'If you're going through hell; keep going'

Sir Winston Churchill said this, and many other inspiring things, during his life; but it's this one I keep coming back to, alongside this one:

'It's okay if you fall down and lose your spark. Just make sure when you do get up, you rise as the whole damn fire' - Colette Werden

There are a thousand quotes I could utilise to drive this point home, and I really struggled to pick just two, but I felt like theese went hand-in-hand with one another. You've reached hell, you're burning and suffering; why quit now? Why not absorb the fire and laugh in the face of the flames? And once you've gone all the way through hell and back you'll look at the flames not in fear, but as though to challenge them. You see, if it didn't destroy you then; why should it now? 

It's always easier said than done. I'm blindly stumbling through the dark of the labyrinth in my mind I call hell and the heat and misery is unbearable. Some days I can cover miles, I anticipate the trick floors and the fake corridors, and other days I'll end up taking a wrong turning and get chased further away by my inner demons. But each day I pick myself up and somehow find it in me to go again. 

Perhaps I'll never escape, but I'd rather die fighting on my feet than cowering somewhere knowing I gave up. That's not going to be how my story ends. I'm a warrior, I'm a survivor; and I'll face the devil with every ounce of courage I own. I'll meet his eye without hesitation and I'll do my best to take him down with me. 

I am the author of my history, I and I alone can write my ending. After all, it's not about what happens to you, it's how you react to it. I choose to fight until my very last breath, I choose to believe there are great things waiting for a brave and weary soldier who never cowered from the important battles; who fought for what she believed was honourable and just.