I love how you use this analogy to describe your life, it's wonderful and having a beautiful life is up to each of us, some days we have it and some days we don't but we have to try at least.
Are you familiar with the Hero's Journey that is used in fantasy novels? I don't describe myself as a hero, gosh not even remotely close but I think my life has to a large degree resembled the kind of events that can ultimately make or break a person ~ either way coming out changed on the other end.
I love quotes, have been finding good ones for years and collecting them. I would never be able to choose a single one as a favourite though.
We all need to be the hero of our own storrt I guess. I mean in the sense that we have to do difficult things, work hard, get out of our comfort zone, show ownership, resilience and persistence and all of that stuff that can be really hard to do. Only then can we respnthe rewards. Make sense?