Hoping Against Hope - Meb

          As a sort of experiment, I've been watching my dog, Cleo. She anticipates and she's joyful, and if I hold up a treat she sees it and salivates, her brain remembering that she got this treat the last time I held it up. Even so, I am not sure she can really hope. Hope requires an ability to imagine a future that is not this one, even if that future is out of our real control or is not very likely. While to live in the moment as Cleo does can be celebrated, to be able to change something - ourselves, the world, anything - requires an element of hope. We humans are able to hope.  

          Some of my darkest days are when hope is hard to find. My friends and I are worried about the state of the world. We cringe when we hear about bombings and the threat of more bombings. We cry tears of empathy when we learn about mothers and children being separated, about sons being murdered, about lives that matter to some but not all. We worry about climate change threatening both the honey bee and the very heartland of countries as we know them. To cope, we learn about and try to build resilience. To cope, we work on developing hope.

          Maya Angelou wrote, "Hope and fear cannot occupy the same space. Invite one of them in." I'll admit, I have been fearful at times. I want certainty more than anything. Certainty that my loved ones will be OK. Certainty that my garden will have enough water to grow and enough bees to pollinate the flowers. Certainty that the good students I know who work so hard will not be punished for being born on the wrong side of the border and will be allowed to complete their degrees. Certainty that our scientists, including my son, will be able to continue to work on behalf of all of us to find new ways to deal with problems that require facts and evidence-based research to solve. I want certainty for myself, my daughter and her friends that we will not be singled out for abuse because of being a woman, or someone with a disability, or a transgender person, or a person of color. I want certainty that I will have a safe place to come home to each and every day.

          When I live in fear, I cannot hope. When I give up and say there is nothing I can really do, I give up hope. When I say, even in a very enlightened way, "I accept whatever is here," I may be choosing to live outside of hope. Hope is required for anything to change, for it is an essential part of imagining the possible.

          When we were little, we sang, "This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine." Today, I heard someone say that even on a sunny day, when someone lights a candle, there are more "Lumens" (a scientific measure of the total quantity of visible light emitted by a source) than before, even when that extra light is not noticeable to a person standing there. Lighting one candle, literally, changes the world. It is also true that the ripple effect of the light waves from that light, (like the ripple effect of miracles, I'll add), enters the web of the Universe. We cannot know where these waves of light go or what their impact may ultimately be. As with many small acts, the end result may be almost imperceptible to a person standing nearby. Sometimes, it may just be too soon to tell. 

          What is the measure of a smile? Can we calculate joy generated by reading a card from a friend, warmth from a hug when lonely, the sense of fullness when we provide dinner for a homeless. hungry person? Each of these acts seems small in light of the horrible tragedies of our time, paling in comparison to the suffering on the news we block from our minds in self-preservation. And yet, the smallest acts of smiling, of serving, of sending love, are also "candles," significant signs of true resistance in a world that can seem dark. Hoping beyond hope that I can make a difference, I will resist!

           Here are some ideas that have been recommended to build up our "hope muscles":

1. When feeling hopeless, ask yourself, "What is truly important to me? Does the situation now make a difference to my raison d'etre?"
2. Ask yourself, "What is it that I have control over in this situation?" and do only that.
3. Conduct a simple act of kindness and know that you just sent a hopeful light into the world. 
4. Don't take failures personally.
5. Celebrate small victories and successes: don't wait for only the big ones.
6. Take  baby steps towards your goals.
7. Tell one another success stories, no matter how small you think they are. These are the ripple effects of light into the darkness and you hold the candle!