100 Inspirational Quotes to Uplift Those Battling Depression

"You don’t have to control your thoughts; you just have to stop letting them control you."

- Dan Millman

"There is hope, even when your brain tells you otherwise."

- John Green

"You are stronger than you seem, braver than you believe, and smarter than you think."

- A.A. Milne

"Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all."

- Emily Dickinson

"Sometimes when you’re in a dark place, you think you’ve been buried, but actually you’ve been planted."

- Christine Caine

"You are not your depression. You are a person who has depression."

- Stephen Fry

"Listen to the people who love you. Believe that they are worth living for even when you don’t believe it. Seek out the memories depression takes away and project them into the future. Be brave; be strong; take your pills. Exercise because it’s good for you even if every step weighs a thousand pounds. Eat when food itself disgusts you. Reason with yourself when you have lost your reason."

- Andrew Solomon

"Believe in yourself and all that you are. Know that there is something inside you that is greater than any obstacle."

- Christian D. Larson

"Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, ‘I will try again tomorrow.’"

- Mary Anne Radmacher

"Out of difficulties grow miracles."

- Jean de La Bruyère

"Many survivors insist they’re not courageous: ‘If I were courageous I would have stopped the abuse.’ ‘If I were courageous, I wouldn’t be scared’… Most of us have it mixed up. You don’t start with courage and then face fear. You become courageous because you face your fear."

- Laura Davis

"I would say what others have said: It gets better. One day, you’ll find your tribe. You just have to trust that people are out there waiting to love you and celebrate you for who you are. In the meantime, the reality is you might have to be your own tribe. You might have to be your own best friend. That’s not something they’re going to teach you in school. So start the work of loving yourself."

- Wentworth Miller

"You are the one thing in this world, above all other things, that you must never give up on. When I was in middle school, I was struggling with severe anxiety and depression and the help and support I received from my family and a therapist saved my life. Asking for help is the first step. You are more precious to this world than you’ll ever know."

- Lili Reinhart

"Depression weighs you down like a rock in a river. You don’t stand a chance. You can fight and pray and hope you have the strength to swim, but sometimes, you have to let yourself sink. Because you’ll never know true happiness until someone or something pulls you back out of that river — and you’ll never believe it until you realize it was you, yourself who saved you."

- Alysha Speer

"Owning your story is the bravest thing you’ll ever do."

- Brené Brown

"If you know someone who’s depressed please resolve to never ask them why. Depression isn’t a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather. Try to understand the blackness, lethargy, hopelessness and loneliness they’re going through. Be there for them when they come through the other side. It’s hard to be a friend to someone who’s depressed, but it is one of the kindest, noblest and best things you will ever do."

- Stephen Fry

"Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise."

- Victor Hugo

"Mental health problems don’t define who you are. They are something you experience. You walk in the rain and you feel the rain, but, importantly, YOU ARE NOT THE RAIN."

- Matt Haig

"There is hope, even when your brain tells you there isn’t."

- John Green

"Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary."

- Fred Rogers

"You are not alone. You are seen. I am with you. You are not alone."

- Shonda Rhimes

"Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life."

- J.K. Rowling

"If you’re not willing to risk, you cannot grow. If you cannot grow, you cannot be your best. If you cannot be your best, you cannot be happy. If you cannot be happy, what else is there?"

- Les Brown

"I found that with depression, one of the most important things you can realize is that you’re not alone. You’re not the first to go through it, you’re not gonna be the last to go through it."

- Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson

"The advice I’d give to somebody that’s silently struggling is, you don’t have to live that way. You don’t have to struggle in silence. You can be un-silent. You can live well with a mental health condition, as long as you open up to somebody about it, because it’s really important you share your experience with people so that you can get the help that you need."

- Demi Lovato

"I now see how owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do."

- Brené Brown

"Do the thing you fear to do and keep on doing it… that is the quickest and surest way ever yet discovered to conquer fear."

- Dale Carnegie

"I think the saddest people always try their hardest to make people happy. Because they know what it feels like to feel absolutely worthless and they don’t want anybody else to feel that way."

- Robin Williams

"You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly – that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp."

- Anne Lamott

"If you’re going through hell, keep going."

- Winston Churchill

"When you come out of the grips of a depression there is an incredible relief, but not one you feel allowed to celebrate. Instead, the feeling of victory is replaced with anxiety that it will happen again, and with shame and vulnerability when you see how your illness affected your family, your work, everything left untouched while you struggled to survive. We come back to life thinner, paler, weaker … but as survivors. Survivors who don’t get pats on the back from coworkers who congratulate them on making it. Survivors who wake to more work than before because their friends and family are exhausted from helping them fight a battle they may not even understand. I hope to one day see a sea of people all wearing silver ribbons as a sign that they understand the secret battle, and as a celebration of the victories made each day as we individually pull ourselves up out of our foxholes to see our scars heal, and to remember what the sun looks like."

- Jenny Lawson

"Deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific location, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope."

- Elizabeth Gilbert

"Trust yourself. You’ve survived a lot, and you’ll survive whatever is coming."

- Robert Tew

"You are not weak. People like us, we’re brave. We’re the ones who get up and face our worst fears every day. We keep fighting."

- Jen Wilde

"We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope."

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

"You say you’re ‘depressed’ — all I see is resilience. You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn’t mean you’re defective — it just means you’re human."

- David Mitchell

"Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light."

- Albus Dumbledore

"The strongest people are not those who show strength in front of the world but those who fight and win battles that others do not know anything about."

- Jonathan Harnisch

"We will never find peace outside ourselves until we make peace within ourselves."

- Dalai Lama

"We would never tell someone with a broken leg that they should stop wallowing and get it together. We don’t consider taking medication for an ear infection something to be ashamed of. We shouldn’t treat mental health conditions any differently."

- Michelle Obama

"When you say you are depressed, all I can see is pure resilience. As a human being, you are permitted to feel inside out and “messed up.” Depression does not mean you are defective. It simply means you are human."

- David Mitchell

"You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection."

- Buddha

"The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall."

- Oliver Goldsmith

"It’s not whether you get knocked down. It’s whether you get up again."

- Vince Lombardi

"Success is not final; failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts."

- Winston Churchill

"In the middle of winter I at last discovered that there was in me an invincible summer."

- Albert Camus

"Promise me you’ll always remember — you’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

- Christopher Robin

"You’re like a grey sky. You’re beautiful, even though you don’t want to be."

- Jasmine Warga

"I am thankful for my struggle because without it I wouldn’t have come across my strength."

- Alex Elle

"This too shall pass."

- Pinterest

"It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it."

- Lou Holtz

"circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start."

- Nido Qubein

"You are allowed to be both a masterpiece and a work in progress simultaneously."

- Sophia Bush

"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars."

- Kahlil Gibran

"I have depression. I’ve had it for years."

- Dwayne Johnson

"I’ve struggled with depression my whole life."

- Lady Gaga

"I’ve been to the darkest places, but I’ve also been to the brightest places."

- Michael Phelps

"Depression is a part of my life, but it’s not my whole life."

- Stephen Fry

"I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve struggled with depression."

- Kristen Bell

"As Confucius said, our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we do."

- Confucius

"You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

- A.A. Milne

"The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it."

- Molière

"The only journey is the journey within."

- Rainer Maria Rilke

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop."

- Confucius

"Your present circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start."

- Nibo Qubein

"The only way out is through."

- Robert Frost

"The opposite of depression is not happiness, but vitality."

- William Styron

"The most beautiful people I’ve known are those who have known trials, have known struggles, have known loss, and have found their way out of the depths."

- Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

"Dealing with depression effectively is a mark not of weakness, but your strength."

- SAMHSA Helpline

"There is power in knowing you are battling depression."

- SAMHSA

"Even from a dark night, songs of beauty can be born."

- Mary Anne Radmacher

"Breathe darling. This is just a chapter. It’s not your whole story."

- S.C. Lourie

"It takes strength to make your way through grief, to grab hold of life and let it pull you forward."

- Patti Davis

"Grief can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life’s search for love and wisdom."

- Rumi

"Self-care is how you take your power back."

- Lalah Delia

"Courage doesn’t happen when you have all the answers. It happens when you are ready to face the questions you have been avoiding your whole life."

- Shannon L. Alder

"Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it’s having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome."

- Brené Brown

"Just because no one else can heal or do your inner work for you doesn’t mean you can, should, or need to do it alone."

- Lisa Olivera

"We must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us."

