At the end of a long day
when my life feels murky,
and I can't really see what's ahead
I sometimes slip, and embrace despair.
When I feel hopeless and helpless
and sometimes unloved or unwanted,
well there's a word that I try to imagine in my mind.
It's a tiny word, with so much meaning.
HOPE.
The wise Neal A Maxwell wrote,
"Significantly, those who look forward
to a next and better world
are usually “anxiously engaged”
in improving this one,
for they “always abound in good works".
Thus, real hope is much more than wishful musing.
It stiffens, not slackens, the spiritual spine.
It is composed,
not giddy,
eager without being naive,
and pleasantly steady without being smug.
Hope is realistic anticipation taking the form of determination—a determination not merely to survive but to “endure … well” to the end." -Neil A Maxwell "Brightness of Hope"
There's a man
that I know who is the epitome
of Hope.
In fact, he wrote the following words and sent them to me.
They're filled with the "steady", "composed" hope
that Neil A. Maxwell described,
"In this the darkest hour of her life,
when her hopes and dreams had burnt to the ground,
a fiery Phoenix rose from the ashes.
The phoenix was not hope
but that is what others saw,
it was not charity,
but that is what other people saw,
it was not joy but that's what others saw,
she was not our savior
but that is what other people saw."
I wept when I read this
because in our darkest hours,
we can still be hope to someone,
we can still be charity, we can still save
and we can still have Joy.
The thing that we have to remember
is that we get to decide on these feelings.
So.
When I awake in the morning,
wishing I could skip ahead
to calmer water,
I say to myself,
I will.
"Embrace this day with an enthusiastic
welcome...no matter how it looks."
Because that. Is Hope.
