“Hope springs eternal in the human breast. Man never is, but always to be blest. The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home. Rests and expatiates in a life to come.”
An Essay on Man – Epistle 1, The English Poet, Alexander Pope (1733)
2017 — Was It Really a Tale of Two Cities?
2017 will undoubtedly go down as a year unlike any other in recent history, one marked with heightened levels of anxiety across our electorate and an increasing polarization in our political discourse on everything from the role of Russia in our 2016 Presidential election, our health care system, our tax structure, the debate over climate change, and where we find ourselves as a country in discussing important moral and cultural issues like the state of race relations, sexual harassment, and our policies on legal and illegal immigration. The environment we are living in has provoked massive demonstrations like the Women’s March in January and in Charlottesville this past October.
Against this challenging backdrop, the global economy has soared ahead in a synchronous fashion that economists like me thought were mere theoretical suppositions, helping propel stock market indices to record new highs and consumer confidence levels we haven’t seen in more than 17 years. I don’t know if there has ever been a period in recent history that offers such a stark contrast between the forces that offer us hope and those that feed our feelings of hopelessness. To borrow some lines from the Charles Dickens novel A Tale of Two Cities:
“It was the best of times, and the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness. It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity. It was the season of light, it was the season of darkness. It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us. We were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.”
Why I Have Hope for 2018
As we begin the new year, it may be an opportune time to ask ourselves whether you feel hope in your daily lives and how you define that hope? I have been thinking about this topic of hope for the last several months, driven in large part through my experiences of being a professional coach and having the privilege of working with so many wonderful clients across a variety of industries. I get to see firsthand the hope they embody in tackling their goals and the specific steps they commit to in accomplishing their goals. But I also see hope through the volunteer work I do as a Trustee for St. Catharine – St. Margaret Parish, the Diocese of Trenton, and in my work as a Board member for Catholic Charities. It’s in these day to day activities that I really get to see the power of hope up close and personal — one person, one moment, one day at a time. These incredibly uplifting interactions I experience may not qualify for those “breaking news” stories that clutter the cable news airwaves but they infuse me with a spirit of hope for the future. It’s reflected in the myriad of incredible work people do for others in need and in the communities they serve:
- I see it in the many people who bring food to our 4 Pantries to serve the needs of those less fortunate than we;
- It’s the hope that can be seen through the many volunteers who help an undocumented immigrant file their legal paperwork and support their basic living needs.
- It’s the gift of hope from the fabulous people who drive a senior citizen to Church or for a Doctor’s visit or who simply give another person that greatest of all gifts — the gift of spending time with those who are lonely and just yearn for some companionship and human connection.
- It’s the earthly shepherds among us who flock to our lost sheep and offer help with their finances, their housing, or who are suffering from addiction and just trying to get back on their feet in the hope of a second chance for a drug-free life.
- I can see it in the saints that walk among us helping men and women who are coming out of prison acclimate to a new world of freedom and one where their own self-worth will not be defined by a mistake they made earlier in their life.
These experiences help reinforce to me that hope is alive and well in our daily lives as we enter 2018, even though we sometimes neglect to see it or embrace it.
Hope Gives Meaning to Life
Hope can drive both our temporal as well as our spiritual reality. For me, hope is more than just a feeling about the future I envision; it’s a certainty of knowing where I am going and who is coming along with me for the journey. There’s the hope that abounds for the people that we love and care about and the hope that we place in the companies and communities that we live and work in. For people of faith, there’s the hope of what your faith teaches you and guides you to, which for me is the belief that there is something unimaginably greater than the earthly life we live – it’s the promise of eternal life so eloquently spoken in Romans 8:24 “For we are saved by hope”.
Hope is what helps us through the difficult periods of our journey – the loss of someone close to us — a parent, spouse or child; a serious illness or life-threatening diagnosis; a painful divorce and separation from loved ones; a career setback like the loss of a job and the hopelessness that we often feel in trying to move forward. Having hope can be a game changer and move you away from that feeling of hopelessness that often accompanies those difficult moments in our lives. And, sometimes those feelings of hopelessness can be meaningfully reduced by bringing hope to other people who are experiencing their own set of difficulties. Hope absolutely gives real meaning to our lives because of its implicit promise that better days await us, ones filled with opportunity and abundant possibility.
So What Does Hope Look Like for You?
I am sure all of us have our goals for 2018 neatly laid out, some in the personal realm and other goals that relate to our career. And, if you are like yours truly, some of those goals have yet to be fulfilled, so they remain on the annual list because we convince ourselves that yes, “this year will be different”, especially goals that focus on losing weight or getting more exercise. Some goals disappear because we have either achieved them or they are no longer a goal worth pursuing; and, every year we add some new goals to our annual list. I have always been a huge believer in setting goals for myself and I have found through my own experience and that of others that writing my goals down increases the odds of achieving them. But this year, I hope my clients, colleagues, and friends can reflect more deeply on what hope means to you in your everyday life and how all of us can become ambassadors of hope to others in our lives who may have lost that feeling of hope.
