Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes

We can stand only a certain amount of unhappiness; anything beyond that annihilates us or passes us by, leaving us apathethetic.

How vast was a human being's capacity for suffering. The only thing you could do was stand in awe of it. It wasn't a question of survival at all. It was the fullness of it, how much could you hold, how much could you care.

Humankind can tolerate only so much rejection.

No single, individual moment is in and of itself unendurable.

I say unto you that suffering is not holding you, you are holding suffering

All damaged people are dangerous. Survival makes them so.' 'Why?' 'Because they have no pity. They know what others can survive, as they did.

I will always try to be happy. I don’t think people really understand the value of happiness until they know what it’s like to be in that very, very dark place. It’s not romantic. Not even a little.

Suffering is not increased by numbers; one body can contain all the suffering the world can feel.

But when you are being physically and psychologically tortured, it is difficult to remove yourself from the pressingness of the moment at hand. Here's how I dealt with bullying: I cried, I hated myself, I hated my life. I didn't deal with it, I survived it, but I never dealt with it. So here are two tips from someone with lots of experience. 1: It's not about you, it has nothing to do with you, it's about the assholes doing it to you. 2: Your job is not to deal with it, your job is to survive it, which you CAN do because it WILL end. And then yes, it will get better.

Refusing to be disillusioned is the cause of much of the suffering of human life.

Real pain can alone cure us of imaginary ills. We feel a thousand miseries till we are lucky enough to feel misery.

Controlled hysteria is what's required. To exist constantly in a state of controlled hysteria. It's agony. But everyone has agony. The difference is that I try to take my agony home and teach it to sing.

The three types of misery are the misery of suffering, the misery of change, and pervasive misery.

I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth. Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell; I awfully forebode I shall not. To remain as I am is impossible. I must die or be better, it appears to me.

My heart was fashioned to be susceptible of love and sympathy, and when wrenched by misery to vice and hatred, it did not endure the violence of the change without torture such as you cannot even imagine.

Don't say mourning. It's too psychoanalytic. I'm not mourning. I'm suffering.

O Lord! Unhappy is the man whom man can make unhappy.

I told myself – as I’ve told myself before – that the body shuts down when the pain gets too bad, that consciousness is temporary, that this will pass. But just like always, I didn’t slip away. I was left on the shore with the waves washing over me, unable to drown.

I do not doubt that it would be easier for fate to take away your suffering than it would for me. But you will see for yourself that much has been gained if we succeed in turning your hysterical misery into common unhappiness.

The only horrible thing in the world is ennui.

It's easy to do nothing, but your heart breaks a little more every time you do.

My wife, who, poor wretch, is troubled with her lonely life.

...the habit of despair is worse than despair itself.

I think you are wrong to want a heart. It makes most people unhappy. If you only knew it, you are in luck not to have a heart.