We have all heard how important it is to surround ourselves with good people, and lately, I’ve noticed how helpful it is to be around good people who also share bits of wisdom at unexpected times.

This past weekend, I was on a run with one of my friends (luckily, he is one of those who can drop helpful words when he doesn’t even realize it), and he said, “The most unexpected and best things really can come out of the hardest times. If I had not gone through some of what I went through, I would not have the amazing things I have now.”

Man, is he right or what? This is something that is so easy to question in life, and I’ve caught myself wondering if good things really can come from difficult circumstances. However, I also know this is a lesson we learned time and time again through sports.

When athletes endure a hard training session, they know it is to better themselves as athletes. Something about the hard session really does make us into better athletes later on. Every hard conditioning session might be tough at the time, but in the long run it is worth it. I think it could be helpful to hold on to this metaphor during our more challenging periods of life. Maybe the challenge is simply just preparing us for what is to come, and what is to come will be full of good things.

Going even deeper into this idea, I’ve also begun to wonder if maybe the “good” does not come just for us, but perhaps sometimes, it comes for those we love, or those who follow in our footsteps. In a video that went viral, Cam Ward, a quarterback for the Tennessee Titans, talked about learning his work ethic from his dad. In this video, he was asked how he keeps himself accountable to work hard, and Ward said, “I’ve grown up watching my dad wake up at 4:30 for a job he didn’t like, so you know, if I can’t wake up early and do what I need to do for a job I do like, I shouldn’t be playing football…good things only come to those who work.”

In this situation, maybe Ward’s dad went through hard times for the good to come later for his son. This isn’t to say that he didn’t experience good seasons along the way, but perhaps the payoff for our times of intermittent suffering is to pave a better road for those we love, or those who come behind us. If you think about a teammate who isn’t a starter or doesn’t play much, they do not suffer through hard sessions because they expect more time on the field, but instead, because they are determined to better the players around them. I think this is the hardest part of being in challenging seasons — the “good outcomes” may look quite different from what we expect.

In a recent meditation, the idea of the session was to accept where we are in life instead of expecting the “grass to get greener.” That is hard to do, but I’ve spent more time being intentional with my gratitude journal and really focusing on all of the good that is already around me. When we focus on being grateful, it does help us see that there is already a lot of goodness that has come from past hard events, and making ourselves seek out the good can help us see the ways it may have even helped some people around us.

Maybe you are an athlete who got injured, but since your injury, you have spent more time studying the game and are now a better thinker while you play; maybe a teammate got to play more and is now a better athlete. Maybe you lost a job and thought you were in an impossible position, but now you have learned that you can fight through the hard times and keep pushing yourself to interview; maybe you are in a hard spot and you learned it’s OK to ask for help, and maybe now, you have realized you have greater friends than you ever knew.

When I’ve noticed myself wallowing in my own self-pity or hardship, I’ve tried to think back to other moments in my life when things felt really difficult, and in hindsight, they are not as bad as they felt at the time. I think it is important to remember all we have already overcome, so we know how capable we are of handling whatever we need to face in the present or future.

For now, I think we can do our best to accept how things are and push ourselves to notice the smallest of bright spots — a cool morning breeze, a good cup of coffee, a smiling face — and know that good already exists. As my friend said, there will probably come a day for all of us when we look back and say, “Thank you,” for without certain hardships, we may never get where our life was intended to go.

As a favorite song of mine says, “I believe, you cannot tear down what’s built back strong now, thankfully,” and I think that artist is right — once we have endured, we walk away knowing we are capable of more than we previously believed.