Where There’s Life, There’s Hope

I have only recently learned the meaning of “Where There’s Life, There’s Hope.” As I get older certain lifelong dreams have appeared more and more likely to remain just that … dreams. This induced hopelessness. And then one day I suddenly realized that I still did retain hope. How could this be?

The first explanation I came up with was that the psyche is constructed in such a way that it simply cannot stop hoping for something it deeply desires, no matter what the unlikelihood of fulfilment. I could imagine how this might have been selected for in evolution. So “Where There’s Life, There’s Hope” simply means that hope is ineradicable.

            But this is only a descriptive assertion about psychology and not an uplifting bit of information about one’s prospects. It does not mean what it might have seemed to mean, which is that, objectively speaking, there really is hope. For even if, in rational, realistic terms, there is no hope, one will continue to experience hope.

            One might oppose the expression to “There’s still hope,” where there is some sense of realistic reassurance being offered, if only on the basis of being aware that there is insufficient information to assess the prospects one way or the other.

            So to breathe is to hope. But one’s rational mind may know better.

            However, soon after this realization I found myself possessed of a more positive way to cognize the situation. I was able to obtain a more rational sustenance from the hope I could not help but feel by ridding myself of any expectation that it would be fulfilled. In this way my hope does not need to oppose my rational assessment of slim to nonexistent prospects but can peacefully co-exist with it. So I could be hopeful and skeptical at the same time without experiencing cognitive dissonance and having to struggle against reason in order to remain hopeful.

            And it just might be the case that harboring hope in this manner could increase the odds of fulfilling it. For the pressure will be off to force circumstances to cooperate, to make reality bend to one’s will. And sometimes that is just what is needed for reality, which is proud, to accede.

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