It was hell at the time, but after it was over, it was wonderful.
Interpretation
Difficult experiences can lead to valuable and transformative outcomes.
This quote by Billy Wilder reflects on the paradox of painful experiences — while they may be challenging and intolerable in the moment, they often lead to a sense of relief and appreciation once they have passed. The statement emphasizes the idea that growth and joy can emerge from suffering, highlighting the importance of perspective in how we view past hardships.
In practice
In a speech about overcoming challenges, one might use this quote to illustrate the value of resilience.
Film’s thought of as a director’s medium because the director creates the end product that appears on the screen. It’s that stupid auteur theory again, that the director is the author of the film. But what does the director shoot-the telephone book? Writers became much more important when sound came in, but they’ve had to put up a valiant fight to get the credit they deserve.
What critics call dirty in our pictures, they call lusty in foreign films.
I have ten commandments. The first nine are, thou shalt not bore. The tenth is, thou shalt have right of final cut.
Happiness is working with Jack Lemmon.
Hindsight is always twenty-twenty.
I'd worship the ground you walked on if only you walked in a better neighborhood.
Let no one trust so entirely to natural prudence as to persuade himself that it will suffice to guide him without help from experience.
So, how do you get back to heaven? _x000D_ To begin with, just notice the thoughts that take you away from it. _x000D_ You don't have to believe everything your thoughts tell you. _x000D_ Just become familiar with the particular thoughts you use _x000D_ to deprive yourself of happiness. _x000D_ It may seem strange at first to get to know yourself in this way, _x000D_ but becoming familiar with your stressful thoughts _x000D_ will show you the way home to everything you need.
Sorrows are the rags of old clothes and jackets that serve to cover, and then are taken off. That undressing, and the beautiful naked body underneath, is the sweetness that comes after grief.
When you have to prove the value of your ideas by persuading other people to pay for them, it clears out an awful lot of woolly thinking.
But it is a blessed provision of nature that at times like these, as soon as a man's mercury has got down to a certain point there comes a revulsion, and he rallies. Hope springs up, and cheerfulness along with it, and then he is in good shape to do something for himself, if anything can be done.
While we are sitting in meditation, we are simply exploring humanity and all of creation in the form of ourselves. We can become the world's greatest experts on anger, jealousy, and self-deprecatio n, as well as on joyfulness, clarity, and insight. Everything that human beings feel, we feel. We can become extremely wise and sensitive to all of humanity and the whole universe simply by knowing ourselves, just as we are.
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