- Joseph Campbell

"Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die."

- Buddha

"We can’t control what people say, but we do have a say in how we react. Refusing to give others power over our feelings is a mark of emotional intelligence."

- Adam Grant

"Don’t fear failure so much that you refuse to try new things. The saddest summary of a life contains three descriptions: could have, might have, and should have."

- Louis E. Boone

"Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold."

- Helen Keller

"Failure is a detour, not a dead-end street."

- Zig Ziglar

"I have learned over the years that when one’s mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear."

- Rosa Parks

"If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment."

- Marcus Aurelius

"Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less."

- Marie Curie

"The best way to predict your future is to create it."

- Peter Drucker

"Most great people have attained their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure."

- Napoleon Hill

"There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in."

- Leonard Cohen

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it."

- Steve Jobs

"In times of pain, when the future is too terrifying to contemplate and the past too painful to remember, I have learned to pay attention to the present."

- Julia Cameron

"Pain nourishes courage. You can’t be brave if you’ve only had wonderful things happen to you."

- Mary Tyler Moore

"Don’t let pain define you, let it refine you."

- Tim Fargo

"If you have the ability to love, love yourself first."

- Charles Bukowski

"To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance."

- Oscar Wilde

"Forgiveness isn’t just the absence of anger. I think it’s also the presence of self-love, when you actually begin to value yourself."

- Tara Westover

"You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them."

- Maya Angelou

"Love yourself enough to set boundaries. Your time and energy are precious. You get to choose how you use it. You teach people how to treat you by deciding what you will and won’t accept."

- Anna Taylor

"Our self-respect tracks our choices. Every time we act in harmony with our authentic self and our heart, we earn our respect. It is that simple. Every choice matters."

- Dan Coppersmith

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

- Thomas Edison

"When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us."

- Helen Keller

"You, of all people deserve a happy ending."

- Sylvain Reynard

"The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved — loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves."

- Victor Hugo

"Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude."

- Denis Waitley

"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassions, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen."

- Elizabeth Kubler-Ross

"The experience I have had is that once you start talking about [experiencing a mental health struggle], you realize that actually you’re part of quite a big club."

- Prince Harry

"Just remember, you are not alone, in fact, you are in a very commonplace with millions of others. We need to help each other and keep striving to reach our goals."

- Mike Moreno

"Life doesn’t make any sense without interdependence. We need each other, and the sooner we learn that, the better for us all."

- Erik Erikson

"Being able to be your true self is one of the strongest components of good mental health."

- Dr. Lauren Fogel Mersy

"My dark days made me stronger. Or maybe I already was strong, and they made me prove it."

- Emery Lord

"You don’t have to be positive all the time. It’s perfectly okay to feel sad, angry, annoyed, frustrated, scared and anxious. Having feelings doesn’t make you a negative person. It makes you human."

- Lori Deschene

"This feeling will pass. The fear is real but the danger is not."

- Cammie McGovern

"Your present circumstances don’t determine where you go; they merely determine where you start."

- Nido Qubein

"Tough times never last, but tough people do!"

- Robert Schuller

"I keep moving ahead, as always, knowing deep down inside that I am a good person and that I am worthy of a good life."

- Jonathan Harnisch

"It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light."

- Aristotle

"Sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think, I’m not going to make it, but you laugh inside — remembering all the times you’ve felt that way."

- Charles Bukowski

"Everyone experiences a version of anxiety or worry in their lives, and maybe we go through it in a different or more intense way for longer periods of time, but there’s nothing wrong with you."

- Emma Stone

"Mental health is something that we all need to talk about, and we need to take the stigma away from it. So let’s raise the awareness. Let’s let everybody know it’s OK to have a mental illness and addiction problem."

- Demi Lovato

"Being vulnerable is actually a strength and not a weakness — that’s why more and more mental health is such an important thing to talk about. It’s the same as being physically sick. And when you keep all those things inside, when you bottle them up, it makes you ill."

- Cara Delevingne

"Anyone can be affected, despite their level of success or their place on the food chain. In fact, there is a good chance you know someone who is struggling with it since nearly 20% of American adults face some form of mental illness in their lifetime. So why aren’t we talking about it?"

- Kristen Bell

"What mental health needs is more sunlight, more candor, and more unashamed conversation."

