“Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O LORD.”
The Book of Psalms, 1611 · Psalm 130:1, King James Version
Chapter 8
On Despair and Its Passing
“Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God.”
The Book of Psalms, 1611 · Psalm 42:5, King James Version
“We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed.”
The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 1611 · 2 Corinthians 4:8-9, King James Version
“A violent wind does not last for a whole morning; a sudden rain does not last for the whole day.”
Laozi, c. 400 BC · Chinese sage, traditional author of the Tao Te Ching
“The longest day will have an end.”
English proverb, 1859 · recorded in a Victorian survey of proverbs from many nations
“How chastening in the hour of pride, how consoling in the depths of affliction: And this, too, shall pass away.”
Abraham Lincoln, 1859 · speaking at the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society, two years before the war
“Does the road wind up-hill all the way? Yes, to the very end. Will the day's journey take the whole long day? From morn to night, my friend.”
Christina Rossetti, 1862 · English poet, who lived much of her life in illness
“All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”
Julian of Norwich, 1373 · English anchoress, writing of visions received during a near-fatal illness
The single most common response to loss and terrible events is not breakdown but resilience. Most people, most of the time, come through with their functioning intact, and this has been badly underestimated.
George Bonanno, 2004 · psychologist, Columbia University, from decades of bereavement research
People who wrote for fifteen minutes a day, four days running, about the hardest thing that ever happened to them visited the doctor less in the months after. Putting it into words did the work.
James Pennebaker and Sandra Beall, 1986 · psychologists, the first expressive writing experiment
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