On Consolation Quotes

“Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.”
― Michael Ignatieff, On Consolation: Finding Solace in Dark Times

“Whatever we think of Job and his God, we must begin any history of the idea of consolation here, for the story describes the human situation so clearly. Job's story tells us we are fated to endure sorrow and suffering that have no apparent meaning, moments when existence is a torment, when we know what it is to be truly inconsolable. But like Job, we must learn to endure, we must hold on to the truth of what we have lived and refuse false consolations, like believing that we deserve to suffer. We should refuse the burden of guilt and struggle as best we can to understand the meaning of our lives. We are not condemned to eternal silence, to meaninglessness. There is an answer to be found in the whirlwind, in human beings' unendingly troubled encounter with our fate, but to find the answer that is true for us we will have to be as courageous as the man in rags who dared raise his fist to the sky.”
― Michael Ignatieff, On Consolation: Finding Solace in Dark Times