“If there is no struggle, there is no progress.” – Frederick Douglass

Hard to deny this.  Most of us would like life to be without stress.  Wake up every morning and have life go without any incident.  Just one day, no strain.  No pain.

But it isn’t what we face.  I read a book some years ago called A Road Less Traveled.  The first line of the book, “Life is difficult” is worth the cover price.

We should expect trials in our life.  It’s designed that way.  We learn.  We stretch.  We grow.

We also fall.  We get back up.  We try the easy route and find out it would have been better to go the hard way.

The above quote reminds us to put our struggle in perspective.  The struggle should not surprise us.  If we expect it, we can expect to keep our feet as the wave crashes.

It reminds us that struggle will come whether we choose it or not.

So, we’re reminded to choose, where we can, the things we will struggle against.  Pick a subject to learn more about and grind through when the learning does not come easy.  Pick a goal to seek and push your limit daily until someday you look back and have moved miles, inches a day.

People who “happen to the world” embrace the struggles we are sure to face every day and strive for a better outcome.