My 7 Hopes for 2018 and Beyond
So, as we begin the new year together, I would like to share 7 of my heartfelt hopes and some of the life lessons that hope has taught me over the years:
#1) Hope in Making Better Choices — We all make choices every day, some good ones as well as some we regret. It’s the nature of life itself that we have this awesome power to choose which some of us view as a blessing, but for others may feel like a burden. But having the power to make choices gives us hope and possibility so it is my hope that I can make better choices in 2018 that align with helping me become the best version of myself I can possibly be. And, from a more spiritual context, I hope that my choices can be in greater alignment with what God wants me to do.
#2) Hope in Embracing Change — I hope that I can find the inner resolve to act on those things that I know I should change and can change. I hope to work harder to create the space for the new habits I seek, the healthy ones like eating earlier and going to bed earlier that can crowd out the unhealthy ones like eating too late at night and going to bed too late as well. I have learned through experience that the best way to break these old habits is to simply start that new desired habit or behavior. And, if I can keep to it, that old habit or behavior will begin to wither away.
#3) Hope in Being More Present and Mindful – Busy lives and packed schedules, too many electronic devices, a “to do list” that seems to get longer with every passing day – sound familiar? How many of us really take the time to treasure some of those special moments we might overlook – the way we greet someone that we don’t know; watching a morning sunrise or the fireworks with a loved one; taking in the ocean air or a beautiful flower garden; or, hearing the energizing sound of young children playing in the schoolyard who represent our best hope of who we can be in the future? I know I don’t always take in every moment as I should but it is something that I have become more acutely aware of since I had a surgical procedure for a new stent last summer. I have replaced years of jogging and marathons with a new passion for walking and I see and hear things like I never did before. Walking is living and it has given me new purpose and a profound appreciation for the gifts of sight and sound that I had never used to full effect before. Those gifts were always present but I didn’t use these God-given blessings as much as I could have. I see so much hope in staying on this trajectory and I want to be ever more present and mindful in all my future interactions. I am even more appreciative of the great lyrics from Seasons, a song by Neal Halstead about how there is “No time for feeling old. No time for feeling blue. No time for wasting what we know”. I just want to take in and absorb every moment I can. Maybe this hope of never wanting to waste any time comes with the passing of age and reflects our human mortality. I think I know now how precious that gift of time really is and why the phrase “the present, that’s why they call it a gift” resonates with me more than ever.
#4) Hope That Rests in the Power of Positive Thinking – Hope allows me to pierce through the darkness of an uncertain journey and bat away my fears, insecurities, self-limiting beliefs, stubbornness, procrastination, self-doubt, and all those stumbling blocks that often get in my way and keeps me from where I want to go. I know I can’t think my way out of hopelessness, rather I must act my way out. And, having hope is that very elixir I need to act on all the things that I want to achieve. The American writer Anne Lamott, described hope in the context of the patience required to be an effective novelist and in a way many of us can relate to irrespective of what our own occupation might be: “Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.” I now know and appreciate how a focus on positive thinking can really change your whole mindset and become a powerful force for hope in my life.
#5) Hope in Helping Others in Need – I know now that our own periods of difficulty, self-doubt, and feelings of helplessness can be turned around by helping someone else who is also going through a difficult period. We may not be able to control or do everything we’d like to do for that person but we can do something and the gift we receive in return is that gift of hope. I have learned that helping others can accelerate our own personal journey away from feelings of hopelessness to a new, exciting destination filled with hope and gratitude for the blessings I always had but never found the time to acknowledge. Helping others and embracing the hope in them that comes from that experience gives me even greater resolve and confidence to tackle my own challenges.
#6) Hope in Knowing That We are Not Alone – We can’t always plan for all the unexpected things that happen in life but I have learned that it is hope that brings us the inner peace we need when the unexpected does happen. It’s the people in our lives who bring us that hope and help us to navigate those difficult moments and help us to move forward. It begs a powerful question that we should all ask ourselves – do I really know what people in my life I am truly grateful for? Do they even know how grateful I am to have them in my life? Identifying the people in our life that we are grateful for and sharing that gratitude with them can be another game changer and help us on the journey to a more hopeful future. And for those of us who are looking for a deeper spiritual connection, there’s hope in what scripture teaches us but perhaps no line more meaningful and inspiring than what we find in Hebrews 13: 5 “I will never leave you nor forsake you”. Imagine that even in those moments of our life when we feel lost and hopeless and no one is paying attention to us, God is always there. Wow, there is so much hope in knowing that!
#7) Hope in Becoming the Best Version of Myself – Spiritually, St. Paul’s Letter to the Galatians (5: 22-23) captures the hope I have in attaining the nine qualities he defines so eloquently in that letter and which can help me on the journey to become my best self — love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Yes, these are indeed the qualities that provide a blueprint to a better self but they also underline the hope we see in others. Living these nine virtues is no easy task, but it’s an insightful look into how hope can lead us to something well worth aspiring to.
Hope is a wonderful thing and all of us need hope now more than ever. You can’t buy hope on the open market but it’s the one thing I know now that I cannot live without. Let’s keep hope alive in 2018 and make sure that tomorrow will be better than today or yesterday. Here’s wishing that my clients, colleagues, and friends can find the joyful hope they seek in the new year and beyond.
Blessings to all, Dr. K
