When Barack Obama was still a senator yet vying for office of the President of the United States he wrote a book "The Audacity of Hope." People must have bought into it because it became a bestseller on the New York Times List and was endorsed by none other than Oprah Winfrey. The title of the book, Obama stated, was from a sermon delivered by his favorite pastor, Jeremiah Wright, and his pastor was inspired to name his sermon "Hope" from a GF Watts painting, the subject of the painting described as "with her clothes in rags, her body scarred and bruised and bleeding, her harp all but destroyed and with only one string left, she had the audacity to make music and praise God...in other words, to take the one string you have left and to have the audacity to hope, which is the real word of God."
I have not read Obama's book, I merely wondered if the title of the book struck a chord amongst millions of people who had..lost hope. All politicians, especially those vying for public office seem to include the word "hope" in their speeches, and for good reason, too. In the face of our economy, mortgages in default, job loss..hope is sometimes all that we have left. I'm not sure that politicians can deliver on the definition of hope and I'm pretty sure many people will say it's government that has influenced hope (or lack thereof) with current economic status. Maybe hope should be a sacred term used only when a politician is intent upon a "positive outcome actually occurring."
A famous Benjamin Franklin quote reads.. "I hope...that mankind will at length, as they call themselves reasonable creatures, have reason and sense enough to settle their differences without cutting throats; for in my opinion there never was a good war, or a bad peace." I'm pretty sure he was referring the state of the union at that time, yet his words are still relevant today even though the same wars are not being fought, they are different ones.
Adversity transcends time and is everywhere; it cannot be escaped. Hope says to adversity, "so why not try to figure out a way to use adversity for your own advantage"?
Emily Dickinson wrote a poem about hope, it goes like this:
Hope
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
Emily Dickinson defines hope by comparing it to a bird - which, if my English Class had any impact at all, means this is a metaphor. Hope is a "thing" because it is a feeling. When she talks about the bird "singing", the tune is "without words"...Is hope a matter of words or is it a feeling about the future, a feeling which consists of both desire and expectation. Psychologically, is it true that hope never fails us, that hope is always possible? I think Emily Dickinson was trying to describe hope using a poem much like songwriters and authors have done throughout time. Sometimes, a reminder of what hope is, even through the a poem or a song is enough to restore it within our souls.
I've yet to find a definition that is compact and completely clear. Most definitions are thought out references of where hope has been written about in a book, sung about in a song, rhymed in a poem or exemplified in life experience. I remember a book I read called "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch. If you have read the book, you know that this was written initially for his children to remember him by. Yet, along the way, he did something really unique. He inspired each of us with his story by sharing everything he was going through and the things life taught him (or didn't teach him) along the way. He was dying from pancreatic cancer, he knew he wouldn't survive, yet I really believe that he held onto hope and faith regardless of the outcome. I wondered to myself, how did he hold onto hope when he knew he would not survive? I mean, he was an engineer and engineers need science and theory to back up every theorum. So, it seems that Hope is a real entity necessary in the lives of each and every one of us, yet I am no better at describing hope to you. I can only point it out and reference it as it permeates everyday life and is present in countless aspects of popular culture phenomenon such as jokes, fairy tales, politics and daily life.
I googled Hope and found it is the Seal of Rhode Island and features an anchor below the word "Hope", the state motto. This is taken from a Biblical passage in Hebrews 6:19(1).
1 Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; The King James Version.
Wiki recommends "See Also" - Chance (disambiguation), Disappointment, Fear, Optimism, Risk, unrequited love, Statue of Hope. I could google away all day on the topic of hope, but it seems to draw me to site after site of references to Hope without an actual, concrete definition. Or maybe, just maybe, I'm looking for an answer that suits me...maybe I aready know the answer and I don't realize it.
I definitely think that hope is some positive outcome (whether we see it that way at the time or not) predicated on uncertainty. It is a word that describes a feeling of being unsure about a current circumstance and then essentially desiring an outcome that is good. Hope is based on faith, hope and faith are almost interchangeable. Faith is more "now" and hope describes "positive outcomes based on our fears". To be left without hope leaves us feeling deflated and without purpose. Faith is the knowing peace that the outcome is for the better, again whether we see the reason at the time we may not know. Hope is an idea that is spread through an understanding that one one is perfectly sure there is a sound outcome to their situations. Hope is a destination, so to speak, rather than an actuality. This is about as close as I can come to describing hope in my own words. Hope and Faith - you cannot see them, they are like the breeze blowing on your face, you feel it...you just cannot tangibly see it.
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