Page 84 - Failure to Triumph - Journey of A Student

If ever you have been sad in your life at any stage then look behind
and ask yourself, hasn't your life been better after going through that

experience of sadness? Did it not improve your personality? Haven’t
you emerged out of it mentally stronger? Like a potter strengthens
and hardens the clay pot with the help of fire, sadness too is like fire
from which you only emerge stronger. We learn to overcome pain
and sadness only when we experience it. The French philosopher
Marquis de Sade said, “It is always by way of pain one arrives at
pleasure.”

We all get depressed or sad because of something or the other in
our lives. All that we need to remember is that the sadness does not
have to become permanent—because that is how it turns into
depression. Being sad is not wrong; what is wrong is the lack of
belief that everything is going to be fine. We need to believe that this

pain will go away some day. Helen Keller said,” Although the world is
full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” If this thought
finds a strong place in our minds then we will develop a positive
outlook and hopefulness. You must look at people who are around
you. A lot of these people would have been through the same
agonizing pain which you are going through right now. Is there
anyone who has absolutely no pain or sadness in his life? People

stay happy, they smile, their lives go on, and it surely does not stop if
someone comes or goes. Problems arise when we think that
happiness is our constant companion.

We enjoy it when we are riding down the slope on a bicycle. We tend
to forget that while returning we will have to ride the bicycle up the

slope, and that would be painful. And the opposite is true as well if
we have already done the hard work of riding up the slope, then now
it is time to enjoy the pleasant ride down the slope. This means that
if you are happy today, you will have to prepare for the days when
you would be sad. And if you are sad today, be ready to welcome the
happy days ahead.