Article image

16 Quotes About the Practice of Not Giving Up

Life often tests us with moments that feel insurmountable. These challenges can come in many forms: personal setbacks, health problems, professional hurdles, or unexpected crises. What defines us in these moments is not the challenge itself, but our response to it — whether or not we give up when the going gets tough.

It’s these moments that require us to summon our inner strength. Endurance is like a quiet force that keeps us pushing forward when every fiber of our being wants to stop — much like a marathon runner pushing through impossible exhaustion for those last few miles. This endurance goes hand in hand with resilience, the art of weathering storms and emerging even stronger than before.

Reminding ourselves that setbacks are temporary and failure is just a detour on the larger path of our life is easier said than done, but giving up is not the answer. Endurance and resilience make for an indomitable spirit, one that will empower us to persevere, adapt, and never, ever give up.

Sure I am of this, that you have only to endure to conquer.
Winston Churchill

Share Quote

The best way out is always through.
Robert Frost

Share Quote

No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That's the only way to keep the roads clear.
Greg Kincaid

Share Quote

When you’ve exhausted all possibilities, remember this: You haven’t!
Robert Schuller

Share Quote

Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
Thomas Edison

Share Quote

Courage is more exhilarating than fear and in the long run it is easier. We do not have to become heroes overnight. Just a step at time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it is not as dreadful as it appeared, discovering we have the strength to stare it down.
Eleanor Roosevelt

Share Quote

Humanity is won by continuing to play in face of certain defeat.
Ralph Ellison

Share Quote

I will either find a way, or make one.
Hannibal Barca

Share Quote

A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.
Christopher Reeve

Share Quote

I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.
Maya Angelou

Share Quote

Resilience is accepting your new reality, even if it's less good than the one you had before. You can fight it, you can do nothing but scream about what you've lost, or you can accept that and try to put together something that's good.
Elizabeth Edwards

Share Quote

The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. It’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.
Barack Obama

Share Quote

The human capacity for burden is like bamboo — far more flexible than you'd ever believe at first glance
Jodi Picoult

Share Quote

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.
Ernest Hemingway

Share Quote

Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.
Marie Curie

Share Quote

When you get into a tight place, and everything goes against you till it seems as if you couldn't hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that's just the place and time that the tide'll turn.
Harriet Beecher Stowe

Share Quote

Featured image credit: Ben Martin/ Archive Photos via Getty Images

Author image
About the Author
Nicole Villeneuve
Nicole is a writer, thrift store lover, and group-chat meme spammer based in Ontario, Canada.
Play more header background
Play more icon
Daily Question
Fill in the blank: "I will ___ my life. I will carve it with care." - Dolores del Río

More Inspiration

happiness theme icon

Failure is a greater teacher than success. Listen, learn, go on.

separator icon
Clarissa Pinkola Estés
motivation theme icon

My turn shall also come: I sense the spreading of a wing.

separator icon
Osip Mandelstam
hope theme icon

If you look for perfection, you will never be satisfied.

separator icon
Leo Tolstoy
love theme icon

The simple act of paying attention can take you a long way.

separator icon
Keanu Reeves
wisdom theme icon

Live for each second without hesitation.

separator icon
Elton John
happiness theme icon

Don’t be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible.

separator icon
George Saunders
motivation theme icon

Life is made of ever so many partings welded together.

separator icon
Charles Dickens
hope theme icon

Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.

separator icon
Albert Camus
love theme icon

I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart.

separator icon
Anne Frank
wisdom theme icon

Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.

separator icon
Eleanor Roosevelt
happiness theme icon

Within you there is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at any time.

separator icon
Hermann Hesse