Contemplating hope 3

-

The emails often come in fast and furious to my work in-box. So many words. So little clarity. So much need for this or that. And so many of them signed off with what I am sure is intended as positive but what I take as fantasy. 

“Have a wonderful day.”

“Have a great day.” 


How can an ordinary Wednesday at my work desk in the middle of an ongoing pandemic be either wonderful or great, I wonder? Could we maybe just aim for ‘good’? I can manage good. I can handle the expectation for ‘good’. But expectations for wonderful or great? Move along to the next sucker, please. Count me out of that optimistic fantasy. 


This connects into my ongoing contemplations about hope. I have already written that I believe action is an essential factor in making hope meaningful. And, it turns out, I am in good company for thinking this. In fact, it turns out, that the field of positive psychology focuses on “the scientific study of positive human functioning and flourishing on multiple levels that include the biological, personal, relational, institutional, cultural, and global dimensions of life.”


Positive functioning. Human flourishing. These are two things I aim for in my daily life, and their roots are in hope. Which is not to be confused with optimism. Optimism is more about expecting good things, while hope presumes that planning and acting may get us what we are needing and wanting. 

Rutgers University research scientist Jacqueline S. Mattis focuses on positive psychology among people who are facing challenges. She has five strategies to cultivate hope: Remember, it doesn’t just exist. We have to actively nurture it for it to be present in our lives.


Mattis says -- 


Do something: “Hopeful people do not wish; they imagine and they act.” 
Harness the power of uncertainty: “Perceive the possibility of success.”
Manage your attention: Don’t let the negative overwhelm you. 
Seek community: “Hope is hard to sustain in isolation.” 

Look at the evidence: “Hopeful people stake their trust in data.” 


In data, you say? Yes. There is (are) data. More on that another time. 


To be continued… 


Thank you to my friend Ann Mason who introduced me to the work of Dr. Mattis via a podcast recommendation. 


-----

A Post a Day in May No. 16 For the past two years, I have posted something to this blog every single day in May. This year, I hope to do it again. 

Comments

  1. AnnMay 16, 2021 at 5:50 AM

    Even though I know that writing a daily entry is a lot of work, I HOPE each year than you will continue beyond the month of May. Since, as I recall, retirement is on the horizon, I HOPE you will consider this!

    How hard it is to attend. This has been a hard year and a half, almost anyway. The news is good regarding the efficacy of vaccination, and here, in NYS, we are 50% fully vaccinated. What a difference a year makes. Yet I have no urge to mingle yet. The recluse in me has taken over.

    Yet I have hope. And thank you for "are data"! I bet you know when to use agenda and agendum, too. xo

    ReplyDelete
  2. ValMay 16, 2021 at 8:45 AM

    Because of your post, I can reclaim the word "hope". For a long time, I have thought of "hope" as a word that is "impoverished" in meaning because it has become a kind of cliche ("I hope you have a wonderful day!".) Maybe because of overuse? Because often one has "hope" but carries out no action?

    But you have brought substance to the word and concept through the specific acts recommended by Mattis. I will write these down and reclaim the word for myself.

    Thank you!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Comments are moderated. Please be respectful.

Popular posts from this blog

Listening for the piano / Thinking about grief

-
Image
Grief is not a land in which I have travelled much, though I routinely explore it via others’ experience. I am drawn to do this as a student is drawn to the masters: To observe, to sit with, to wonder if those others’ experiences might help prepare me for my own when I find myself in that place. Will it? Sara Paretsky, author of the V.I. Warshawski mystery series, says that the grief over her long-time husband’s death hit her like a grand piano falling out of the sky onto her head. There is no pre-mourning, she says. Nonetheless, I persist in my studies: Memoirs of loss. Stories of grief. Tales of survival. I sit with those experiences. The words, the feelings, the anguish wash over me. And I ask myself: Will the sun rise tomorrow? Will I see it when it does?  Should I worry about this? Should I just expect, presume that what has always been will always be? Absurd. It will not always be. The loves of my life are all older, are all old. 95, my mother. Almost 80, my p...
Read more

Anniversary post: This year marks 31 together

-
Image
Amanda and Val: many years ago and today.  Man, look how young we were. Sheesh. Thirty-one years and counting certainly shows. But who in their right mind would care about wrinkles or grey hair when it is a good and generous love that has propelled us through the years together.  Every good story is told through both summary and scenes. Val & Amanda’s story: The summary A generous love that has withstood the challenges of two bouts of cancer and multiple joint replacements, of job changes and career disappointments, of cats found and cats lost, of parents living and parents dying. Two women, together, building a good life. Amanda: Three scenes April 1997: Val and I are driving from Winnipeg  down through the Dakotas and Wyoming and Utah to Arizona, camping in a tent along the way and marvelling at what we can do together, still, after Val’s cancer diagnosis earlier that year. At a roadside cafe somewhere in Utah, a woman asks me if we are sisters. Without skipping a b...
Read more

If pride comes before a fall, what comes after disappointment?

-
Image
Disappointment is not something any of us aim for, I’m sure. The very last thing I ever want to be told by someone is that they are disappointed in me. But this week, I have been very disappointed in others. Life goes on, but that niggling thread of “if only” and “why could it not have been different” lingers in the corners of my mind. Last week’s lightening-quick sale of our cottage ended in disappointment all round when the deal fell through at the final hurdle. The details are not what matter here; what matters is that age-old life lesson about counting your chickens before they’re hatched and sharing good news before it is fully rooted and secured. But who among us has not jumped the gun? Presumed that all would go as promised, as planned? Believed in the goodness of people and trusted that the story would unfold as it had begun — smoothly, seamlessly, successfully? Ah, well. Sometimes it just doesn’t. So we find ourselves at a new beginning, with a different round of showings and...
Read more