Action can be so dull compared to hope. Don’t you agree?
When we choose to live with a positive frame of mind, we can slide into avoidance. We prefer to hope it will all work out – stay positive – rather than work, struggle, fail perhaps, and finally create something. It can get to where you fear risking your hope.
We prefer Hopium. We are addicted to it.
As a coach who peddles in positivity, I think it is important to see hope for what it is, and what it can be.
What is HOPE?
- (Noun) Hope – a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen.
- (Verb) Hoping, to hope – a active wish for something to be different or to turn out differently
- (Adverb) Hopefully – a wistful, desirous way of saying or thinking about something
As a feeling of expectation – hope can be a powerful motivator. Most of us would not enter into a new endeavor without some awakening of hope. When hope returns, it is moving. To instill…to feel…to watch in a character arc.
As an example, a diet leads us to believe it’s possible to lose 61 pounds in 4 weeks. (Who else has seen endless internet ads for diet gummies that both Oprah and the Shark Tank endorse… unofficially?) Do you feel hope? Not usually. the promise is too outrageous. But once in a while, I click on that stupid ad, and think what if? A small dawning of “hope” that is actually Hopium.
As a verb, hoping can literally bog us down, however.
Hope can be a passive rationalization for not starting, not doing, but believing that it will all come together, someday.
Hope can be that glittery feeling you hold onto, and that you protect from being tarnished by sunlight, transparency, reality.
I love hope. I love to see things as they might be, even, sometimes at the expense of what they are, what’s achievable, what’s real.
So is there harm in that? It feels good… and if it feels good…
When is it Hope and when is it Hopium?
Hope drains out of you when you realize you’ve been propping it up, it’s an illusion. You feel betrayed. You feel hurt. Our dear egos will do almost anything to protect us from hurt, so we enter into Denial. When you’re in denial, hope becomes more than a desire, it becomes a promise, something you’re counting on. Something that you can’t live without.
Once you’re in denial, you’re full-on smoking Hopium. You want the desired outcome. You want it so badly that you don’t dare try, work at it, HOPE, bec deep down you mi
- impossible
- harder than you think
- not worth it
By now, we’ve invested time and energy and ego into that Hopium… Rather than see it as bullshit, we would rather just smoke another don’t. (As the brilliant Lynda Barry calls it, in Picture This, (c) 2010.) You don’t instead of do. It’s too scary to do. It’s too real to try.
Hopium is when you allow hope to become so desirous that you fear to try, work, effect or materialize the the thing you’re hoping for. You drown out fears, negative thoughts and sometimes indulge in over-behaviors like overthinking, overdrinking, overeating or overshopping to keep yourself from losing the thin veil of hope you’ve created. You smoke a Don’t.
I hope to bring you real hope and expectation, by giving real information about how you think and practical writing solutions to overcome the resistance you might feel. (It might be all that Hopium in your system.)