- Glenn Close

"We want you to know that you don’t need to be in crisis or distress to seek help as going to therapy has numerous benefits."

- Carla Avalos LCSW+PMH-C

"What if you moved through the world as if you were easy to be loved? Because I promise you, you are easy to love."

- Sonalee Rashatwar, LCSW

"Take a deep breath to remember you are the child who lived through survival mode and the empowered adult who chose their healing."

- Dr. Nicole LePera

"'Positive vibes only' isn’t a thing. Humans have a wide range of emotions and that’s OK."

- Molly Bahr, LMHC

"I don’t regret opening up about what I went through [with depression], because, it sounds really cliché, but I have had women come up to me and say, ‘It meant so much to me.’ It means so much when you realize that someone was having a really hard time and feeling shame and was trying to hide this whole thing."

- Winona Ryder

"Change what you can, manage what you can’t."

- Raymond McCauley

"Mental health affects every aspect of your life. It’s not just this neat little issue you can put into a box."

- Shannon Purser

"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen."

- Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

"We are not our trauma. We are not our brain chemistry. That’s part of who we are, but we’re so much more than that."

- Sam J. Miller

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress."

- Frederick Douglass

"Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them—every day begin the task anew."

- Saint Francis de Sales

"The pain of severe depression is quite unimaginable to those who have not suffered it, and it kills in many instances because its anguish can no longer be borne. The prevention of many suicides will continue to be hindered until there is a general awareness of the nature of this pain."

- William Styron

"So many people look at [my depression] as me being ungrateful, but that is not it — I can’t help it. There’s not much that I’m closed off about, and the universe gave me all that so I could help people feel like they don’t have to be something they’re not or feel like they have to fake happy. There’s nothing worse than being fake happy."

- Miley Cyrus

"Others imply that they know what it is like to be depressed because they have gone through a divorce, lost a job, or broken up with someone. But these experiences carry with them feelings. Depression, instead, is flat, hollow, and unendurable. It is also tiresome. People cannot abide being around you when you are depressed. They might think that they ought to, and they might even try, but you know and they know that you are tedious beyond belief: you are irritable and paranoid and humorless and lifeless and critical and demanding and no reassurance is ever enough. You’re frightened, and you’re frightening, and you’re ‘not at all like yourself but will be soon,’ but you know you won’t."

- Kay Redfield Jamison

"Feeling your feelings will not lead to depression."

- Jordan Pickell, MCP RCC

"I will be stronger than my sadness."

- Jasmine Warga

"Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy."

- Thich Nhat Hanh

"There is some good in this world, and it’s worth fighting for."

- J.R.R. Tolkien

"You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief, but rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound."

- Khalil Gibran

"Sadness and depression will fly away on the wings of time."

- Jean de La Fontaine

"My brother died from depression. He also frequently exercised, had supportive friends/family, was successful in school and work. He had goals that he was constantly reaching—he still completed suicide. People who are depressed are not weak-minded—they are sick."

- Maddie Rawrk

"There is so much pain in the world, and most of these people keep theirs secret, rolling through agonizing lives in invisible wheelchairs, dressed in invisible bodycasts."

- Andrew Solomon

"Grief is a most peculiar thing; we’re so helpless in the face of it. It’s like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less, and one day we wonder what has become of it."

- Arthur Golden

"When you feel anger beginning to build up inside of you, let your whole body droop and relax to the best of your ability while beginning to breathe slowly from the diaphragm. Breathing in this way helps to calm both the body and the mind which leads to letting go of anger before it takes a hold."

- Marge Powers

"When the feelings of sadness, anger, and depression appear, allow them to flow and allow yourself to express the emotion with the intention of not doing harm to others."

- Molly McCord

"What I love about therapy is that they’ll tell you what your blind spots are. Although that’s uncomfortable and painful, it gives you something to work with."

- Pink

"Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing in one’s own sunshine."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual, you have an obligation to be one."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

"New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings."

- Lao Tzu

"The humanity we all share is more important than the mental illnesses we may not"

- Elyn R. Saks

"In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on."

- Robert Frost

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. ‭‭Romans‬ ‭15‬:‭13‬."

- Bible (Romans 15:13)

"If only you could sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet; how important you can be to people you may never even dream of. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person."

