Why do I feel hopeful in the face of worldly turmoil?
Hope and God are inextricably linked.
People often pray when they are desperate for hope.
Hollywood blockbusters depict the protagonist praying for a hopeful outcome.
When you’re desperately worried or fearful, you pray; a non-Christian, in the face of terror and adversity, will look to a God or some higher being for help.
The news perpetually sells us doom and gloom, another financial disaster, more bombing in Ukraine, rising inflation and soaring energy costs.
What is there to be hopeful about in the face of this gloom?
I’m a self-confessed pessimist, at the very least a fatalist; I’m a walking contradiction, a person of two halves.
When you’re hopeful, you are optimistic and likely to take action.
But optimism and hopefulness are different.
I was hopeful and realistic during the pandemic, but not optimistic.
I didn’t pay much attention to the nonsense; I researched and came to my conclusions.
Meanwhile, the optimists tried to convince us that normalcy would resume and life would return to how it was?
They were wrong.
Hope is far more potent than optimism.
Maintaining hopefulness in the face of a dire situation, one not of your making, is efficacious.
From perseverance comes hope more than optimism.
To be hopeful is to cherish a desire with anticipation; to want something to happen ( not win the lottery) to be true.
Hope is an optimistic state of mind, so why do I feel hopeful?
Often it is the worst moments, those times when we least feel hopeful, that reframe and help us look forward with renewed hope and vigour.
Good things tend to follow the bad; that’s my philosophical foresight.
Maintaining perspective and asking yourself, will this matter a year from now helps.
This serves to help me focus and appreciate the good things that happen, often occurring after something awful.
I aim to control the things I can and let go of the rest; it’s hard work as you can’t control free will.
Although it is hard to feel hopeful, acknowledge it and be hopeful anyway.
Pause and reflect on what is good
It’s amazing how this makes you appreciate what surrounds you.
I took a coffee break in the garden this morning, sat and listened to the bird song, and enjoyed the warmth on my face.
Those small moments make a real difference to the rest of your day.
What are you grateful for in life?
Right now, it’s the sunny weather, my family’s health, hot and cold running water and electricity.
The conditions that those poor survivors in Mariupol, Ukraine, are experiencing make me appreciate what I sometimes take for granted.
Look forward, not back.
I’m finally looking forward to the end of exams and a family holiday, including good food, wine, and lots of laughter.
Looking to a positive and hopeful future enables us to shift our focus from the negative to the positive and can be used as a mental health barometer.
Here’s hoping that diplomacy will end the war in Ukraine and that we can look forward to more sunny weather and a more certain future.
” Everything that is done in the world is done by hope”.
~ Martin Luther King
