Trials are a gold mine to be exploited

"Oh! How it costs to give Jesus what He asks!... What joy that it costs... What an unspeakable joy to carry our Crosses feebly...

...far from complaining to Jesus about that Cross He is sending us, I cannot understand the infinite love that has drawn Him to treat us in this way... (...) What a joy to be humbled; it is the only thing that makes saints!... Can we doubt now the will of Jesus concerning our souls?... Life is only a dream, and soon we shall wake up, and what joy... the greater our sufferings are the more infinite will be our glory... Oh, let us not lose the trial that Jesus is sending us, it is a gold mine to be exploited. Are we going to miss the chance?... The grain of sand wants to get to work, without joy, without courage, without strength, and it is all these titles which will facilitate the enterprise for it; it wants to work through love.

The Martyrdom is beginning. Let us enter the arena together..."

-- Letters of St Thérèse of Lisieux

Face life bravely and fearlessly

"Face life bravely and fearlessly. Yet let your courage be calm.

Courage without calmness is incomplete and imperfect. It is a promising bud, not yet open. Only when it has weathered seasonal storm and drought will it blossom and bear fruit."

-- Where Silence is Praise by A Carthusian

Facing Life

"Endure! In the first place through good sense and sound philosophy. What is the use of rebelling? In any event, we must accept what comes. Events dominate us; we are not the masters of them. To recriminate, to sigh, and to protest are ineffective actions. 

Endure! Through a supernatural spirit, because our crosses unite us to our Lord's Cross. God sends or permits to identify ourselves with His Son, Moreover, even humanly speaking, suffering well accepted makes us mature; it demands rare virtues. As long as a man has had nothing but happiness, he does not know of what he is capable, just as we do not really know what the sound of the bell is as long as the clapper has not struck it. But let sorrow come upon a man, then he can divine what he is capable of doing. When the soul is fortified by divine motives, it can reach that summit which humanity can reach in the way of moral uplift. For the sons of men as for the Son of Man, the highest royalty comes from the crown of thorns. 

Endure! Through charity for all your brethren. While it permits us "to complete that which is wanting in the passion of Jesus Christ," suffering gives us a most efficacious role int he redemption. To act safely; but to suffer, how much more! The great instrument of salvation is the acceptance of the cross on which one is to be nailed. If we had more often present in our mind the sufferings of all our brethren scattered throughout the world, how much more cheerful would we be in accepting the many myseries which assail us!" -- Some Rare Virtues by Raoul Plus, SJ