With all the focus on success it’s easy to overlook the valuable lessons we can learn from the more difficult parts of our journey. Below, you’ll find some very interesting insights from some of the most fascinating members of the community.
Sharon Chapman
It might be an overused word in today’s society but resilience. I don’t think that you can truly learn how to be resilient until you’ve been through tough times. You don’t know what you are capable of until you have had to push through, even when you thought that you couldn’t. Read more>>
Adriana Jimenez
Suffering taught me something success never could: that the two are deeply entangled and that one should never define the other. As women, we’ve been conditioned to measure our worth through our productivity, how much we give, or how much we sacrifice. For so many of us, suffering has become a silent badge of honor we wear proudly. Read more>>
Yasmeen Le
Suffering taught me so much grace. When you’re in the middle of a storm it’s so essential for us to want to get out of it as soon as we can. But sometimes, we can’t. Sometimes we have to stay within it and allow it to pass. Suffering brings refining. Refining purifies us. Read more>>
Jamaal Ghauri
Failures teach success, success teaches nothing. The process of suffering and failing is the iteration loop that allows for improvements and changes that result in inevitable success. Once success is achieved, there is no more learning to be done in that area, and you must move on to other problems that will teach you new things. Read more>>
Jose Romero
It taught me to be humble. It taught me that you are never better than anyone else, and that you’re supposed to treat everyone with respect no matter who they are. Whether they’re 5 or 75. Read more>>
Betty Encinales
Being humble is one of the biggest lessons I’ve learned. When you struggle, you quickly realize how important it is to stay grounded—no matter how much success you achieve or how many goals you reach. Kindness and humility cost nothing, and my own ups and downs have taught me that titles and accomplishments come and go, but staying grounded is what truly lasts. Read more>>
Lindsey Gill
Suffering keeps us humble, and it reminds us of our humanity. No matter who you are, we will all eventually meet the same fate. So why treat other’s suffering as any less than your own? Through that shared pain, that shared failure, we find comfort and community. The affirmation that we are never alone is so important for our mental health. Read more>>
Michael Brovac
One of the greatest lessons suffering taught me a lesson success on its own never could is that to truly feel happiness, you must first experience pain. If we never knew suffering, we would have nothing to compare happiness to. Without contrast, joy loses its meaning. For me, this showed up most clearly in sports. Read more>>
Angelic Pinera Toledo
Suffering taught me something success never could; that your greatest enemy, obstacle, and source of strength can all exist within you. I learned that the mind controls everything: your thoughts, your dreams, and the actions that shape your reality. “Mind over matter” became more than a saying-it became my way of life. Read more>>
Natalie Morgan
Losses always stand out more than wins. You will deconstruct everything that happened in order to see how you could have done better. Typically, when I make a mistake I make note not to ever make that same mistake twice. I figured out what I need to do in order to ensure success the second time around. ‘Good decisions come from experience. Read more>>
Ami Beach
The struggles I faced with my own health challenges are what ultimately forged me into the strong, powerful healer I am today. I went through years of undiagnosed Lyme disease, heavy metal poisoning, severe endometriosis that prevented me from having children, adrenal fatigue, and profound hormone imbalances. Read more>>
Anastasia Kyprianou
This is such a beautiful question! It taught me everything. Success is the easy part. That’s when you get to enjoy the fruits of your labor, whether that’s in your work or personal development. Suffering, failure are what make success so important. I heard this the other day. “You cannot breathe in until you let go of the last breath” It is like the yin-yang. Read more>>
Meryl Binder
Failing and missing are what teach us the most. It freaking sucks to be in those places, but when we let ourselves be in them instead of running away, numbing, or avoiding, we grow our capacity and capability. Read more>>
Donaldo Taylor
Suffering taught me things success never could. It taught me how to sit with myself , without the career, without the roles, without the mask. It showed me what resilience actually feels like, not the pretty version people applaud, but the quiet kind that grows in the dark when no one is watching. Suffering taught me compassion, for others, yes, but especially for myself. Read more>>
Ezeabasilim Emzor
Suffering taught me a kind of risk management that no book or success story could teach, also an experience you can’t buy.. When you’ve faced real pressure and survived real setbacks, you learn how to calculate risks differently with clarity, discipline, and instinct. It also opened my eyes to people. Read more>>
Tara Polley
Growing up the way I did – with instability, constant change, and a mother who had to fight for every inch of ground we stood on, taught me adaptability long before it was a leadership skill. But more than anything, suffering taught me gratitude. Everything I have today feels sweeter because I can vividly remember the seasons when I didn’t have it. The stability. Read more>>
Anthony M. Wiley
Aeschylus said, “We suffer our way to wisdom.” Success can make life look good on the outside, but suffering reaches the parts of you that you usually keep hidden. It shows you what still hurts, what you have been avoiding, and what needs real healing. Suffering slowed me down long enough to see myself honestly. Read more>>
Sheida Kermani
Suffering taught me what success never could: hhmm, let’s see, it showed me the stories my own wounded parts kept repeating and how much of my pain lived in my mind. I realized that if I didn’t understand or love those parts of myself, they would take the wheel and steer my life from fear instead of truth. Read more>>
Maddy G
Suffering teaches you far more than success ever could. I’ve spent the majority of my life in survival mode, and although not easy, it’s built my work ethic and determination. Suffering teaches resilience and humility, and it makes you appreciate the little things even more. Success feels different when you have to fight for it. Read more>>
