Grief is something we all go through. Yet, it feels different for everyone. Losing someone you love leaves a space that’s hard to fill.

Sometimes, no words are enough to explain it. But certain quotes can help. They give you a way to express those tough emotions when you can’t find the right words.

You might be thinking, “Can words make a difference?”, I think they can. Grief quotes serve an important role in the healing process:

• They let you express the emotions you can’t find the words for
• They validate your feelings
• They remind you that you’re not alone
• They offer a fresh perspective and hope

Inspirational Grief Quotes for Healing

In this article I’ve gathered 85 inspirational grief quotes to bring a little comfort and healing during this tough time. As you go through these quotes, I hope they bring you a moment of peace.

Short and Powerful Grief Quotes

“Grief is the price we pay for love.” – Queen Elizabeth II

“What we have once enjoyed we can never lose.” – Helen Keller

“To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.” – Thomas Campbell

“The pain passes, but the beauty remains.” – Pierre Auguste Renoir

“Grief is love with no place to go.” – Anonymous

Quotes About Love and Loss

“Sometimes memories sneak out of my eyes and roll down my cheeks.” – Anonymous

“Death ends a life, not a relationship.” – Mitch Albom

“Love is stronger than death.” – Robert Fulghum

“Gone yet not forgotten.” – Anonymous

“Memories… let them fill your mind, warm your heart, and lead you through.” – Unknown

Quotes About Strength in Grief

“Grief never ends, but it changes. It’s a passage, not a place to stay.” – Anonymous

“You will survive this loss. What’s more, you will thrive again.” – Unknown

“Strength grows in the moments when you think you can’t go on but you keep going anyway.” – Anonymous

“Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.” – Victor Hugo

Grief Quotes from Famous Literature

“Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.” – William Shakespeare

“The reality is that you will grieve forever.” – Elizabeth Kübler-Ross

“While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates.” – Samuel Johnson

“Time is the wisest counselor of all.” – Pericles

“Grief is not a disorder, a disease or a sign of weakness. It is an emotional, physical and spiritual necessity, the price you pay for love.” – Earl Grollman

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” – Rumi

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues.” – Washington Irving

“We need to grieve the ones we have loved and lost in this lifetime — not to sustain our connection to suffering, but to sustain our connection to love.” – J.W.

“When someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure.” – Unknown

“Grief does not change you, Hazel. It reveals you.” – John Green

“Grief is in two parts. The first is loss. The second is the remaking of life.” – Anne Roiphe

“You don’t get over it, you just get through it. You don’t get by it because you can’t get around it. It doesn’t ‘get better’; it just gets different. Everyday… Grief puts on a new face.” – Wendy Feireisen

“There is a time for departure, even when there’s no certain place to go.” – Tennessee Williams

“Grief is the emotional contract you sign when you fall in love. And it’s the price you pay to understand what it means to love completely.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

“In times of grief and sorrow, I will hold you and rock you and take your grief and make it my own. When you cry, I cry. When you hurt, I hurt. And together, we will try to hold back the floods of tears and despair and make it through the pothole-filled streets of life.” – Nicholas Sparks

Spiritual and Religious Grief Quotes

Christian Perspectives on Grief

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” – Matthew 5:4

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted.” – Psalm 34:18

“He will wipe every tear from their eyes.” – Revelation 21:4

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” – Psalm 30:5

“Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal.” – Thomas Moore

Buddhist Wisdom for Times of Loss

“Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.” – Buddhist Proverb

“The pain of separation is felt by all.” – Buddha

“Both grief and joy are part of the dance.” – Zen Proverb

“Let go of the past, let go of the future, let go of the present.” – Buddha

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes.” – Lao Tzu

Universal Spiritual Messages

“What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.” – Richard Bach

“Death is not extinguishing the light; it is only putting out the lamp because the dawn has come.” – Rabindranath Tagore

“When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.” – Kahlil Gibran

“Love transcends the physical body.” – Wayne Dyer

“The heart will break, but broken live on.” – Lord Byron

Quotes About Different Types of Grief

Losing a Parent

“A parent’s love is whole no matter how many times divided.” – Robert Brault

“The loss of a parent is one of the most emotionally complex challenges we face.” – Unknown

“A father’s guiding hand always sits on the shoulder of his children.” – Unknown

“Mother’s hold their children’s hands for a while, but their hearts forever.” – Unknown

“The death of a parent is the closest thing to losing a part of yourself.” – Anonymous

Grieving a Spouse

“What we have once enjoyed we can never lose; all that we love deeply becomes a part of us.” – Helen Keller

“Love is eternal, the aspect may change, but not the essence.” – Vincent van Gogh

“Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality.” – Emily Dickinson

“Like a bird singing in the rain, let grateful memories survive in time of sorrow.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

Coping with the Loss of a Child

“There is no foot too small that it cannot leave an imprint on this world.” – Unknown

“An angel in the book of life wrote down my baby’s birth. Then whispered as she closed the book, ‘Too beautiful for earth.'” – Anonymous

“The smallest coffins are the heaviest.” – Unknown

“A piece of my heart lives in heaven.” – Unknown

“Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart.” – A.A. Milne

Quotes for Grieving Friends

“A friend who dies, it’s something of you who dies.” – Gustave Flaubert

“True friends are never apart, maybe in distance but never in heart.” – Helen Keller

“Friendship isn’t about whom you have known the longest. It’s about who came and never left your side.” – Unknown

“Good friends help you to find important things when you have lost them… your smile, your hope, and your courage.” – Doe Zantamata

“The comfort of having a friend may be taken away, but not that of having had one.” – Seneca

Grief Quotes About Hope and Healing

“Although it’s difficult today to see beyond the sorrow, may looking back in memory help comfort you tomorrow.” – Unknown

“Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing.” – Unknown

“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul.” – Emily Dickinson

“Where there is sorrow there is holy ground.” – Oscar Wilde

“There are far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” – C.S. Lewis

“The heart will break, but broken live on.” – Lord Byron

“After the rain, the sun will reappear.” – Unknown

“Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” – Maya Angelou

“What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” – Pericles

“Legacy is not leaving something for people. It’s leaving something in people.” – Peter Strople

“Life must be lived as we go along.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.” – C.S. Lewis

“Sometimes the strongest people are the ones who love beyond all faults, cry behind closed doors, and fight battles that nobody knows about.” – Unknown

“There are some who bring a light so great to the world that even after they have gone, the light remains.” – Unknown

“Grief can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life’s search for love and wisdom.” – Rumi

“When it is darkest, we can see the stars.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“What is lovely never dies, but passes into another loveliness, star-dust or sea-foam, flower or winged air.” – Thomas Bailey Aldrich