Serendipitously stumbled across Henryk Górecki's Symphony Nº3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs) today. It was a Kleenex moment!, that helped put life in perspective. Here's the story (via Wiki) about what inspired the creation of the 2nd movement:

Later that year Górecki learned of an inscription scrawled on the wall of a cell the Gestapo prison in the town of Zakopane, which lies at the foot of the Tatra mountains in southern Poland. The words were those of 18-year-old Helena Wanda BÅ‚ażusiakówna, a highland woman incarcerated on 25 September 1944. It read O Mamo nie pÅ‚acz nie—Niebios Przeczysta Królowo Ty zawsze wspieraj mnie (Oh Mamma do not cry—Immaculate Queen of Heaven support me always). The composer recalled, "I have to admit that I have always been irritated by grand words, by calls for revenge. Perhaps in the face of death I would shout out in this way. But the sentence I found is different, almost an apology or explanation for having got herself into such trouble; she is seeking comfort and support in simple, short but meaningful words".[8] He later explained, "In prison, the whole wall was covered with inscriptions screaming out loud: 'I'm innocent', 'Murderers', 'Executioners', 'Free me', 'You have to save me'—it was all so loud, so banal. Adults were writing this, while here it is an eighteen-year-old girl, almost a child. And she is so different. She does not despair, does not cry, does not scream for revenge. She does not think about herself; whether she deserves her fate or not. Instead, she only thinks about her mother: because it is her mother who will experience true despair. This inscription was something extraordinary. And it really fascinated me."[9]

Here's the 2nd movement: