Thirteen Quotes About Moving On from Death

Sometimes, as the famous song by R.E.M. proclaims, “everybody hurts.”  But just as the song urges the listener to hang on “when you’re sure you’ve had enough of this life,” the quotes below encourage the reader to view pain, particularly the pain of loss, as temporary.  The underlying theme is no matter what, keep going, even using pain as fuel for the journey.

1. “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” 

– Soren Kierkegaard

2. “You’ll drift apart, it’s true, but you’ll be out in the open, part of everything alive again.” 

– Philip Pullman

 

3. “It’s okay to look at the past and the future. Just don’t stare.” 

– Lisa Lieberman-Wang

4. “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.” 

– Albert Einstein

5. “We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey.”
– Kenji Miyazawa

 

6. “If we wait until our lives are free from sorrow or difficulty, then we wait forever. And miss the entire point.” 

– Dirk Benedict

7. “The art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.” 

– Henry Ellis

8. “Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn’t people feel as free to delight in whatever remains to them?”

– Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy



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

– Joseph Campbell

10. “Don’t cry because it is over, smile because it happened.”
– Theodor Seuss Geisel

11. “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.” – Robert Frost

12. “Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but – I hope – into a better shape.”

 – Charles Dickens, “Great Expectations”

13. “Hope smiles on the threshold of the year to come, whispering that it will be happier.”

– Alfred, Lord Tennyson