- Fred Rodgers

"My mother told me to be a lady. And for her, that meant be your own person, be independent."

- Ruth Bader Ginsburg

"Depression is a prison where you are both the suffering prisoner and the cruel jailer."

- Dorothy Rowe

"Sometimes the people around you won’t understand your journey. They don’t need to, it’s not for them."

- Joubert Botha

"Always find time to do the things that make you feel happy to be alive!"

- Dr. Zwig

"I knew well enough that one could fracture one’s legs and arms and recover afterward, but I did not know that you could fracture the brain in your head and recover from that too."

- Vincent van Gogh

"I will love the light for it shows me the way, yet I will endure the darkness for it shows me the stars."

- Og Mandino

"Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional."

- Buddhist proverb

"As Abraham Lincoln once said, if we magnified our successes as much as we magnified our disappointments, we’d all be much happier."

- Abraham Lincoln

"The acknowledgement of having suffered evil is the greatest step forward in mental health."

- Stefan Molyneux

"There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in"

- Leonard Cohen

"Crazy isn’t being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever."

- Susanna Kaysen

"I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship."

- Louisa May Alcott

"…if you rely solely on medication to manage depression or anxiety, for example, you have done nothing to train the mind, so that when you come off the medication, you are just as vulnerable to a relapse as though you had never taken the medication."

- Daniel Goleman

"You are not in the mountains; the mountains are in you."

- John Muir

"You don’t have to have it all figured out to move forward."

- Roy T. Bennett

"Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it."

- Greg Anderson

"We can choose to throw stones, to stumble on them, to climb over them, or to build with them."

- William Arthur Ward

"Part of my identity is saying no to things I don’t want to do… I check in with myself throughout the day and I say, ‘Do I really want to do this?’ and if the answer is no, then I don’t do it. And you shouldn’t either."

- Lady Gaga

"It’s my experience that people are a lot more sympathetic if they can see you hurting, and for the millionth time in my life I wish for measles or smallpox or some other easily understood disease just to make it easier on me and also on them."

- Jennifer Niven

"Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strength."

- Charles Spurgeon

"No amount of support or generosity justifies someone treating you badly. This includes parents."

- Sarah Crosby

"Storms make trees take deeper roots."

- Dolly Parton

"You don’t need to find a lesson in your trauma."

- Jordan Pickell, MCP RCC

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

"Life is a journey, and if you fall in love with the journey, you will be in love forever."

- Peter Hagerty

"Don’t let your mind bully your body into believing it must carry the burden of its worries."

- Astrid Alauda

"Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves."

- Carl Jung

"Stress is self-created, I decided to stop manufacturing it. We can choose an internal calm and joy even amid the chaos."

- Brendon Burchard

"Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live."

- Jim Rohn

"I can’t help but feel that I am in some way the architect of my own misery."

- Sylvia Plath

"The heart was made to be broken."

- Oscar Wilde

"If you plan on being anything less than what you are capable of being, you will probably be unhappy all the days of your life."

- Abraham Maslow

"I was with someone recently who asked: ‘Well, don’t you think that if you do too much therapy it will take away your artistic process?’ And I told them: ‘The biggest lie that we’ve ever been sold is that we as artists have to stay in pain to create.'"

- Katy Perry

"Put your heart, mind, and soul into even your smallest acts. This is the secret of success."

- Swami Sivananda

"There is no cast, no scar, no stitches. No X-ray with the evidence of pain. Rarely is there physical evidence of mental illness, but for those suffering from pervasive mental illness the pain and exhaustion is deep and heavy."

- Emily Sanders, LMFT

"One’s anger is one’s greatest enemy and one’s calmness is one’s protection."

- Sathya Sai Baba

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings."

- John Muir

"Because wherever I sat — on the deck of a ship or at a street café in Paris or Bangkok — I would be sitting under the same glass bell jar, stewing in my own sour air."

- Sylvia Plath

"In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks."

- John Muir

"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"I put my heart and my soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process."

- Vincent Van Gogh

"Never react emotionally to criticism. Take time to objectively evaluate the criticism. Is it justified? If it is, correct yourself. Otherwise, go on about your business."

- Norman Vincent Peale

"And something inside me just broke. That’s the only way I could describe it."

- Ranata Suzuki

"I wanted to write down exactly what I felt, but somehow the paper stayed empty, and I could not have described it any better."

