him for breaking your heart.”

— Oswald Chambers

99. “The seed of suffering in you may be strong, but don’t wait until you have no more suffering before allowing yourself to be happy.”

— Thich Nhat Hanh

100. “Life with God is not immunity from difficulties, but peace in difficulties.”

— C. S. Lewis