What gives you hope?

Feeling hopeful can influence our present behavior in ways that create opportunities for our future. When we have hope, we see a world of possibility in front of us.  When we don’t have hope, we see everything that life is lacking and we can pull ourselves into feelings of despair.

So what creates hope?  We love to believe that it’s the things happening in the world around us.  We get a call about a job we really want, land an unexpected new client, or meet with a new boss that paints a picture of the future that is promising.  But what actually creates hope is the thought we have about those events.  Likely, something along the lines of “This sounds amazing”, “I didn’t even realize this could be possible” or “Better days are definitely ahead”.  Seeing that something greater than what we have today, could be in our future, opens our mind in terms of what is possible.  Now, all of a sudden, we can dream bigger and see more clearly.

And what takes from our hope?  Not the external circumstances, but the thought that our future is somehow limited.  That we won’t experience the possibility we have today or we will have access to less possibility in the future than we have today.  It can come in seemingly innocent thoughts such as “It shouldn’t be this way”, “This wasn’t meant to happen”, or “This isn’t going to fix anything”.  

What’s fascinating about all of this, is two intelligent individuals can look at the same event and consciously or unconsciously choose either path.  To one, the event creates thoughts that life is not going to be better and it sends them into a cycle of despair.  To the other, the event creates thoughts of endless possibility and they are embraced with feelings of hope.  

When we find ourselves on the side of despair, the first question I like to ask is “What is true?”.  Our mind loves to make up a story of all the bad that “could” happen, yet most of it is a story.  So pulling out what is an actual fact vs. the story our brain is making up can be extremely helpful.  The second thing we can do is give equal air time to the opposition.  What if this was happening exactly as it should be?  What are all the possibilities that could come of this?  And then third, evaluate the benefits of believing the future is limited vs. what could be gained from thinking that anything is possible?

Where there are dreams, there is always room for hope.  Sometimes, we just have to do a little thought work in order to find it, so we can make those dreams a reality.