In an interview talking about his imprisonment and torture from 1968 to 1974, Admiral Jim Stockdale had this to say when asked how he didn't let it get him down or depressed:

He said, “Well, you have to understand, it was never depressing. Because despite all those circumstances, I never ever wavered in my absolute faith that not only would I prevail—get out of this—but I would also prevail by turning it into the defining event of my life that would make me a stronger and better person. Not only that, Jim, you realize I’m the lucky one.”

I said, “No, I don’t.”

He said, “Yes, because I know the answer to how I would do, and you never will.”

A little later in the conversation, after I’d absorbed that and said nothing for about five minutes because I was just stunned, I asked him who didn’t make it out of those systemic circumstances as well as he had.

He said, “Oh, it’s easy. I can tell you who didn’t make it out. It was the optimists.”

This link / quote post is basically a copy of what John Gruber posted on Daring Fireball. I wanted to try it as a test of how easily I could post to my new CMS I set up for my blog.