“Hope is being able to see that there is light
despite all of the darkness.”—Desmond Tutu
What gives you hope? What inspires optimism and opens you to possibilities when times are challenging? What lights a new path when the world seems overwhelmingly dark?
Reflecting on these questions is a supportive and nurturing practice, particularly when you are navigating change, uncertainty, and challenges in your life. When you feel overwhelmed and exhausted living in the unknown maintaining a positive attitude is especially difficult. When the challenges you face seem out of your control, hope can feel even more out of reach.
And along with our own anxiety about change, it is easy to absorb negativity and other people’s anxiety when we are bombarded with the 24/7 news, drama on social media, and hear about conflicts with friends, friends or colleagues. Our feelings of hope may decrease with each negative interaction leaving us drained and filled with despair. If you are feeling this way currently you are not alone.
What you probably know intuitively however is that you can only negotiate change and challenges with grace and creativity when you feel more positive and hopeful. You may be yearning for a fresh perspective and new ways to embrace hope to counter all the difficulties present in the world. And the good news is that it is possible!
So how do we embrace hope even when times are tough?
The answer is deceptively simple – you commit to nurturing and caring for yourself each and every day. When we nurture ourselves, we can transform our perceptions colored by fear and scarcity into trust and positive expectation. Coming from this place of wellbeing allows us to feel renewed and rejuvenated and capable of handling any challenges we may face.
Embracing hope fuels our resilience and encourages us to take the next empowered step on our journey, breaking through the disempowered feelings that keep us stuck.
In addition, the joy we feel when we are deeply nurtured expresses itself as positivity, hopefulness, and open heartedness in our daily lives. This positivity influences everything in our lives from how we perceive challenges, to how we respond to difficult people and situations, and even how we receive abundance and blessings.
The beautiful thing about this practice is that our positivity and hopefulness fuel each other and this empowering cycle is then effortlessly maintained by our self-nurturing practice.
I want you to know that with consistent practice your ability to remain hopeful will become a powerful self-nurturing tool that will transform your life.
As Guy Finley reminds us “If you want light to come into your life, you need to stand where it is shining.”
So how can you embrace hope and stand where it is shining?
I encourage you to begin by exploring the following reflective questions:
- What anchors you in hope?
- What makes you feel less hopeful?
- What helps you generate a feeling of hopefulness?
During a recent wellness workshop that I facilitated on cultivating hope we explored the following questions and participants were able to identify what helped them embrace hope including:
- Prayer
- Nature
- Trusting self
- Connecting in community
- Remembering that you are not alone
- Journaling
- Listening to self
- Exploring choices
- Moving forward
- Inspiring books
- Gratitude practice
- Gardening
- Affirmations
- Mindfulness
- Making Plans
- Asking for help
- Support
- Perseverance
- Learning
- Acknowledging my resilience and empowered choices
- Asking what my future self would thank me for
What would you add to this list? What self-nurturing practices resonated with you that could support you embrace hope each day?
Developing self-awareness is an empowering self-nurturing practice that provides you with more choices and when coupled with self-compassion becomes the foundation of your self-nurturing practice.
I invite you to create space each day to listen to the wisdom of your heart as you reflect on what is anchoring you to hope. Remember your heart always knows!
Also begin to create a hope list as a reminder of the practices you can engage in consistently to support you and include them in your self-nurturing practice. You can add these hope filled activities to your calendar to reinforce your commitment to embracing hope. Take time at the end of the day to check in on your level of hopefulness and what contributed to it. Then adjust your practice the following day if needed. Perhaps that means less scrolling and more engaging with uplifting people and activities. Nurturing your self-awareness will guide you toward more hope.
To deepen your understanding of how hope functions in your life you can journal on the following questions:
- Where in your life could you use more positive energy and perspective?
- What self-nurturing practice could you start today that would fuel your positivity and hopefulness?
- What difference have you noticed in how you respond to your life when you are feeling positive?
- How is being positive and hopeful an asset in your life?
Reflecting on these questions will reinforce the importance of embracing and cultivating hope in your life. When you recognize that nurturing hope and a positive attitude will improve your ability to gracefully handle life challenges, increase your confidence, and allow you to see more possibilities, you will prioritize these self-nurturing practices in your day. Although you cannot control some things in your life, you can choose how you respond and that can fuel hope.
As Viktor Frankl reminds us, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” And our empowering, hope filled choices will create ripple effects in the world!
May you joyfully embrace hope in your life as you nurture peace, love and compassion in the world from the inside out!
Sending you so much peace, love and gratitude, Kelley
