Harness the Power of Hope
It Is the Fuel We Need to Do Hard Things
Is hope naïve? Or a necessity?
Those who characterize hope as naïve often confuse it with optimism.
However, there is a critical difference between the two, as Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has made beautifully clear.
“Optimism,” he says, “is the belief that things are going to get better. Hope is the belief that we can make things better.”
In other words,
To make things better, hope is a necessity.
This is true in our personal lives, our professional lives, and our collective lives.
In our personal lives, if we don’t have hope—that we can improve our health or relationships or bank accounts—we almost certainly won’t.
In our professional lives, if we don’t maintain hope that we can advance important mission-driven goals together, we are bound to lose steam.
And in our collective lives, if we don’t have hope that we can help safeguard what must be protected—from democracy to the health of our natural world—we will soon wallow in despair.
What Hope Provides
When we harness the power of hope, we are more likely to act and inspire others to do the same.
Research also shows that hope improves well-being and increases self-esteem. As the American Psychological Association put it earlier this year, “Hope may be the antidote to today’s chaotic world.”
This is not to suggest that hope—or anything else—is a panacea or silver bullet in today’s complex world.
To be successful, good people doing hard things in tough times need a wide range of skills to support them, including the capacity for perceptual savvy, emotional mastery, and purposeful action.
But hope is the spark that helps us get going and keep going.
Hopeful stories are not often in the news (though some would suggest they have been lately.)
In real life, however, they are everywhere:
In the hearts of the 10,500 athletes who will compete in the Olympics this month
The stories of powerful changemakers throughout history
And perhaps most importantly, in the day-to-day actions of everyday people.
Of course, living a life of hope takes courage. But, as with most good things, it gives more than it takes from us.