- WTM

"The mountains are calling, and I must go."

- John Muir

"No amount of therapy can or self care can make up for scarcity of food & drink, time, or financial resources."

- Whitney Goodman, LMFT

"If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will escape a hundred days of sorrow."

- Chinese Proverb

"Anger blows out the lamp of the mind."

- Robert G. Ingersoll

"Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important."

- Natalie Goldberg

"Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves"

- Henry David Thoreau

"Increasing the strength of our minds is the only way to reduce the difficulty of life."

- Mokokoma Mokhonoana

"Have patience with yourself. When you learn to be patient with yourself, you learn to be patient with the rest of the world."

- Anonymous

"Every day may not be good, but there is something good in every day."

- Alice Morse Earle

"Stars can’t shine without darkness."

- D.H. Sidebottom

"Healing takes time, and asking for help is a courageous step."

- Mariska Hargitay

"Never, ever, ever, ever, ever give up on yourself. As long as you keep on fighting, then you can beat your depression."

"I am bent, but not broken. I am scarred, but not disfigured. I am sad, but not hopeless. I am tired, but not powerless. I am angry, but not bitter. I am depressed, but not giving up."

"You don’t have to be positive all the time. It’s okay to feel sad, angry, or scared. Just remember, at the end of the tunnel, the light shines brighter!"

"Depression is a war you fight alone, but don’t have to win by yourself."

- Unknown

"You don’t have to be okay all the time. It’s okay to not be okay."

- Unknown

"Sometimes the strongest people are the ones who fight battles you know nothing about."

- Unknown

"Even in a huge crowd, you can feel alone. But remember, you are not alone in your struggle."

- Unknown

"When your depression says, “Give up”, hope whispers, “Try one more time”."

"Having depression does not mean you are weak, a failure, or worth less than anybody else. Please, don’t discriminate against yourself."

"It is not weak to say, “I’m not OK, and I need help”. On the contrary, it is brave. It is courageous. And in the end, it could save your life."

"No matter who gives up on you, don’t you ever give up on yourself."

"Remember: Your depression does not define you. Your strength and your courage does."

"No one is ever too broken, too scarred or too far-gone to recover. If you keep on fighting, then anything’s possible."

"Maybe not today, tomorrow, or even in a year, but if you keep fighting and never give up, then things will eventually turn around, and you’ll be able to look back with relief and shout, ‘Yes! I made it!’"

"Depression is a war. Don’t give up just because you lost a battle."

"You are NOT your illness. You have an individual story to tell. You have a name, a history, a personality. Staying yourself is part of the battle."

"Healing is a process, not an event. Give it time. Good things happen to those who never give up."

"Guilt is toxic. Reliving the same mistake over and over again is torture. Constantly criticising and blaming yourself is bullying. Break free of this cycle. Reflect. Learn. Grow. Love yourself. Forgive yourself."

"You’re allowed to scream. You’re allowed to cry. You’re allowed to fall apart. But you are not allowed to give up."

"Don’t hate yourself for everything you aren’t. Instead, love yourself for everything you are."

"If you need a confidence booster, then remind yourself of all the difficult things you’ve endured and overcome."

"Try not to be discouraged by setbacks. Instead, try to be encouraged by the fact that you have the chance to overcome them."

"Never be ashamed of a scar. It simply means that you were stronger than whatever tried to hurt you."

"You deserve as much love and support as anybody else."

"Being imperfect doesn’t mean you’re unworthy. It means you’re human."

"Hope and depression are bitter rivals until one, always and inevitably, defeats the other."

"Admitting that you’re not OK is NOT a sign of weakness. It’s a sign of self-awareness, maturity, and emotional strength."

"Making mistakes does not mean you’ve failed. Rather, it means you had the courage to try, and if you learn from those mistakes, then you’ll soon succeed."

"One day, you’ll wake up and realise that the pain’s still there but that it doesn’t hurt quite as much as it used to. That’s when you’re on the road to healing."

"Never forget that walking away from something unhealthy is a very brave thing to do – even if you stumble a little on your way out the door."

"If you’re feeling suicidal, write down your dreams. Block everything else out and picture them coming true. Use them as reasons to keep on fighting."

"You were given this life because you are strong enough to live it."

