Maia

“We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face... we must do that which we think we cannot.”
― Eleanor Roosevelt

“I think we all wear armor. I think those who don’t are fools, risking the pain of being wounded by the sharp edges of the world, over and over again. But if I’ve learned anything from those fools, it is that to be vulnerable is a strength most of us fear. It takes courage to let down your armor, to welcome people to see you as you are.”
― Rebecca Ross, Divine Rivals

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien

“Hail Thorin!" Gandalf said as he entered. "I have brought him." 
There indeed lay Thorin Oakenshield, wounded with many wounds, and his rent armor and notched axe were cast upon the floor. He looked up as Bilbo came beside him. "Farewell, good thief." He said. "I go now to the halls of my fathers, until the world is renewed. Since I leave now all gold and silver, and go where it is of little worth, I wish to part in friendship from you, and I would take back my words and deeds at the Gate." 
Bilbo knelt on one knee filled with sorrow. "Farewell, King under the Mountain!" He said. "This is a bitter adventure, if it must end so; and not a mountain of gold can amend it. Yet I am glad that I have shared in your perils-that has been more than any Baggins deserves.
"No!" Said Thorin. "There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. But sad or merry, I must leave it now. Farewell!" ”
― J.R.R.Tolkien, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again