Quotes: Wounds
Wounds are not only damage: they probe how you value yourself and how you respond to another’s flaws. The selected authors treat wounds as both tests that forge strength and as invitations to new being, challenging exile and self-reproach.
Balancing endurance and opening, these voices — Nietzsche on resilience, Mary Tyler Moore on growth through failure, Clarissa Pinkola Estés on scars as thresholds, and T. D. Jakes on love and worth — lead to the question: do wounds shut us down or make a way forward?
5 quotes on this theme, each with its source and insight
The quotes
“If you don’t find a way to love a flawed person, secretly you’re teaching yourself that you are not lovable because of your flaws.”
Source: no specific work is documented · Check the source
Disputed attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- The sentence is widely attributed to T. D. Jakes across quote compilations, but no searchable primary book, sermon transcript, or publisher text has been found for this exact wording.
- What remains uncertain
- The attribution is disputed/weakly sourced; the wording may be a paraphrase or variant circulating online rather than a verified line from a specific published or transcribed work.
The line says refusing to love someone’s imperfections teaches you, in secret, that your own flaws make you unlovable. It ties into modern themes of grace and healing and fits T. D. Jakes’s known emphasis on worth beyond perfection. The wording mainly appears in online quote collections and is not firmly sourced to a primary text.
“Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.”
Source: no specific work is documented · Check the source
MisattributedWhat we know
- What is documented
- Available evidence finds no occurrence of this wording in Lewis’s published work; a close variant appears in Chicken Soup for the Soul credited to "Author Unknown."
- What remains uncertain
- The attribution to C. S. Lewis is unreliable: the ‘‘monkey bars’’ phrasing likely postdates Lewis and the true origin remains unestablished.
The image makes recovery feel tangible: progress sometimes demands letting go before you can move on. It’s a modern motivational analogy, widely shared online — but no primary source ties these exact words to C. S. Lewis.
“What does not kill me makes me stronger.”
Source: Twilight of the Idols ("Maxims and Arrows", aphorism 8), 1889 · Check the source
Verified attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- The sentence appears as aphorism 8 in the “Maxims and Arrows” section of Twilight of the Idols, published 1889.
Nietzsche frames hardship as a possible crucible: suffering can be raw material for greater independence, creativity, or self-mastery, but only when actively transformed. The line appears in Twilight of the Idols (1889) among short maxims that challenge easy comforts.
“Take chances, make mistakes. That’s how you grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.”
Source: McCall's interview, 1980 · Check the source
Disputed attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- A 1980 McCall's interview quotes Moore saying lines like “Pain nourishes my courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave,” and later collections expand the wording.
- What remains uncertain
- Evidence supports the quote’s substance from the interview, but the exact phrasing widely circulated comes mainly from secondary compilations rather than a verifiable primary transcript.
The line frames growth as something earned by taking risks and learning from mistakes: courage deepens through hardship rather than comfort. It reflects Mary Tyler Moore’s public message about resilience and is traced to a 1980 McCall's interview, though exact wording is partly disputed.
“The doors to the world of the wild Self are few but precious. If you have a deep scar, that is a door, if you have an old, old story, that is a door. If you love the sky and the water so much you almost cannot bear it, that is a door. If you yearn for a deeper life, a full life, a sane life, that is a door.”
Source: Women Who Run With the Wolves · Check the source
Verified attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- The phrasing is consistently attributed to Clarissa Pinkola Estés and is cited in connection with Women Who Run With the Wolves in reputable quote collections.
- What remains uncertain
- Attribution is well established across sources, though the strongest confirmation would be a direct page citation from the book; the examined indexes reproduce the passage without a primary-page image.
Estés frames certain pains and longings as threshold experiences that grant access to the deeper, instinctive Self. The passage, associated with Women Who Run With the Wolves, suggests that scars, old stories, and intense longing can become openings to a more embodied, sane life.