"You might be sad because you’ve been through a lot, but you should also be proud of yourself for being strong enough to make it through everything you’ve been through."

"If you do everything you can to keep on fighting, then even if they don’t tell you, there’ll be people who’ll find your plight with depression inspiring."

"On particularly rough days when I’m sure I can’t possibly endure, I like to remind myself that my track record for getting through bad days so far is 100%, and that’s pretty good."

"If you rearrange the letters in Depression, you’ll get “I pressed on.” Your current situation is not your final destination."

"Get rid of the baggage of who you are not. Embrace who you really are. It is not important what others think of you. You are not here to make others happy."

"You are not worthless, you are not a failure, and you are not a loser. That voice saying you are is just your depression trying to trick you."

"Life is like a camera: focus on what’s important, capture the good times, develop from the negatives, and if things don’t work out, take another shot."

"Sometimes, you just need to cry your eyes out to be able to keep going. And you know what? That's OK."

"I know you’re sad, so I won’t tell you to have a good day. Instead, I advise you to have a day. Stay alive, feed yourself well, wear comfortable clothes, and don’t give up on yourself just yet. It’ll get better. Until then, have a day."

"Don’t let negative, toxic, insecure people drag you down to their level."

"It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living."

"Never forget that H.O.P.E. stands for "Hold On, Pain Ends"."

"The difference between your mind and my mind is this: Your mind wants to keep you alive, and mine wants to kill me."

"We are not in control of what happens around us but we remain in control of what happens inside us."

"The best view comes after the hardest climb."

"Depression is such a cruel punishment. There are no fevers, no rashes, no blood tests to send people scurrying in concern, just the slow erosion of self, as insidious as cancer. And like cancer, it is essentially a solitary experience, a room in hell with only your name on the door."

"Depression is feeling like you’ve lost something but having no clue when or where you last had it. Then, one day you realize what you lost was yourself."

"Depression is a lot like drowning, except that you can see everyone else around you breathing."

"What’s wrong? I’m ugly. I’m fat. I’m a failure. I’m depressed. I’m suffering. I hate this world. I hate myself. I’m imperfect. I can’t do anything right. I’m disgusting. I’m just not okay. Nothing, I’m fine."

"When your intentions are powerful, your actions will be just as powerful. When actions are powerful, results will be extraordinary."

"If you rearrange the letters in depression, you’ll get ‘I pressed on' - meaning your current situation is NOT your final destination."

"I don’t feel sad. I don’t feel anything."

"Sometimes the best thing you can do is not think, not wonder, not imagine, not obsess. Just breathe and have faith that everything will work out for the best."

"Declutter your life. Eliminate anything that does not contribute to your evolution as a fully realized human being."

"What does depression feel like? You don’t want to live, but you don’t want to die. You don’t want to talk to anyone, but you feel very lonely. You wake up in the morning and simply wait for the night to come."

"Exercise is a natural mood booster. Find an activity you enjoy and make it a part of your daily routine."

- Unknown

"Nothing is more depressing than having everything and still feeling really sad."

"Get enough sleep. Lack of sleep can exacerbate depression symptoms."

- Unknown

"This too shall pass. Got me through the deepest depression I have ever experienced."

"Eat a healthy diet. A healthy body and mind are connected."

- Unknown

"I think I’m afraid to be happy because whenever I get too happy, something bad always happens."

"Nobody ever tells you that emptiness weighs the most."

"I am here for you, and it’s okay to feel this way. You are not alone in this struggle."

"You are not alone in this fight. There are people who care about you and want to help."

- Unknown

"Mindfulness is the practice of being present in the moment, without judgment."

- Unknown

"Keep close to nature’s heart."

"Just when the caterpillar thought the world was ending, he turned into a butterfly."

"Never make a permanent decision based on a temporary emotion."

"Never be ashamed of a scar. It means you were stronger than whatever tried to hurt you."

- Unknown

"Everything will be okay in the end. If it's not okay, it's not the end!"

"Depression is like a black hole, some days you’re lucky to get out of bed."

"You are not your thoughts; you are the observer of your thoughts."

"Sometimes, the only way to cope with overwhelming emotions is to hope you can fall asleep and find some relief."

"You are not your illness. You have a story to tell."

"Don’t be afraid to start over. It’s a chance to build something better this time."

"The darkest hour is just before the dawn."